I think Grandia 3 would also fit this list. This was the first game to have the protagonist's mom be a playable character and it baffles me that they axed her and another character on the 10 hour gameplay mark. The decision was so bad because those 2 had way more personalities and acted as both a parent and mentor figure to our main leads to only be replaced with even more bland and uninteresting party members. You could also feel the tonal shift once you reach that point and the plot just takes a nose dive to being awful. It was obvious that the game was rushed as they were remnants of areas that were meant to be explored and more mini games you could participate in to get valuable goodies. If there were an alternate universe I wish the devs were able to remake this game and fix some of the low points I mentioned above. It's such a shame because we got a really good entry for Grandia 2 only to be followed up with this shallow game.
Totally agree about the story in Final Fantasy XV. I didn’t really care about Noctis’s dad or Lunafreya dying because he only has like one scene with both of them! The vibe of being on a road trip with the bros really carried the game for me though.
@@GamingBroductionsdepending on the player, even deaths of characters you have a reason to care about may mean nothing. I fully agree with the point that you made, to be clear, but I always think of the death of Aerith in FF7. I was 18 or so the first time I played that game, 25 years ago or so, and I am the only person I know who did NOT find that death meaningful on any sort of personal level whatsoever. Obviously it has story significance and is relevant to the other characters, but when I first experienced that moment I actually thanked Sephiroth for removing dead weight from my party. Not trying to be cruel or cool or edgy, just relating based on my own experiences that for some players, even meaningful deaths will carry no emotional weight. But to your point, it's difficult to care about the deaths of characters that you've spent no time with over the course of a game.
I still haven't forgiven Konami for putting Suikoden I-IV on PSN and giving up at the last second. You could argue that Suikoden IV being digitally relased on the PS3 in 2016 There was little financial incentive to put the remaining two games on there. Konami had no issue of putting completely untranslated Turbo Grafx 16 JRPGs on the Wii U Virtual Console in 2017. That is one aspect of crackhead business choices by Konami that never gets brought up.
The Last Remnant is honestly one of my most fav games of all time. The unique battle and party member systems were so addictive for me once I got the hang of it and knew how to strategize team formations and positions and trigger specific options of command, there are many optional unique playable characters that have their own special abilities and synergies too. But I could see why it's complex and niche and feels kinda random as there're not a lot of in-game manuals and clues for players to maximize/optimize what you can do, optional monsters and weapon upgrades are a challenge too, it's definitely complex and a learning curve that requires some time and patience unless one decides to just use a guide, so casual players who don't really care about optional stuff wouldn't really resonate well with this game I suppose. I'd like to play a game with such battle and party systems more, where it's a mini-war moving as units that take positioning and quick-time-actions into considerations instead of 3-6 individual party members making moves individually in turns, SaGa series is similar in some aspects but overall it's not really that similar too, I can't think of any game with this style of gameplay systems... Really wish there'll be prequel sequel or successor to this game, or original games that take inspirations from this concept.
Always love seeing last Remnant get more love. Once you grasp the mechanics it is addicting as hell. Did not know about the Saga connection tho. I always felt a FF12 ivalice vibe from it.
@@Mr69hammertime Yeah, it's such a shame because clearly it's quite a polarizing game. I recognized its imperfection and overall flaws, but its gameplay concept was one of the most memorable and interesting aspects that has stayed with me. The mechanics were fun and engaging with some level of necessary strategizing and attention for quick time event. It really feels like it's not meant for casual players, traditional jrpg players or non-jrpg enthusiasts the more I think about it, no wonder it's so niche and polarizing lol. I'm not sure what's the SaGa connection too but I did see it mentioned online, probably mainly because of some devs and a few similar concepts and references. I agree it has a FF12 Ivalice vibe too, due to the warring tension, the non-human races living together like it's a normalized diversity, the ecosystems, the architectures, and the general aesthetics. It feels like there are rich cultures and histories in the world, making it "alive" (even though the story didn't fully explore the depth and push the boundaries in terms of making those cultures and histories even more relevant, but it's adequately satisfactory for me personally anyway lol).
@@RaymondTywaif TLR was in development initially as SaGa Frontier 3 and was produced by Akitoshi Kawazu leading a team of SaGa and FF devs. For those who haven't played it, if you're a SaGa fan having a gorillion unexplained mechanics will be nothing new to you, and at least for me is part of the draw. I love poking and prodding to figure out what's going on under the hood. And not for nothing, Kawazu also co-produced FF12 after Yasumi Matsuno (Ogre Battle, Tactics Ogre, FFT) bounced out due to health issues. Kawazu is just one of those dudes who's been around Square forever and has his hand in a surprising number of projects. But you can always kinda tell when it's him running the show on one of them. I mean, you probably wouldn't think he'd have had much of a hand in the Mana series but he was there too and when you think about the convoluted and unexplained systems of Legend of Mana suddenly it all makes sense... at least in terms of where that all came from. From the Land Make system, through pounding a nonsensical amount of fruits and garbage into a weapon to make it break the game, and all the other weird and completely optional crafting and monster ranching stuff. Needless to say I'm a huge fan of his.
@@gaspump Thanks for the info! I don't really research into devs or company histories too much so I didn't know about this. I guess maybe I'm also one of those who enjoy Kawazu's style of games, since Legend of Mana was one of my all time favs too lol FF12 also one of my top 5 FF. Haven't tried SaGa series but I suppose it'll likely speak to me too :D
Dude I think your channel is going to explode in the next 12 months. Your content is so on point, and your intro is absolutely fantastic. Reminds me of that Toonami commercial that combined various scenes from anime shows like Gundam Wing and Rurouni Kenshin
Appreciate that dude, we can only hope! And yeah that was definitely the vibe we were going for, absolutely loved the whole vibe and aesthetic of Toonami back in the day
I actually played Wild Arms 4 a month ago during my marathon of the seires, and in all honestly I actually really enjoy it. I personally wasn't really bothered by the visual novel cutscenes, and I actually think both the localization and presentation are way better than in Wild Arm 3 IMO. I also really enjoyed the cast as well as the HEX System being introduced and even including platforming. But for me what made me really love this title was it's themes centered around a post-World War and the struggles of living in it. such as how many of the adults believe that humankind is doomed and is predisposed to war and should embrace it as a fact of life. While the younger people such as our main characters don’t want to believe that humans crave for war or destruction and that they can strive towards peace and it’s their child-like innocence that prevents them from lying like most adults due and they see the beauty of the world for what it is and they hope to create a better future where they could all live in. And I love this because almost all of these themes are within my book that I'm trying to write, so it was neat seeing a game that was trying to deliver the exact same message like in my story. Sure I wouldn't say the game is completely perfect. I feel some of the villain characters could have been fleshed out, the game runs a little short, and there is no real overworld map, but overall I found AW4 to be a really underrated title and one I'm glad to have played.
@@DSan-kl2yc Not true. for me I enjoy stories such as Avatar the Last Airbender, Naruto, and Kingdom where the characters find themselves either in a world that is on the brink of war or in a world that is already in the middle of war. And the characters want either the war to end or not to have another war that would bring more ruin. And so they bring upon themselves to do everything they can to end the war and to unify people. As someone who was born shortly before the 9/11 event and the war that's happening in Ukraine and seeing major conflict happening around me, I longed for these kinds of stories that show the character's desire to do what is right and try to bring balance and hope to the world and that has always stuck with me. and that's why I enjoyed WA 4's story as much as it did for me.
Oh yeah also the shinining series one of the games, maybe shining the holy ark 2 and 3 or was it shining wisdom? Which never came out in USA, the one with Galm as a side dark bad/good guy, and it was a strategy turn based overhead view.
The thing about the Last Remnant that always stuck with me is The Conqueror, the final boss. In a game of large-party battles, this guy can and will fight you on his own in a fight where you're likely often on the backfoot, and if you failed to capture the two strongest summons in the game, he will have them on his side. The entire game has played him up to be a nigh-unstoppable threat, and when you face him in the final battle, he fully delivers on that.
Another absolute banger. I always get very strong Toonami vibes from your videos. The music, the intro/intermission/outro is such a nice touch and provides a chill vibe you don't really see on youtube. Great work!
My first PS game was Granstream Saga, and I found it quite enjoyable. The gameplay offers a moderate level of difficulty, the story isn't too lengthy, and it's easy to understand without being overly complex. Additionally, the cutscenes were surprisingly well done.
Hoshigami is the dark souls of tactical RPG. If you just push and accept the grind it's actually pretty good. There are branching story line, and depending the choices you make, certain party members can be recruited and I think the story also change.
I loved The Last Remnant. Hearing it brought up always makes me pretty excited. The game had some issues, especially with scaling. But the world was incredibly cool, and the battle system was incredibly epic and fun once you learn it. To enjoy it, you really have to embrace that you're a commander and not a micromanager. You can strategically pair and level up your units, but you have to have to trust them once you're actually on the battlefield. Each character makes their own decisions, so you end up reacting to your own units as much as you react to your enemies. That said, they'll usually be pretty smart about things too, like trying to heal at low health or buff themselves while out of danger. By the end of the game, I could pretty much predict what would happen for each team's turn. At the same time, you can definitely remove a lot of that randomness by theming each team to focus on attack, magic, defense, healing, etc. I specifically had a dedicated speed team and a healing team, which allowed me to almost always intercept dangerous enemies or land huge heals reliably. Meanwhile, my attack and magic teams would do most of the fighting. So there's a lot of depth and once you start to think about teambuilding and combat from a macro perspective. Unfortunately, the tutorials don't convey that very well. Naturally, it's not for everyone. If you feel the need to micromanage every attack in a game, The Last Remnant might not be enjoyable. There's also a lot of murkiness when it comes to turn order, since you'll have to estimate how teams will move and clash. But for a squad-based RPG war game, there's really nothing else like it that I'm aware of. It really made me feel like a commander, forcing me to balance variables and take calculated risks with each turn. It's one of the most memorable games I've played, and I only tried it a decade after its original release.
Great video. One recommended topic for you to cover might include spiritual successors to JRPGs made by the original game creators. So, for example, you might compare Suikoden and Eiyuden Chronicles when it comes out to see if there were any improvements or if it missed the mark. You could do something similar comparing Final Fantasy to The Last Story.
Definitely would love to see a part 2, my pick would be 7th Saga, had some good ideas and an interesting story but the difficulty ruined it. Heard it was better in Japanese.
Unbelievably, I beat 7th Saga with both Alien and Elf. I had to employ extreme save scum tactics in order to get near perfect stat rolls on almost every level up just to get through it.
Oh good, I was needing a Gaming Broductions fix! The only game in this list I've played was Final Fantasy XV and you're pretty on point with it. I'm pretty stoked for Eiyuden Chronicle though! I'm glad I pledged to it on Kickstarter. What are some other upcoming jrpgs are you looking forward to? Did you play Sea of Stars? I'm also looking forward to a game called Full Circle that's in the works.
Eiyuden Chronicle looks to be awesome! I haven’t played Sea of Stars yet but will get around to it later this year. Focusing on finishing up some Star Ocean 2/Super Mario RPG content before I dive into anything new
Spectral Force 3 was graphically a generation behind and had several game-breaking bugs that were never patched. However, it was one of my favorite TRPGs outside of those facets and the general concepts and battle system had massive potential. I mean, you can conquer a cat kingdom and recruit their officers |-)
And I say this as someone who considers Star Ocean one of the best JRPGs on the SNES, and who has a deep love for the (yes, very flawed) Last Remnant... a game that literally had me consider reviving my UA-cam channel and dedicate a 1.5h video essay to this random obscure PS3/360 era game, haha. Subjective opinions and all that, I can very much see where you're coming from with those games.
Thanks dude, really appreciate that take. A lot of people can get easily offended when you don’t share the same opinion as them so it’s nice hearing from someone who can still appreciate the content even if they don’t always agree with all of the takes. And hell yeah, if you wanna make that Last Remnant retrospective go for it! It has very little coverage on UA-cam for a game that resonated pretty deeply with some people
I quite liked The Granstream Saga. The faceless characters have always been off-putting but I really loved the animated scenes. I remember it being quite fun to play but as you said, the lack of a traditional level-up system imo doesnt do it any favors but not a deal breaker. I should play it again before the SO2 remake drops.
Tbh for Star Ocean 1 I think you aren't right. the second title isn't such a big improvement to the first one AND that is because the first one already is GREAT I don't think it's overrated, but underrated.
I agree with you, I played Star Ocean games in the order they were released and after the first game, the second one did not impress me, and in a number of aspects it looked like a step backward.
Suikoden V came out pretty late in the PS2 lifecycle I believe so many might have skipped over it. As for Suikoden IV the biggest issue with that game was the high combat encounter rate by far (also the 4 character party limit). Glad you mentioned Granstream Saga, I actually really liked that game.
Couldn't agree more about FFXV. Of course part of the reason why the story feels incomplete is because it literally was incomplete. It got pushed out the door before it could be finished. I remember characters and story arcs in the Appendix (or whatever it was called in the game, it's been a while) being mentioned that didn't appear in the game at all :O
Awesome video! Definitely gonna sit here and watch the whole thing through while sipping on some cold Sprite. 😮💨 Nothing beats that feeling. Also, totally unrelated but are you ever gonna make Atlus in the 2000s? 😅😅 I was a huge fan of the previous one in the 90s, but I understand the 2000s one is probably going to be a huge project. 🤣😂😅💀 No worries if it takes a while. It’s worth the wait. ☺️😊😁
Great vid dude! Man I never knew they strayed from the wild west setting with Wild Arms 4. That's the kind of random, out of pocket stuff that (temporarily) kills a series. Kind of like what happened with Breath of Fire as well. Damn, now I'm sad lol.
Thank you so much for jogging my memory with Granstream Saga - I rented it back in the day and thought it was okay but then never could remember it’s name
Your FF15 is so in line with mine - it was SO CLOSE to true greatness. It's worth playing if only to imagine what it could have been, and even still it makes me cry everytime.
Wild Arms 4 really suffered a severe case of the generic 00s anime as much as I love the battle system with all my heart. Seriously all I remember about the game is Raquel being the best character in writing and gameplay, a former bad guy punching a missile, and the main villain's sexy secretary being a Whitney's Miltank/Ultra Necrozma level roadblock due to guide dang it shenanigans in a mostly simple game.
Great video! As a huge fan of JRPG's in general, it does help to be able to reference these kinds of lists before starting to invest 40+ hours into my next gaming adventure :)
Another banger of a video, fellas! Most of these were games I remember thinking LOOKED dope, but I never picked up. Hoshigami's reviews really bummed me out back in the day.
Thanks man! Yeah Hoshigami disappointed me deeply back in the day lol. That was when I was first really getting into JRPGs so any new release coming out I always got overly hyped for
Even though I absolutely love games like FFT or Tactics Ogre, I could not get into Hoshigami. I only tried it a bit, but my mom (RIP 2016) liked it and has to be the only one I knew that played that game to the end. We usually did not put a game up for trade until both of us either passed or completed a game individually and that was one of the few where I passed. For example, we both ended up completing FFT and Suikoden 1/2. Our games got so much mileage because she played the game while I was at school, out elsewhere or not currently playing games.
Rogue Galaxy. It was a game with alot of potential - great characters, unique setting - but just didn't seem to get much attention. Another "JRPG" I thought was very good but was largely ignored was Earthlock. I suspect it's because it wasn't made in Japan even though it was made in a JRPG style. It absolutely exceeded my expectations, but few JRPG fans seem to know about it.
I don't know if you're gonna notice this comment, but the Hoshigami section got me stuck in the Hoshigami pits again. I don't like the game at all beyond the character and generic unit designs, but after seeing you (or whomever recorded the footage) use magic in the game, I gave reading the Coin and Seal guide on GFAQs another go. I finally sort of understand the Coinfeigm system after trying to read the GameFAQs guide on it again, because as a SaGa and Star Ocean fan I am cursed to forever be addicted to stupid systems in RPGs. Again, I don't like this game, it's just kinda fascinating. Don't worry I'm currently playing like way too many JRPGs + 3(?) WRPGs so. It's fine. +1 for the Star Ocean segment, your videos that touched on SO1 were very on point, despite me loving that game. I do wanna play Wild Arms 4, but it does seem to be The Weird One.
I would add Dragon Quest 6 to this list. A lot of people don't realize this game was cannibalized by Chrono Trigger, compare the MC and Ashlynn/Barbara to Crono and Marle and you'll find they're very similar with some changes in hair color (even by Toriyama's standards of character reuse). The dream/real world system was also meant to be a time travelling feature (remnants of this are still apparent in the Amor vignette) where doing things in the past affects the present but that was given to Chrono Trigger instead and fully expanded there. There's also some hints, like Ashlynn's fire resistance and datamined references about the Gold Dragon that shows unused storylines. Its why 6 (my personal favorite) is often kind of an underdog among Dragon Quest fans from its apparent lack of polish, but you appreciate it a bit more when you realize why it feels unfinished.
Some time ago you made an interesting video about dialogue boxes. On that same line of topics of "technical details rarely analyzed on the rpg scene" have you thought of exploring the evolution of user interfaces in rpgs? Battle mode interfaces and maybe others too. From the clunkiness of Nes and Snes games to the optimized later designs.
I totally agree with last remnant. I think I understand the gameplay a little more than you explained here, you are the battles general, eg the top guy of the entire army, so your commands "attack" "attack with mystic arts!" "attact with combat arts!" "play it by ear" is what you are telling one union to do, not the individual characters, so with that idea, it works alot better. Later you say grinding early hinders you later on, is kinda true but not quite true. you level up in 2 different ways and this is the main probalem in my opinion, you have Battle Rank and you have stats and they level independantly. I suffered with this myself, and at end game, in the Ancient ruins, I could not up my stats anymore as my BR was too high, and I could not get past the Ancient dragon, but I stuck it out and had probably my personal best gaming moment ever where I went over 50 rounds against the dragon to finally beat it, I only managed this because the ancient dragons AoE attack killed some of my characters in each union. this is good as Union HP is collective, which inturn means that AoE hits less but still the same HP, then when instructing a union to heal, I prevent reviving characters! it was indeed an epic fight. In addition the final battle gets increasingly difficult depending on what additional content you did, meaning the final boss battle is the hardest battle in the game --> I love this idea a lot, I highly recommend this game, as long as you understand what it is and not what you want it to be.
I honestly don't remember anything about FF XV story. Never played the DLCs and it was confusing. Instakilling the world boss with 1 move was bad ass though!
I played most of these games back in my day but never got to finish them because I lost interest. Thank you for making this video, it feels kind of nostalgic that someone actually also played all of them and also reviewed them.
I remember getting Hoshigami back when it came out and barely playing it. Seemed so up my alley. I actually really enjoyed Granstream. I too had a save file right before the first scene that I kept for longer than I'm comfortable admitting. But I was like 13 when it came out. But the same itself I enjoyed quite a bit. Loved the way you got new equipment.
I really emjoyed The Last Remnant. It haunts me though becuase I soft locked myself with an insanely hard boss. now i cant finish it and im roughly 30/40 hours in too. lol
I don't mind the lax leveling/combat system in Granstream Saga. Fun for the kids, but the grownups with a tight schedule can skip as much combat to push the story! Kind of nice for the busy gamer who wants an RPG honestly.
I never heard of a few of these. I am also surprised that Robotrek is not mentioned, as that is the QUINTETsential game with untapped potential. It is loved by many even with its flaws, myself included. If I could, I would gladly try to get rights to develop another game.
Suikoden 4 and Last Remnant are great picks for this topic. Enjoyed both quite a bit but they could have been so much better. I think Black Sigil and Suikoden Tierkreis would also have been good picks. (as it is I actually think Tierkreis is slightly above Suikoden 4 over all)
Especially because Shining Force 3 Scenario 3 was such a masterpiece. Still upset that they never finished the original trilogy, just left you on a cliffhanger in The Lost Age and you assume it turns out alright.
This was a great list. The worst thing about FF 15 was the potential for greatness you could feel while playing through it. Almost every aspect was lazy, half baked, or mid but you knew if they did it right it could have been one legendary 10/10 jrpg
Granstream Saga had this side quest where you had to collect a bunch of random cards and give them to an old man. During the course of the game, i never found a single card, and I'm very thorough. I have no idea where these cards are hidden.
FFVIII might belong on that list. I heard it was supposed to be a massive 8-disc game, and they cut out half the content. For example, the locked locations in the time compression were supposed to be visitable, and a lot of the story got shortened or removed. On the other hand, it was still a pretty damn good game and one of my favorites, so maybe it doesn't?
Hoshigami is difficulty will be based on how knowledgable the player with coinfeigm, it is grindy but can be easy or hard depending on your understanding with the game.
Suikoden 4 is great. Hell, 1-5 are pretty good too. Also, one id add here is Summon Night. I've played twin age and though it was pretty good, and considering it was one of the games that got released overseas, im surprised its not that well known.
Great video. I would like to add different way of looking at this. Jrpgs are often part of a series. Despite that it is rare for developers to focus on fixing badly implemented ideas or even reuse great ideas in another games. why do you thunk that is?
I don't think any game has disappointed me as much as Golden Sun 3. Something about the combat was unbalanced, so even without grinding, I never felt like I needed to be strategic with my resources like in the first two games. But the thing that really ruined it for me was how they tell the story. The first two games are pretty talky, but they repeat the same things over and over in the third game. Everyone talks twice as long as they need to. I hope someone takes another shot at the franchise someday.
Nice video. But honestly a part of me wished to rather see a breakdown of the subject of "games that didnt reach their full potential because of certain old game design ideas or hardware limitations". It's a difference of nuance from your idea, but it's a nuance that matters. Because that's a subject i really like, and somehow i find myself thinking of it a little more often lately. That seems like a kind of common phenomenon with games that come out late in a console's life cycle. Looks like they push the "last gen" console too hard and would look better in the new gen console instead.
I really like Granstream Saga, but I get that it's not up to the quality of Quintet's 16-bit stuff. I mean, that's _peak_ 16-bit art versus _early_ 3D stuff, so right off the bat, it's got a completely different appeal... like, none, if you don't appreciate the colorful, blocky, charm of that stuff. I wish it was made for N64 instead; it EASILY would've picked up a bigger audience if it wasn't on the JRPG Behemoth that was the OG Playstation. I wish a couple of these went to alternate platforms; that's why Bloody Roar has a cult following today, or why the Tales series gained a foothold in the West - because they (Extreme/Primal Fury and Symphonia) went to the _Gamecube_ and avoided ALL competition on the Playstation 2. If only that kind of chance was taken with some of these a console generation earlier. Btw, _love_ the new intros for channel videos! It's got such heavy old-school Toonami "video package we used to replace the actual opening" vibes. So genuinely cool to see something effectively evoke that sort of video bumper again! Cozy and cool at the same time. Awesome job! I love this topic. I think you did a good job of tiptoeing around the whole, "WAIT WAIT WAIT - DON'T GET MAD! I'm NOT SAYING THESE ARE BAD GAMES!" aspect here, lol, and it's always commendable that you just want a good excuse to talk about some underloved JRPGs. Some B+ efforts instead of the A++ guys everyone already knows about. I can respect that. I say that Infinite Undiscovery, Blue Dragon, Arabian Nights (SNES), Avalon Code (DS) and Alundra 2 fill that space nicely, if you want to look into them for a sequel to this vid or another one that's of a similar theme.
I feel the SNES Tales of Phantasia also fits in here. The PS1 version highly improves on the battle system but the random battle dungeons are still an issue.
Back as a child I really liked Granstream Saga. If I remember correctly, then the story got quite a bit of drama towards the end, having an Ending close top Terranigma. Maybe its time for a replay .
Upfront, I'll say that I greatly preferred what we were set to get with Nomura at the helm of XV as presented in 2011 and 2013 and that Square's mismanagement and blame games for this title are insane. Both Nomura and Tabata get blamed too much for how it turned out and there's a lot of misinformation going around about the development, so a lot of people really hate this kind of opinion. But wanted to get it out of the way first before I gave an opinion on the game we got. And that is that it is absolutely... fine. It's not great, it can be fun and going through the areas can be relaxing if you are just looking for a bro trip. But for a lot of us who had been there since it's announcement in 2006 and seeing what it originally was intended to be, we didn't come in for a bro trip, we came into it for an epic fantasy that took place in a modern setting and seeing how the tropes of the franchise translate to such a setting so close to our own. And that's my biggest issue. I can accept the change in heroine even if the new heroine has no real personality in the scenes we see nor any reason to care for her on a deeper level. I can accept not being part of the invasion even though that was a setpiece that was rife for fun gameplay and memorable moments. I can even accept the game not even having as many towns or locals as older games to instead just have three big cities and a bunch disparate tiny settlements with nothing but wilderness for the most part. But what I can't fathom is why, with still so much good material to work with thanks to what did survive the transition, such as antagonists and such, that we ultimately don't get anything of great substance out of them and all of it is just focused on one villain. A villain who is good, but it feels like he's literally stealing screentime from other equally interesting antagonists. And then the game completely wastes it's conceit of having the fantasy in a realistic setting by not exploring the deeper implications of character actions. Lunafreya's actions in releasing Leviathan should literally have some extremely intense pushback considering she's about to cause untold devastation to the city and she doesn't even give real reasons for why this has to be done other than vague speechifying about darkness and light. Yet the game doesn't give this more than lipservice and her speech ends with her getting a standing ovation when if this were following it's own premise more closely, would have received a much harsher reaction. But because Luna is such a controversial character because of her origins, all interesting scenes with her that could cast even more controversy seem to have been cut out and replaced with scenes where she doesn't have to be seen in a negative light. But it takes me out of the moment because for all her talk of helping Noctis save the world, she's ultimately responsible for a lot of untold devastation (even despite the evacuation, there were no doubt a lot of lives lost and even then, Altissia was destroyed and thus people lost their homes) and she doesn't have to answer for it. All this can be summed up by one phrase. Wasted potential. The only things that seem to have had any real effort put into it by the director was the road trip, but everything else just doesn't get that. So even if I hadn't gone into the game already pissed it wasn't Versus XIII, I still wouldn't have been happy because there was too much great material and ideas simply wasted.
am a long time Wild Arms fan. i loved the original(played once a year since release), loved WA 3, WA2 missed the mark pretty hard but HOLY HELL Wild Arms 4 was something else. the dialogue made me quit in less than 3 hours. that game didn't deserve to be on this list; it didn't deserve to be released. we, the players, deserved better. our wallets deserved better
FF15 Kingsglaive was pretty decent. Would have been interesting if that was the actual opening for the game, having to watch a full movie before getting to drop into the world.
still rember the comments under youtube videos and on reddit of fans claiming that this movie is "optional" to watch if you want to be more "involved" in the story :-D
Glad to hear I'm not the only person who was disappointed with Final Fantasy XV, although I could honestly make a lot of the same complaints about XII. But that's neither here nor there. I'd love to see a part 2 for this video, and I would recommend Rogue Galaxy for it. It wasn't bad by any means, but I always felt like Level 5 took the Dark Cloud series (which I loved), took out the systems that made it interesting, and ran it through a "Star Wars knockoff" filter. At the end of the day, it had no real personality of its own, in my opinion. And don't get me started on White Knight Chronicles, but that's a story for another time.
Hahah you touched up on so many of my favorites. To this day im a defender of suikoden 4 for reasons and while wild arms 4 was a downgrade from its previous titles, it was a nice little game with an emotional ending. Havent finished golden sun series but now u got me about to buy grandstream saga lol. Nothing beats those old crisp anime cutscenesm thank you and yes please do a part 2 that outro was amazing haha
Add Final Fantasy 16 to the list. I bought a PS5 just to play it, and was extremely disappointed. The combat was garbage. The story was mid. It didnt feel like an RPG. I am looking forward to Rebirth though Also are you going to play the upcoming remaster/remakes of Suikoden 1 and 2, Super Mario RPG, and Star Ocean The Second Story?
I’ve enjoyed FF16 on some level, but yeah it’s definitely not really the Final Fantasy experience I was wanting. Looking forward to Rebirth as well though, I would say I did enjoy FF7R over FF16 Definitely plan on getting around to the Super Mario RPG and Star Ocean 2 remakes when they come out and we have retrospectives planned for the original versions. Same with Suikoden 2 for whenever those remasters end up dropping
For me it was Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter. I though I'd finally get to the surface and there'd be at least another half of the game in story and finally some exploration up there, but alas... game finishes before you get to experience it :( I remember I was so mad I wanted to break my PS2 afterwards lol
I think if I were to make my own list of these it'd be: Megaman Battle Network 6 Star Ocean 6 Tales of Arise Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded (and I guess 358/2 Days by extension)
Wild Arms 4 was my first encounter with Xseed and since then a lot their games have always rubbed me wrong way. Most could have been good but there was always something holding them back. WA 4 was definitely the low point, the only reason I finished it was to see how things ended with Racquel since she was the only thing worth a damn in the game. Later Wild Arms games did get a littel better but thing that keep it from reaching top form , for me at least, was that Hexgrid battle system and Xseed's hard-on to keeping it around.
Xseed doesn't develop games. They are a western distributor. Sony actually owns the rights to Wild Arms. Media Vision kinda just lost what made the original 3 Wild Arms games.
Man I never heard of hoshigami, looks mad goood but rip its trash. Great stuff guys!always hitting it right snd I love the outro song. The editing magic on the intro is fire. Lol I love the bros editing magic, he's gotten more creative with stuff that's for sure!
I wanted to love The Last Remnant so badly. The game just constantly freezing and crashing on me when it came out though. Gave up after a few times. Need to go back to it at some point, but just never have. I enjoyed what I did get to play of it at least
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Thanks for teleporting me to an alternate reality where i'm sitting back at home as a kid watching toonami meets G4TV. Great vibes as always my guyyy~
I've been wracking my brain trying to figure out why I like their editing style and presentation so much and you fucking nailed it.
G4😢😢 man those were the days. What was that one called attack of the show or something? Good times😂
Definitely Toonami vibes 😂
These are the type of comments we love to see 💯
I think Grandia 3 would also fit this list. This was the first game to have the protagonist's mom be a playable character and it baffles me that they axed her and another character on the 10 hour gameplay mark. The decision was so bad because those 2 had way more personalities and acted as both a parent and mentor figure to our main leads to only be replaced with even more bland and uninteresting party members.
You could also feel the tonal shift once you reach that point and the plot just takes a nose dive to being awful. It was obvious that the game was rushed as they were remnants of areas that were meant to be explored and more mini games you could participate in to get valuable goodies.
If there were an alternate universe I wish the devs were able to remake this game and fix some of the low points I mentioned above. It's such a shame because we got a really good entry for Grandia 2 only to be followed up with this shallow game.
Totally agree about the story in Final Fantasy XV. I didn’t really care about Noctis’s dad or Lunafreya dying because he only has like one scene with both of them! The vibe of being on a road trip with the bros really carried the game for me though.
Exactly, deaths mean nothing if we’re given no reason to care about that character’s death in the first place
@@GamingBroductionsdepending on the player, even deaths of characters you have a reason to care about may mean nothing. I fully agree with the point that you made, to be clear, but I always think of the death of Aerith in FF7.
I was 18 or so the first time I played that game, 25 years ago or so, and I am the only person I know who did NOT find that death meaningful on any sort of personal level whatsoever. Obviously it has story significance and is relevant to the other characters, but when I first experienced that moment I actually thanked Sephiroth for removing dead weight from my party. Not trying to be cruel or cool or edgy, just relating based on my own experiences that for some players, even meaningful deaths will carry no emotional weight.
But to your point, it's difficult to care about the deaths of characters that you've spent no time with over the course of a game.
I still haven't forgiven Konami for putting Suikoden I-IV on PSN and giving up at the last second. You could argue that Suikoden IV being digitally relased on the PS3 in 2016 There was little financial incentive to put the remaining two games on there.
Konami had no issue of putting completely untranslated Turbo Grafx 16 JRPGs on the Wii U Virtual Console in 2017. That is one aspect of crackhead business choices by Konami that never gets brought up.
The Last Remnant is honestly one of my most fav games of all time. The unique battle and party member systems were so addictive for me once I got the hang of it and knew how to strategize team formations and positions and trigger specific options of command, there are many optional unique playable characters that have their own special abilities and synergies too. But I could see why it's complex and niche and feels kinda random as there're not a lot of in-game manuals and clues for players to maximize/optimize what you can do, optional monsters and weapon upgrades are a challenge too, it's definitely complex and a learning curve that requires some time and patience unless one decides to just use a guide, so casual players who don't really care about optional stuff wouldn't really resonate well with this game I suppose.
I'd like to play a game with such battle and party systems more, where it's a mini-war moving as units that take positioning and quick-time-actions into considerations instead of 3-6 individual party members making moves individually in turns, SaGa series is similar in some aspects but overall it's not really that similar too, I can't think of any game with this style of gameplay systems... Really wish there'll be prequel sequel or successor to this game, or original games that take inspirations from this concept.
Always love seeing last Remnant get more love. Once you grasp the mechanics it is addicting as hell. Did not know about the Saga connection tho. I always felt a FF12 ivalice vibe from it.
@@Mr69hammertime
Yeah, it's such a shame because clearly it's quite a polarizing game. I recognized its imperfection and overall flaws, but its gameplay concept was one of the most memorable and interesting aspects that has stayed with me. The mechanics were fun and engaging with some level of necessary strategizing and attention for quick time event. It really feels like it's not meant for casual players, traditional jrpg players or non-jrpg enthusiasts the more I think about it, no wonder it's so niche and polarizing lol.
I'm not sure what's the SaGa connection too but I did see it mentioned online, probably mainly because of some devs and a few similar concepts and references.
I agree it has a FF12 Ivalice vibe too, due to the warring tension, the non-human races living together like it's a normalized diversity, the ecosystems, the architectures, and the general aesthetics. It feels like there are rich cultures and histories in the world, making it "alive" (even though the story didn't fully explore the depth and push the boundaries in terms of making those cultures and histories even more relevant, but it's adequately satisfactory for me personally anyway lol).
@@RaymondTywaif TLR was in development initially as SaGa Frontier 3 and was produced by Akitoshi Kawazu leading a team of SaGa and FF devs. For those who haven't played it, if you're a SaGa fan having a gorillion unexplained mechanics will be nothing new to you, and at least for me is part of the draw. I love poking and prodding to figure out what's going on under the hood.
And not for nothing, Kawazu also co-produced FF12 after Yasumi Matsuno (Ogre Battle, Tactics Ogre, FFT) bounced out due to health issues.
Kawazu is just one of those dudes who's been around Square forever and has his hand in a surprising number of projects. But you can always kinda tell when it's him running the show on one of them. I mean, you probably wouldn't think he'd have had much of a hand in the Mana series but he was there too and when you think about the convoluted and unexplained systems of Legend of Mana suddenly it all makes sense... at least in terms of where that all came from. From the Land Make system, through pounding a nonsensical amount of fruits and garbage into a weapon to make it break the game, and all the other weird and completely optional crafting and monster ranching stuff. Needless to say I'm a huge fan of his.
@@gaspump
Thanks for the info! I don't really research into devs or company histories too much so I didn't know about this.
I guess maybe I'm also one of those who enjoy Kawazu's style of games, since Legend of Mana was one of my all time favs too lol FF12 also one of my top 5 FF. Haven't tried SaGa series but I suppose it'll likely speak to me too :D
I've thought about trying The Last Remnant. Is the story good?
The Look of The Last Remnant always reminds me to FF 12. Never played The Last Remnant but have it on my wishlist for the switch.
Dude I think your channel is going to explode in the next 12 months. Your content is so on point, and your intro is absolutely fantastic. Reminds me of that Toonami commercial that combined various scenes from anime shows like Gundam Wing and Rurouni Kenshin
Appreciate that dude, we can only hope! And yeah that was definitely the vibe we were going for, absolutely loved the whole vibe and aesthetic of Toonami back in the day
I actually played Wild Arms 4 a month ago during my marathon of the seires, and in all honestly I actually really enjoy it.
I personally wasn't really bothered by the visual novel cutscenes, and I actually think both the localization and presentation are way better than in Wild Arm 3 IMO.
I also really enjoyed the cast as well as the HEX System being introduced and even including platforming.
But for me what made me really love this title was it's themes centered around a post-World War and the struggles of living in it. such as how many of the adults believe that humankind is doomed and is predisposed to war and should embrace it as a fact of life. While the younger people such as our main characters don’t want to believe that humans crave for war or destruction and that they can strive towards peace and it’s their child-like innocence that prevents them from lying like most adults due and they see the beauty of the world for what it is and they hope to create a better future where they could all live in.
And I love this because almost all of these themes are within my book that I'm trying to write, so it was neat seeing a game that was trying to deliver the exact same message like in my story.
Sure I wouldn't say the game is completely perfect. I feel some of the villain characters could have been fleshed out, the game runs a little short, and there is no real overworld map, but overall I found AW4 to be a really underrated title and one I'm glad to have played.
You might like the movie Silent Night. Sounds like what you're saying.
@@DSan-kl2yc Not true. for me I enjoy stories such as Avatar the Last Airbender, Naruto, and Kingdom where the characters find themselves either in a world that is on the brink of war or in a world that is already in the middle of war.
And the characters want either the war to end or not to have another war that would bring more ruin.
And so they bring upon themselves to do everything they can to end the war and to unify people.
As someone who was born shortly before the 9/11 event and the war that's happening in Ukraine and seeing major conflict happening around me, I longed for these kinds of stories that show the character's desire to do what is right and try to bring balance and hope to the world and that has always stuck with me. and that's why I enjoyed WA 4's story as much as it did for me.
"like making a dragon quest not based on medieval european fantasy"
DQMJ3: hello
Oh yeah also the shinining series one of the games, maybe shining the holy ark 2 and 3 or was it shining wisdom? Which never came out in USA, the one with Galm as a side dark bad/good guy, and it was a strategy turn based overhead view.
The thing about the Last Remnant that always stuck with me is The Conqueror, the final boss. In a game of large-party battles, this guy can and will fight you on his own in a fight where you're likely often on the backfoot, and if you failed to capture the two strongest summons in the game, he will have them on his side. The entire game has played him up to be a nigh-unstoppable threat, and when you face him in the final battle, he fully delivers on that.
Another absolute banger. I always get very strong Toonami vibes from your videos. The music, the intro/intermission/outro is such a nice touch and provides a chill vibe you don't really see on youtube. Great work!
Thank you! Like the title of our dialogue box video, it’s the little things that matter so we take that same approach with our channel
My first PS game was Granstream Saga, and I found it quite enjoyable. The gameplay offers a moderate level of difficulty, the story isn't too lengthy, and it's easy to understand without being overly complex. Additionally, the cutscenes were surprisingly well done.
Hoshigami is the dark souls of tactical RPG. If you just push and accept the grind it's actually pretty good. There are branching story line, and depending the choices you make, certain party members can be recruited and I think the story also change.
Awesome upload at the perfect time!!!! Appreciate the hard work fellas!
For sure, thanks for watching!
I loved The Last Remnant. Hearing it brought up always makes me pretty excited. The game had some issues, especially with scaling. But the world was incredibly cool, and the battle system was incredibly epic and fun once you learn it.
To enjoy it, you really have to embrace that you're a commander and not a micromanager. You can strategically pair and level up your units, but you have to have to trust them once you're actually on the battlefield. Each character makes their own decisions, so you end up reacting to your own units as much as you react to your enemies. That said, they'll usually be pretty smart about things too, like trying to heal at low health or buff themselves while out of danger. By the end of the game, I could pretty much predict what would happen for each team's turn.
At the same time, you can definitely remove a lot of that randomness by theming each team to focus on attack, magic, defense, healing, etc. I specifically had a dedicated speed team and a healing team, which allowed me to almost always intercept dangerous enemies or land huge heals reliably. Meanwhile, my attack and magic teams would do most of the fighting. So there's a lot of depth and once you start to think about teambuilding and combat from a macro perspective. Unfortunately, the tutorials don't convey that very well.
Naturally, it's not for everyone. If you feel the need to micromanage every attack in a game, The Last Remnant might not be enjoyable. There's also a lot of murkiness when it comes to turn order, since you'll have to estimate how teams will move and clash. But for a squad-based RPG war game, there's really nothing else like it that I'm aware of. It really made me feel like a commander, forcing me to balance variables and take calculated risks with each turn. It's one of the most memorable games I've played, and I only tried it a decade after its original release.
Great video. One recommended topic for you to cover might include spiritual successors to JRPGs made by the original game creators. So, for example, you might compare Suikoden and Eiyuden Chronicles when it comes out to see if there were any improvements or if it missed the mark. You could do something similar comparing Final Fantasy to The Last Story.
Definitely would love to see a part 2, my pick would be 7th Saga, had some good ideas and an interesting story but the difficulty ruined it. Heard it was better in Japanese.
Mystic Ark and Treasure Hunter G will be nice too as well
Unbelievably, I beat 7th Saga with both Alien and Elf. I had to employ extreme save scum tactics in order to get near perfect stat rolls on almost every level up just to get through it.
Oh good, I was needing a Gaming Broductions fix! The only game in this list I've played was Final Fantasy XV and you're pretty on point with it. I'm pretty stoked for Eiyuden Chronicle though! I'm glad I pledged to it on Kickstarter. What are some other upcoming jrpgs are you looking forward to? Did you play Sea of Stars? I'm also looking forward to a game called Full Circle that's in the works.
Eiyuden Chronicle looks to be awesome! I haven’t played Sea of Stars yet but will get around to it later this year. Focusing on finishing up some Star Ocean 2/Super Mario RPG content before I dive into anything new
Spectral Force 3 was graphically a generation behind and had several game-breaking bugs that were never patched. However, it was one of my favorite TRPGs outside of those facets and the general concepts and battle system had massive potential. I mean, you can conquer a cat kingdom and recruit their officers |-)
This video's comment section will turn up a lot of great B JRPG's. I never heard of Spectral Force 3, but it's on my list now.
@michaelp4122 it's Xbox 360 and not backwards compatible, not easy to get but hey I agree about finding hidden gems here
Just always immaculate vibes on this channel, truly appreciate it.
And I say this as someone who considers Star Ocean one of the best JRPGs on the SNES, and who has a deep love for the (yes, very flawed) Last Remnant... a game that literally had me consider reviving my UA-cam channel and dedicate a 1.5h video essay to this random obscure PS3/360 era game, haha. Subjective opinions and all that, I can very much see where you're coming from with those games.
Thanks dude, really appreciate that take. A lot of people can get easily offended when you don’t share the same opinion as them so it’s nice hearing from someone who can still appreciate the content even if they don’t always agree with all of the takes. And hell yeah, if you wanna make that Last Remnant retrospective go for it! It has very little coverage on UA-cam for a game that resonated pretty deeply with some people
I quite liked The Granstream Saga. The faceless characters have always been off-putting but I really loved the animated scenes. I remember it being quite fun to play but as you said, the lack of a traditional level-up system imo doesnt do it any favors but not a deal breaker. I should play it again before the SO2 remake drops.
Tbh for Star Ocean 1 I think you aren't right. the second title isn't such a big improvement to the first one AND that is because the first one already is GREAT I don't think it's overrated, but underrated.
I agree with you, I played Star Ocean games in the order they were released and after the first game, the second one did not impress me, and in a number of aspects it looked like a step backward.
Suikoden V came out pretty late in the PS2 lifecycle I believe so many might have skipped over it. As for Suikoden IV the biggest issue with that game was the high combat encounter rate by far (also the 4 character party limit).
Glad you mentioned Granstream Saga, I actually really liked that game.
Couldn't agree more about FFXV. Of course part of the reason why the story feels incomplete is because it literally was incomplete. It got pushed out the door before it could be finished. I remember characters and story arcs in the Appendix (or whatever it was called in the game, it's been a while) being mentioned that didn't appear in the game at all :O
Awesome video! Definitely gonna sit here and watch the whole thing through while sipping on some cold Sprite. 😮💨 Nothing beats that feeling.
Also, totally unrelated but are you ever gonna make Atlus in the 2000s? 😅😅 I was a huge fan of the previous one in the 90s, but I understand the 2000s one is probably going to be a huge project. 🤣😂😅💀 No worries if it takes a while. It’s worth the wait. ☺️😊😁
Great vid dude! Man I never knew they strayed from the wild west setting with Wild Arms 4. That's the kind of random, out of pocket stuff that (temporarily) kills a series. Kind of like what happened with Breath of Fire as well. Damn, now I'm sad lol.
Thank you! And ah yeah don’t even get me started on what happened to BoF after 4… such a shame
I'm still bitter over how dirty they did FFXV. It has a BEAUTIFUL story. With everything that makes it beautiful not inside the main game itself.
but it is in my oppinion better than they did with 16.. Console Exclusives shit.. Square Enix getting worse and the Numbers shows it..
3:12 I was not ready for the sound of his little pitter patter foot steps😂😂 another banger of a video💜👍
Yeah too funny not to include lol. Thank you!
I think Magna Carta was also one of them
Thank you so much for jogging my memory with Granstream Saga - I rented it back in the day and thought it was okay but then never could remember it’s name
Your FF15 is so in line with mine - it was SO CLOSE to true greatness. It's worth playing if only to imagine what it could have been, and even still it makes me cry everytime.
goodness, that intro track is cold!! Hell yeah wit the vibes!!
Thanks dude! Yeah we all about the vibes over here
Wild Arms 4 really suffered a severe case of the generic 00s anime as much as I love the battle system with all my heart. Seriously all I remember about the game is Raquel being the best character in writing and gameplay, a former bad guy punching a missile, and the main villain's sexy secretary being a Whitney's Miltank/Ultra Necrozma level roadblock due to guide dang it shenanigans in a mostly simple game.
Definitely need a part 2 to this video, and excellent job as usual dudes!
Thanks dude! We’ll definitely plan on it at some point
I know one of these days that Legend of Legaia retrospective is gonna drop and I can't wait
Really? Hope so!!
Great video! As a huge fan of JRPG's in general, it does help to be able to reference these kinds of lists before starting to invest 40+ hours into my next gaming adventure :)
Another banger of a video, fellas! Most of these were games I remember thinking LOOKED dope, but I never picked up. Hoshigami's reviews really bummed me out back in the day.
Thanks man! Yeah Hoshigami disappointed me deeply back in the day lol. That was when I was first really getting into JRPGs so any new release coming out I always got overly hyped for
Even though I absolutely love games like FFT or Tactics Ogre, I could not get into Hoshigami. I only tried it a bit, but my mom (RIP 2016) liked it and has to be the only one I knew that played that game to the end. We usually did not put a game up for trade until both of us either passed or completed a game individually and that was one of the few where I passed. For example, we both ended up completing FFT and Suikoden 1/2. Our games got so much mileage because she played the game while I was at school, out elsewhere or not currently playing games.
Rogue Galaxy. It was a game with alot of potential - great characters, unique setting - but just didn't seem to get much attention. Another "JRPG" I thought was very good but was largely ignored was Earthlock. I suspect it's because it wasn't made in Japan even though it was made in a JRPG style. It absolutely exceeded my expectations, but few JRPG fans seem to know about it.
Nothing like kicking back on a sunday and watching a Gaming Broductions video, intro is my favourite intro on YT easily another great video guys 🙌🏾
I don't know if you're gonna notice this comment, but the Hoshigami section got me stuck in the Hoshigami pits again. I don't like the game at all beyond the character and generic unit designs, but after seeing you (or whomever recorded the footage) use magic in the game, I gave reading the Coin and Seal guide on GFAQs another go.
I finally sort of understand the Coinfeigm system after trying to read the GameFAQs guide on it again, because as a SaGa and Star Ocean fan I am cursed to forever be addicted to stupid systems in RPGs. Again, I don't like this game, it's just kinda fascinating.
Don't worry I'm currently playing like way too many JRPGs + 3(?) WRPGs so. It's fine.
+1 for the Star Ocean segment, your videos that touched on SO1 were very on point, despite me loving that game. I do wanna play Wild Arms 4, but it does seem to be The Weird One.
I love the video format with the amazing intro and almost 30 minute run time. It reminds me of a 2000s TV show, but better cause it's all about jrpgs
Thank you for watching! 🙌🏼💯
I would add Dragon Quest 6 to this list. A lot of people don't realize this game was cannibalized by Chrono Trigger, compare the MC and Ashlynn/Barbara to Crono and Marle and you'll find they're very similar with some changes in hair color (even by Toriyama's standards of character reuse). The dream/real world system was also meant to be a time travelling feature (remnants of this are still apparent in the Amor vignette) where doing things in the past affects the present but that was given to Chrono Trigger instead and fully expanded there. There's also some hints, like Ashlynn's fire resistance and datamined references about the Gold Dragon that shows unused storylines. Its why 6 (my personal favorite) is often kind of an underdog among Dragon Quest fans from its apparent lack of polish, but you appreciate it a bit more when you realize why it feels unfinished.
Some time ago you made an interesting video about dialogue boxes. On that same line of topics of "technical details rarely analyzed on the rpg scene" have you thought of exploring the evolution of user interfaces in rpgs? Battle mode interfaces and maybe others too. From the clunkiness of Nes and Snes games to the optimized later designs.
Awwwwww yeah, I love getting a notification from you guys. this should be fun
Hell yeah hope you enjoy 👍
@@GamingBroductions I surely did, and like always, your choices were spot on for the topic.
I totally agree with last remnant.
I think I understand the gameplay a little more than you explained here, you are the battles general, eg the top guy of the entire army, so your commands "attack" "attack with mystic arts!" "attact with combat arts!" "play it by ear" is what you are telling one union to do, not the individual characters, so with that idea, it works alot better.
Later you say grinding early hinders you later on, is kinda true but not quite true. you level up in 2 different ways and this is the main probalem in my opinion, you have Battle Rank and you have stats and they level independantly. I suffered with this myself, and at end game, in the Ancient ruins, I could not up my stats anymore as my BR was too high, and I could not get past the Ancient dragon, but I stuck it out and had probably my personal best gaming moment ever where I went over 50 rounds against the dragon to finally beat it, I only managed this because the ancient dragons AoE attack killed some of my characters in each union. this is good as Union HP is collective, which inturn means that AoE hits less but still the same HP, then when instructing a union to heal, I prevent reviving characters! it was indeed an epic fight.
In addition the final battle gets increasingly difficult depending on what additional content you did, meaning the final boss battle is the hardest battle in the game --> I love this idea a lot, I highly recommend this game, as long as you understand what it is and not what you want it to be.
I feel like the complaints you had for Star Ocean apply to all the games. Even Star Ocean 2 has a pretty poor story and main villain imo
I honestly don't remember anything about FF XV story. Never played the DLCs and it was confusing. Instakilling the world boss with 1 move was bad ass though!
I played most of these games back in my day but never got to finish them because I lost interest. Thank you for making this video, it feels kind of nostalgic that someone actually also played all of them and also reviewed them.
I remember getting Hoshigami back when it came out and barely playing it. Seemed so up my alley.
I actually really enjoyed Granstream. I too had a save file right before the first scene that I kept for longer than I'm comfortable admitting. But I was like 13 when it came out. But the same itself I enjoyed quite a bit. Loved the way you got new equipment.
I still have Hoshigami on disc, bought it after loving FFT and REALLY wanted it to be good and tried so hard to love it.
Just started playing that again on PS1. My FIRST japanese RPG, holds a place in my heart.
Good video would want to see part 2, my picks would be dragon force 2, alundra 2, threads of fate, legend of dragon !, dark cloud, xenosaga 2,
Ooh got a couple hot takes in there, I dig it. I agree with most of those (haven’t played Dragon Force 2)
I really emjoyed The Last Remnant. It haunts me though becuase I soft locked myself with an insanely hard boss. now i cant finish it and im roughly 30/40 hours in too. lol
Popolocrois, I didn't know of its existence until the PSP, I enjoyed it when I got to play it though, but I hardly ever see anyone mention it
I see a new Gaming Broductions video, I watch.
Ya love to see it
I don't mind the lax leveling/combat system in Granstream Saga. Fun for the kids, but the grownups with a tight schedule can skip as much combat to push the story! Kind of nice for the busy gamer who wants an RPG honestly.
Still trying to push myself to finish the remastered remake of Star Ocean before starting the one that came out yesterday.
I never heard of a few of these. I am also surprised that Robotrek is not mentioned, as that is the QUINTETsential game with untapped potential. It is loved by many even with its flaws, myself included. If I could, I would gladly try to get rights to develop another game.
Suikoden 4 and Last Remnant are great picks for this topic. Enjoyed both quite a bit but they could have been so much better.
I think Black Sigil and Suikoden Tierkreis would also have been good picks. (as it is I actually think Tierkreis is slightly above Suikoden 4 over all)
Dark Dawn is the poster child of missed potential
Especially because Shining Force 3 Scenario 3 was such a masterpiece.
Still upset that they never finished the original trilogy, just left you on a cliffhanger in The Lost Age and you assume it turns out alright.
This was a great list. The worst thing about FF 15 was the potential for greatness you could feel while playing through it. Almost every aspect was lazy, half baked, or mid but you knew if they did it right it could have been one legendary 10/10 jrpg
Granstream Saga had this side quest where you had to collect a bunch of random cards and give them to an old man. During the course of the game, i never found a single card, and I'm very thorough.
I have no idea where these cards are hidden.
Great video really cool to learn about some of these games
Appreciate it, glad you enjoyed it
FFVIII might belong on that list. I heard it was supposed to be a massive 8-disc game, and they cut out half the content. For example, the locked locations in the time compression were supposed to be visitable, and a lot of the story got shortened or removed.
On the other hand, it was still a pretty damn good game and one of my favorites, so maybe it doesn't?
Waiiit a minute.. What're the games at 0:08 & 0:32 ? Think i might know, but don't quite recognize the spritework.
Great list, btw!
I also want to know what these are. One looks like Pier Solar for Genesis, but it's not.
Don't know what game at 0:08, but the game at 0:32 is Demikids for GBA.
@@atonimid3204 Oh, rad.. havent heard o that one. Thanks!
@gamingbroductions 0:08
Brandish 2 at the 8 second mark
hey here's a video idea: Great JRPGs with smaller casts for people with FOMO.
Go into The Last Remnant like a Saga game and it will begin to make sense.
I wish we could directly control our units though..
Ironically Granstream Saga did reach its full potential in the next Quintet ARPG called Brightis.
Part 2 please! Loved it!
Will do at some point!
Hoshigami is difficulty will be based on how knowledgable the player with coinfeigm, it is grindy but can be easy or hard depending on your understanding with the game.
Suikoden 4 is great.
Hell, 1-5 are pretty good too.
Also, one id add here is Summon Night.
I've played twin age and though it was pretty good, and considering it was one of the games that got released overseas, im surprised its not that well known.
Great video.
I would like to add different way of looking at this. Jrpgs are often part of a series. Despite that it is rare for developers to focus on fixing badly implemented ideas or even reuse great ideas in another games. why do you thunk that is?
I don't think any game has disappointed me as much as Golden Sun 3. Something about the combat was unbalanced, so even without grinding, I never felt like I needed to be strategic with my resources like in the first two games. But the thing that really ruined it for me was how they tell the story. The first two games are pretty talky, but they repeat the same things over and over in the third game. Everyone talks twice as long as they need to. I hope someone takes another shot at the franchise someday.
Nice video. But honestly a part of me wished to rather see a breakdown of the subject of "games that didnt reach their full potential because of certain old game design ideas or hardware limitations".
It's a difference of nuance from your idea, but it's a nuance that matters. Because that's a subject i really like, and somehow i find myself thinking of it a little more often lately. That seems like a kind of common phenomenon with games that come out late in a console's life cycle. Looks like they push the "last gen" console too hard and would look better in the new gen console instead.
I really like Granstream Saga, but I get that it's not up to the quality of Quintet's 16-bit stuff. I mean, that's _peak_ 16-bit art versus _early_ 3D stuff, so right off the bat, it's got a completely different appeal... like, none, if you don't appreciate the colorful, blocky, charm of that stuff. I wish it was made for N64 instead; it EASILY would've picked up a bigger audience if it wasn't on the JRPG Behemoth that was the OG Playstation. I wish a couple of these went to alternate platforms; that's why Bloody Roar has a cult following today, or why the Tales series gained a foothold in the West - because they (Extreme/Primal Fury and Symphonia) went to the _Gamecube_ and avoided ALL competition on the Playstation 2. If only that kind of chance was taken with some of these a console generation earlier.
Btw, _love_ the new intros for channel videos! It's got such heavy old-school Toonami "video package we used to replace the actual opening" vibes. So genuinely cool to see something effectively evoke that sort of video bumper again! Cozy and cool at the same time. Awesome job!
I love this topic. I think you did a good job of tiptoeing around the whole, "WAIT WAIT WAIT - DON'T GET MAD! I'm NOT SAYING THESE ARE BAD GAMES!" aspect here, lol, and it's always commendable that you just want a good excuse to talk about some underloved JRPGs. Some B+ efforts instead of the A++ guys everyone already knows about. I can respect that. I say that Infinite Undiscovery, Blue Dragon, Arabian Nights (SNES), Avalon Code (DS) and Alundra 2 fill that space nicely, if you want to look into them for a sequel to this vid or another one that's of a similar theme.
Gotta' snag a copy of Granstream Saga. Looks so interesting.
Yeah it’s a jank game for sure but is still unique enough that makes it worth trying, the atmosphere alone is really cool
I feel the SNES Tales of Phantasia also fits in here. The PS1 version highly improves on the battle system but the random battle dungeons are still an issue.
Back as a child I really liked Granstream Saga. If I remember correctly, then the story got quite a bit of drama towards the end, having an Ending close top Terranigma.
Maybe its time for a replay .
Ready for part 2!
In due time 💯
Upfront, I'll say that I greatly preferred what we were set to get with Nomura at the helm of XV as presented in 2011 and 2013 and that Square's mismanagement and blame games for this title are insane. Both Nomura and Tabata get blamed too much for how it turned out and there's a lot of misinformation going around about the development, so a lot of people really hate this kind of opinion. But wanted to get it out of the way first before I gave an opinion on the game we got.
And that is that it is absolutely... fine. It's not great, it can be fun and going through the areas can be relaxing if you are just looking for a bro trip. But for a lot of us who had been there since it's announcement in 2006 and seeing what it originally was intended to be, we didn't come in for a bro trip, we came into it for an epic fantasy that took place in a modern setting and seeing how the tropes of the franchise translate to such a setting so close to our own. And that's my biggest issue.
I can accept the change in heroine even if the new heroine has no real personality in the scenes we see nor any reason to care for her on a deeper level. I can accept not being part of the invasion even though that was a setpiece that was rife for fun gameplay and memorable moments. I can even accept the game not even having as many towns or locals as older games to instead just have three big cities and a bunch disparate tiny settlements with nothing but wilderness for the most part.
But what I can't fathom is why, with still so much good material to work with thanks to what did survive the transition, such as antagonists and such, that we ultimately don't get anything of great substance out of them and all of it is just focused on one villain. A villain who is good, but it feels like he's literally stealing screentime from other equally interesting antagonists. And then the game completely wastes it's conceit of having the fantasy in a realistic setting by not exploring the deeper implications of character actions. Lunafreya's actions in releasing Leviathan should literally have some extremely intense pushback considering she's about to cause untold devastation to the city and she doesn't even give real reasons for why this has to be done other than vague speechifying about darkness and light. Yet the game doesn't give this more than lipservice and her speech ends with her getting a standing ovation when if this were following it's own premise more closely, would have received a much harsher reaction. But because Luna is such a controversial character because of her origins, all interesting scenes with her that could cast even more controversy seem to have been cut out and replaced with scenes where she doesn't have to be seen in a negative light. But it takes me out of the moment because for all her talk of helping Noctis save the world, she's ultimately responsible for a lot of untold devastation (even despite the evacuation, there were no doubt a lot of lives lost and even then, Altissia was destroyed and thus people lost their homes) and she doesn't have to answer for it.
All this can be summed up by one phrase. Wasted potential. The only things that seem to have had any real effort put into it by the director was the road trip, but everything else just doesn't get that. So even if I hadn't gone into the game already pissed it wasn't Versus XIII, I still wouldn't have been happy because there was too much great material and ideas simply wasted.
I just couldn't get along with The Last Remnant either. It looked like it had potential but man that battle system was wack 😭
am a long time Wild Arms fan. i loved the original(played once a year since release), loved WA 3, WA2 missed the mark pretty hard but HOLY HELL Wild Arms 4 was something else. the dialogue made me quit in less than 3 hours. that game didn't deserve to be on this list; it didn't deserve to be released. we, the players, deserved better. our wallets deserved better
Love your videos so much, immaculate vibes
Thanks dude
FF15 Kingsglaive was pretty decent. Would have been interesting if that was the actual opening for the game, having to watch a full movie before getting to drop into the world.
still rember the comments under youtube videos and on reddit of fans claiming that this movie is "optional" to watch if you want to be more "involved" in the story :-D
Glad to hear I'm not the only person who was disappointed with Final Fantasy XV, although I could honestly make a lot of the same complaints about XII. But that's neither here nor there.
I'd love to see a part 2 for this video, and I would recommend Rogue Galaxy for it. It wasn't bad by any means, but I always felt like Level 5 took the Dark Cloud series (which I loved), took out the systems that made it interesting, and ran it through a "Star Wars knockoff" filter. At the end of the day, it had no real personality of its own, in my opinion. And don't get me started on White Knight Chronicles, but that's a story for another time.
The World Ends with You on the DS was my favourite JRPG, but they didn't make a sequel for 14 years!!
Hahah you touched up on so many of my favorites. To this day im a defender of suikoden 4 for reasons and while wild arms 4 was a downgrade from its previous titles, it was a nice little game with an emotional ending. Havent finished golden sun series but now u got me about to buy grandstream saga lol. Nothing beats those old crisp anime cutscenesm thank you and yes please do a part 2 that outro was amazing haha
That intermission song is amazing.
Add Final Fantasy 16 to the list.
I bought a PS5 just to play it, and was extremely disappointed. The combat was garbage. The story was mid. It didnt feel like an RPG.
I am looking forward to Rebirth though
Also are you going to play the upcoming remaster/remakes of Suikoden 1 and 2, Super Mario RPG, and Star Ocean The Second Story?
I’ve enjoyed FF16 on some level, but yeah it’s definitely not really the Final Fantasy experience I was wanting. Looking forward to Rebirth as well though, I would say I did enjoy FF7R over FF16
Definitely plan on getting around to the Super Mario RPG and Star Ocean 2 remakes when they come out and we have retrospectives planned for the original versions. Same with Suikoden 2 for whenever those remasters end up dropping
Grandia 2 and 3, Tales of Zesteria, Xenosaga 1 and 2, every Paper Mario after super
For me it was Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter.
I though I'd finally get to the surface and there'd be at least another half of the game in story and finally some exploration up there, but alas... game finishes before you get to experience it :(
I remember I was so mad I wanted to break my PS2 afterwards lol
no mention of Disgaea 6? Was a great JRPG but fell short between carnage/rakshasa post-game areas.
I think if I were to make my own list of these it'd be:
Megaman Battle Network 6
Star Ocean 6
Tales of Arise
Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded (and I guess 358/2 Days by extension)
tell me about tales of arise
Wild Arms 4 was my first encounter with Xseed and since then a lot their games have always rubbed me wrong way. Most could have been good but there was always something holding them back. WA 4 was definitely the low point, the only reason I finished it was to see how things ended with Racquel since she was the only thing worth a damn in the game.
Later Wild Arms games did get a littel better but thing that keep it from reaching top form , for me at least, was that Hexgrid battle system and Xseed's hard-on to keeping it around.
Xseed doesn't develop games. They are a western distributor. Sony actually owns the rights to Wild Arms. Media Vision kinda just lost what made the original 3 Wild Arms games.
I would describe the aethetic of Suikoden IV as vintage doll like. Twilight Princess and Super Smash Bros Brawl also have this to some extent.
Man I never heard of hoshigami, looks mad goood but rip its trash. Great stuff guys!always hitting it right snd I love the outro song. The editing magic on the intro is fire.
Lol I love the bros editing magic, he's gotten more creative with stuff that's for sure!
Thank you for the support! We greatly appreciate it! We’re always trying to up the video production every new video!
OMG! Someone talking about Granstream SaGa. I thought it was so lost that nobody had played it
I wanted to love The Last Remnant so badly. The game just constantly freezing and crashing on me when it came out though. Gave up after a few times. Need to go back to it at some point, but just never have. I enjoyed what I did get to play of it at least