214 réponses à ce sujet

[LinksOcarina]

Ok, let me get this out of my system.

 

JRPG as a term is terrible to describe anything, because frankly it should not exist in any context. The teacher in me rages against it all the time because it's a horrendous label that carries too many various meaning that make the "What is an RPG?" question look like child's play. 

 

First problem is people associate it with the country of origin. If this is the case then games like Dark Souls or Wizardry need to be classified as such, since they are Japanese made RPGs. 

 

Secondly, they tend to base it on aesthetics of design. How characters look and act, the style of the world, the protagonists and their age range, etc. Because this is a stylistic choice and we have seen cross-over from multiple countries doing different things, It is again foolish to pin this down as a "JRPG" influenced aspect of a game. Dragon's Dogma comes to mind as an example, Capcom-made RPG that has a "western" style with "anime hair" attached, meshing the two styles into one if you really notice it.Another example is the Kickstarter game of Echoes of Eternia, which is a western developed game with anime-styled characters and settings, designed as a throwback to console-based RPG's from 1990s.

 

Another note is people believe "JRPGs" are cartoony. Well, so are western-made ones too.Games like Breath of Death and Cthulu Saves the World come to mind, as do Borderlands, which has more associated with an RPG than people give credit for. So it also goes both ways. 

 

Third is based on mechanics. Turn-based vs real-time, types of items and enemies present, first or third perspective, party based over singular-focus, classes and specific requirements for each class. Emphasis on story over anything else is a hallmark of the "genre" as well. If it is based on mechanics, then BioWare owes more to the genre because they have followed that genre more closely since Baldur's Gate, and the tropes associated with it (party based combat, cutscenes and story intervals, Limited gear and specific class restrictions, secret bosses and items, paused based gameplay being optional vs full real-time, etc.) the kickstarter game Tides of Numenara will have turn-based combat last I checked, and games like Betrayal at Krondor have the same restrictions as most "JRPG" games, including combat, cutscene emphasis, and class restrictions.

 

So honestly, the whole term and distinction between the two genres, and most of these games, is bullshit from the get go. I would just stop using the term all together because it's meaningless and as false of a genre as CRPG is.

[Killdren88]

More character's that you can't tell they are male or female would be my guess. One of the main reasons I find few animes and JRPGs to be enjoyable...In fact..could someone who is more educated ion the subject explain this to me to while Eastern media is fond of this sort of thing? I just find it really distracting.

[JeffZero]

More character's that you can't tell they are male or female would be my guess. One of the main reasons I find few animes and JRPGs to be enjoyable...In fact..could someone who is more educated ion the subject explain this to me to while Eastern media is fond of this sort of thing? I just find it really distracting.

 

Cross-cultural variations in perceived ideals of masculine and feminine beauty.

[JeffZero]

A well-articulated rant.

 

Well said.

 

My biggest issue with the terminology is that it tends to turn into easy dismissive nonsense for either "side" of this ought-not-be-so-bipartisan landscape. The number of times I've seen BSN posts target Fenris' hair as "the very worst of JRPGs" (let's just completely ignore things like Tactics Ogre and Dark Souls; all Japanese-made roleplaying games look and feel like Tales of Symphonia) or GameFAQs posts dismiss Mordin's character development on grounds that it's "impossible for a WRPG to do proper characterization" alone is tedious as hell.

[JamieCOTC]

They already did. It was called Dragon Age 2.

[JeffZero]

They already did. It was called Dragon Age 2.

 

I have never, to my recollection, played a JRPG that looked or felt like Dragon Age 2.

 

That super-quick sword slashing is not a staple of the country's stylistic choices. Well. Maybe it's a little... shoenin anime-esque, I suppose.

[Mistic]

Ok, let me get this out of my system.

 

JRPG as a term is terrible to describe anything, because frankly it should not exist in any context. The teacher in me rages against it all the time because it's a horrendous label that carries too many various meaning that make the "What is an RPG?" question look like child's play. 

 

First problem is people associate it with the country of origin. If this is the case then games like Dark Souls or Wizardry need to be classified as such, since they are Japanese made RPGs. 

 

Secondly, they tend to base it on aesthetics of design. How characters look and act, the style of the world, the protagonists and their age range, etc. Because this is a stylistic choice and we have seen cross-over from multiple countries doing different things, It is again foolish to pin this down as a "JRPG" influenced aspect of a game. Dragon's Dogma comes to mind as an example, Capcom-made RPG that has a "western" style with "anime hair" attached, meshing the two styles into one if you really notice it.Another example is the Kickstarter game of Echoes of Eternia, which is a western developed game with anime-styled characters and settings, designed as a throwback to console-based RPG's from 1990s.

 

Another note is people believe "JRPGs" are cartoony. Well, so are western-made ones too.Games like Breath of Death and Cthulu Saves the World come to mind, as do Borderlands, which has more associated with an RPG than people give credit for. So it also goes both ways. 

 

Third is based on mechanics. Turn-based vs real-time, types of items and enemies present, first or third perspective, party based over singular-focus, classes and specific requirements for each class. Emphasis on story over anything else is a hallmark of the "genre" as well. If it is based on mechanics, then BioWare owes more to the genre because they have followed that genre more closely since Baldur's Gate, and the tropes associated with it (party based combat, cutscenes and story intervals, Limited gear and specific class restrictions, secret bosses and items, paused based gameplay being optional vs full real-time, etc.) the kickstarter game Tides of Numenara will have turn-based combat last I checked, and games like Betrayal at Krondor have the same restrictions as most "JRPG" games, including combat, cutscene emphasis, and class restrictions.

 

So honestly, the whole term and distinction between the two genres, and most of these games, is bullshit from the get go. I would just stop using the term all together because it's meaningless and as false of a genre as CRPG is.

 

Classifications in general exist just because we humans feel the need to put labels to everything to bring order to the chaos of existence. It gets into dangerous territory when we start basing it on subjective appreciations such as "genres". So I agree with you on that.

 

However, there are also more objetive ways to do a classification. I, for one, call 'JRPGs' games which come from Japan, and 'WRPGs' games which come from Western countries. So yeah, I would actually call Dark Souls a JRPG according to that classification. If that breaks some people's image of what a JRPG should be, that's a problem with their expectations, not with the classification.

[Eudaemonium]

Ok, let me get this out of my system.

 

JRPG as a term is terrible to describe anything, because frankly it should not exist in any context. The teacher in me rages against it all the time because it's a horrendous label that carries too many various meaning that make the "What is an RPG?" question look like child's play. 

 

First problem is people associate it with the country of origin. If this is the case then games like Dark Souls or Wizardry need to be classified as such, since they are Japanese made RPGs. 

 

Secondly, they tend to base it on aesthetics of design. How characters look and act, the style of the world, the protagonists and their age range, etc. Because this is a stylistic choice and we have seen cross-over from multiple countries doing different things, It is again foolish to pin this down as a "JRPG" influenced aspect of a game. Dragon's Dogma comes to mind as an example, Capcom-made RPG that has a "western" style with "anime hair" attached, meshing the two styles into one if you really notice it.Another example is the Kickstarter game of Echoes of Eternia, which is a western developed game with anime-styled characters and settings, designed as a throwback to console-based RPG's from 1990s.

 

Another note is people believe "JRPGs" are cartoony. Well, so are western-made ones too.Games like Breath of Death and Cthulu Saves the World come to mind, as do Borderlands, which has more associated with an RPG than people give credit for. So it also goes both ways. 

 

Third is based on mechanics. Turn-based vs real-time, types of items and enemies present, first or third perspective, party based over singular-focus, classes and specific requirements for each class. Emphasis on story over anything else is a hallmark of the "genre" as well. If it is based on mechanics, then BioWare owes more to the genre because they have followed that genre more closely since Baldur's Gate, and the tropes associated with it (party based combat, cutscenes and story intervals, Limited gear and specific class restrictions, secret bosses and items, paused based gameplay being optional vs full real-time, etc.) the kickstarter game Tides of Numenara will have turn-based combat last I checked, and games like Betrayal at Krondor have the same restrictions as most "JRPG" games, including combat, cutscene emphasis, and class restrictions.

 

So honestly, the whole term and distinction between the two genres, and most of these games, is bullshit from the get go. I would just stop using the term all together because it's meaningless and as false of a genre as CRPG is.

 

I've usually thought the distinction was primarily one of emphasis on player agency. "WRPGs" tend to be centred on an abstract protagonist shaped by player input within the parameters set up by the devs, whereas "JRPGs" tend to be ensemble casts with defined protagonists. Its a difference in storytelling emphasis and so a difference in audience appeal. Of course classic JRPGs like the original Final Fantasy were fairly obviously inspired by DnD, so it's never been truly centred on Japan.

[LinksOcarina]

I've usually thought the distinction was primarily one of emphasis on player agency. "WRPGs" tend to be centred on an abstract protagonist shaped by player input within the parameters set up by the devs, whereas "JRPGs" tend to be ensemble casts with defined protagonists. Its a difference in storytelling emphasis and so a difference in audience appeal. Of course classic JRPGs like the original Final Fantasy were fairly obviously inspired by DnD, so it's never been truly centred on Japan.

 

But then you have games like Dark Souls which defy that trend as being a game entirely on player agency, versus a game like Mass Effect which is more inclined with the agency parameters of a "JRPG", ensemble cast and defined protagonist via the background and class of Shepard being more or less defined fully for you. The added widget of dialogue and branching trees becomes something else entirely, a "hybrid" of sorts that defys genre much like Borderlands can be seen as a dungeon crawler, co-op RPG and shooter all at once.

[Battlebloodmage]

Make a romanceable schoolgirl that goes tsundere whenever you try to talk to her.

[UniformGreyColor]

Its a disagreement of categorization nothing more.

[SolNebula]

If you see androginous characters,bad taste attire, hairstyles and improbable characters then you see how they catered jrpg crowd

[spinachdiaper]

the more cookie cutter RPG by numbers, auto dialogues, and unexplainable endings the closer Bioware gets to JRPG

[JeffZero]

Man, sometimes I forget just how harshly anti-JRPG this site can be.

[AlanC9]

However, there are also more objetive ways to do a classification. I, for one, call 'JRPGs' games which come from Japan, and 'WRPGs' games which come from Western countries. So yeah, I would actually call Dark Souls a JRPG according to that classification. If that breaks some people's image of what a JRPG should be, that's a problem with their expectations, not with the classification.

That's an objective standard, all right. But I don't see how it's the slightest bit useful. Who cares where an RPG was made?

[Ailith Tycane]

Why would they want/need to market to the JRPG crowd? 

 

Also I wouldn't classify Dark Souls as an RPG in any form, but maybe that's just me. 

[JeffZero]

Why would they want/need to market to the JRPG crowd? 

 

To get more money, I'd wager.

[Ailith Tycane]

To get more money, I'd wager.

 

I seriously doubt Bioware is concerned about that. I mean, clearly they want to make money, obviously, but I doubt they sat down and said "And this is how we'll appeal to the COD FPS fans, and this is how we'll appeal to the isometric rpg fans" etc etc, they just wanted to make the game that they wanted and to tell the stories they wanted. Breaking up gaming fans into subsections and trying to figure out how to appeal to all of them as opposed to just picking a strong gameplay and design element from the beginning and sticking with it sounds like a great way to make a game that no one wants to play.  

[JeffZero]

I seriously doubt Bioware is concerned about that. I mean, clearly they want to make money, obviously, but I doubt they sat down and said "And this is how we'll appeal to the COD FPS fans, and this is how we'll appeal to the isometric rpg fans" etc etc, they just wanted to make the game that they wanted and to tell the stories they wanted. Breaking up gaming fans into subsections and trying to figure out how to appeal to all of them sounds like a great way to make a game that no one wants to play.  

 

It's not really a BioWare thing. It's more a marketing thing. I agree with you in spirit, apropos to the wishes of the developers themselves, but publishers look for even the most incredibly subtle ways to craft "hits" into their marketing exposure that strike true in the minds of as varied a viewership as possible, and in the past I've never really seen anything in BioWare's advertising, especially on an international level, that has told me their marketers aren't following that same general business rubric.

[Ailith Tycane]

Even so, and I may be wrong in this assumption, but it seems like as far as western gaming markets, JRPGs are not as popular anymore compared to western RPG's like Skyrim, Fallout, The Witcher, DA, Mass Effect, so it seems like appealing to JRPG fans would be kinda low on EA's radar. I could be wrong, that's just the direction I've seen the western gaming market go in the past 5-10 years. 

[JeffZero]

Even so, and I may be wrong in this assumption, but it seems like as far as western gaming markets, JRPGs are not as popular anymore compared to western RPG's like Skyrim, Fallout, The Witcher, DA, Mass Effect, so it seems like appealing to JRPG fans would be kinda low on EA's radar. I could be wrong, that's just the direction I've seen the western gaming market go in the past 5-10 years. 

 

Nah, I would certainly agree with you. I wouldn't consider this terribly high on the priority list, and I'd be surprised if it were one of the first things a hired marketing team began discussing. I'm just saying that there's certainly grounds to assume that, given that the game is releasing in Japan, any potential advertising conducted there would center around elements as close to the cultural gaming norm there as possible, and as an extension, it wouldn't be a surprise to discover that a couple of beats in the trailers we've seen were hand-picked to draw interest from more Asian audiences.

[UniformGreyColor]

Who here knew there was a Dragon Age Anime movie? Its called Dragon Age: Dawn of the Seeker. Apparently it was only released in Japan as far as I can tell.

[Ailith Tycane]

It was released in America as well. I personally thought it was awful and hope Bioware doesn't do anything like that again, or if they do I hope they have more direct control over the writing...

[Lavaeolus]

BioWare have always made western RPGs. Quite frankly, they're one of "the" makers of western RPGs, and Baldur's Gate 2 is probably one of the classically defining examples of the genre, as much as a genre so loose as "RPGs made in the West" can be defined. A large part of their audience is thus so inclined.

 

And a lot of the marketing for Inquisition has fallen back on that. Hell, the Dragon Age series was billed as Baldur's spiritual successor. The announcement of choosing your race/background, the heavy exploration, the very idea of "choice and consequence" -- these are hallmarks of the western RPG. You've mentioned stuff like tactical camera and pausing, yadda yadda, but for all the appeal that might have to JRPG fans it's really a direct nod at the western isometric games of old.

 

As time goes on, BioWare have been more focused on telling a story. To that end choices have been reigned in, the protagonist's become a bit more defined (thinking specifically of Shepard here, who was even given personal drama in ME3 concerning survivor guilt and a random child, or something), and a bunch of other things. Still, while this might make it a bit closer to "JRPGs", I've never really felt BioWare was taking cues from them all that much, and certainly the marketing never drew the connection. They might be trying to appeal to the story crowd, however.

 

Who probably also flock to The Walking Dead and BioShock Infinite, and since I don't want deal with trying to relate Inquisition with a first-person shooter, I shall cease now.

 

I am aware many JRPGs like exploration, but damn when you're working with terms so vague.

[Maeshone]

It was released in America as well. I personally thought it was awful and hope Bioware doesn't do anything like that again, or if they do I hope they have more direct control over the writing...

I actually kind of enjoyed getting some backstory for Cassandra, but that was probably the only redeeming factor for that movie. Still though, it's the third best game-related anime movie I've seen.. Which doesn't say much as I've only seen it, Mass Effect: Paragon Lost and Halo Legends