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Various JRPG stuff not deserving its own thread

And related anime RPGs go here.
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

rusty_shackleford wrote: March 9th, 2025, 08:04
I saw the suikoden games on steam, are they good?
Dunno about the "remasters" but yes the two original games are great.

Suikoden 1 is a 15 hour long heavy war story. Lots of major characters dying left and right, never loses steam. Is the best game in the series. Probably my biggest gripe is that the game uses a cheap trick and tries to guilt you into sparing the villains ("they were mind controlled!"), though you are still allowed to kill them anyway. The ending music is very memorable.

S2 loses the flavor of S1 and feels much more like a generic JRPG, albeit still a good one. It is 40 hours long but only two heroes die, and it starts to get boring in the second half. There is a satisfaction in seeing some S1 characters return and having grown up a bit. Has the best soundtrack in the series. Is aesthetically an improvement from S1. Gameplay wise it eliminated the inventory micromanagememt of S1.

The Suikogaidens which take place in between S2 and S3 were neat visual novels. They are short and don't waste your time. They are also the only glimpse into Harmonia we got. Good soundtrack, arranges of S2's OST.

After that, the creator Murayama leaves is or was ousted from Konami and the franchise goes downhill. S3 is an intriguing 40 hour long prologue, and then ends 10 hours later, and has gameplay issues like backtracking through corridors. The writing also begins indulging in ergregious JRPGisms like multiple battles against a villain only for him to beat you up in the following cutscene and then waltz off. S5 is okay but it's a 50 hour long time commitment for a game that isn't very memorable. Eiyuden was utterly boring, dropped after 10 hours.

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Post by MC_Sea »

rusty_shackleford wrote: March 9th, 2025, 08:04
I saw the suikoden games on steam, are they good?
I heard the remaster on Steam was a sidegrade at best. The localisation changed dialogue that worked better in the original. The excuse localisers used was "The text space was limited back then." but that is a blatant lie because the changed lines had the same amount of text as the original. The animations/graphics were simplified for certain attacks, some Quality of Life features were implemented yet they made it more annoying to do other actions, and minor censorship was added (removal of blood, alcohol, crosses, and cigars). Both games are worth playing but I wouldn't bother paying $50 for each since it doesn't add enough to justify those high prices when you can just emulate the originals or pirate the game instead.

Yes, I know RockPaperShotgun is gross but it was the only website that cited specific examples of changed lines.
(https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-sc ... ginal-rpgs)


STORY SPOILERS BELOW:
► Show Spoiler
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Post by Valter »

You FF juicers like XV or XVI better?
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

Valter wrote: April 13th, 2025, 13:26
You FF juicers like XV or XVI better?
At least 15 has a party and a protagonist who is engaged to get married (how rare you see that in games) from the get go. You can also still see the remnants of Testuya Nomura's and Isamu Kamikokuryo's art even if it has been heavily diluted from the moody Versus XIII vision.
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Post by Valter »

Val the Moofia Boss wrote: April 13th, 2025, 18:04
Valter wrote: April 13th, 2025, 13:26
You FF juicers like XV or XVI better?
At least 15 has a party and a protagonist who is engaged to get married (how rare you see that in games) from the get go. You can also still see the remnants of Testuya Nomura's and Isamu Kamikokuryo's art even if it has been heavily diluted from the moody Versus XIII vision.
I do like party members... :pipe-thinking:
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Post by Vergil »

GayRPG stuff not deserving it's own head lol
I'm just stating the facts.
Question is are you going to gargle the truth or swallow?
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Post by KOS-MOS »

Valter wrote: April 13th, 2025, 13:26
You FF juicers like XV or XVI better?
FF15 still looked like a real FF. Not much, but there were still some vestiges of the old FF. FF16 is a completely different game that presents itself as an FF.
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Post by Cipher »

Oyster Sauce wrote: October 11th, 2024, 20:49
Vergil wrote: October 11th, 2024, 20:43
Why would anyone be listening to the dub anyway? I hope you guys don't do this...

Also are there any JRPGs that are just fun turn based games and not grindfests for exoskeleton havers?
Try Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology
This one is a real gem.
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Post by spookyheart »

rusty_shackleford wrote: March 9th, 2025, 08:04
I saw the suikoden games on steam, are they good?
Yeah suikoden is a pretty fun series imo defo worth looking into.
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Post by spookyheart »

Parasite Eve is the best that is the post.
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Post by spookyheart »

thousand arms is also the best that is the post.
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Post by spookyheart »

Seven Pirates H is so fuckng good defo happy to got this from play asia and im defo having the time of my life with this game.
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Post by methoxetamine »

spookyheart wrote: April 21st, 2025, 04:42
Seven Pirates H is so fuckng good defo happy to got this from play asia and im defo having the time of my life with this game.
I just looked this up, I'm surprised this **** is actually on the Switch
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

Sakura Wars 2 fan translation patch was published today. I tried patching the game myself but then had to download a specific .net version to get the patcher running, and then that didn't work, so I gave up and I'm just gonna wait for someone to kindly reupload the patched version of the game.
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

Sakura Wars 2: Thou Shalt Not Die

I had some difficulty applying the fan translation patch. I needed a specific version of .NET runtime installed, installed that, but I was getting an error when I tried launching the patcher. Turns out I needed desktop runtime installed, which then fixed the issue and allowed me to patch the game. Then I had to get Mednafen setup again and go trawling through the web trying to figure out how to configure my controller and how to turn on the goat shader.


It is good to be back.

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I like the menus.

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I lost my save data for the first Sakura Wars game when I got a new computer a couple years ago. I wouldn't even know how to get a save tranfers working with this mednafen thing, already had so much difficulty getting it to work with the Suikoden games on RetroArch. Fortunately the game just asks me who I romanced in the last game (Sumire), so that's neat.


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Apparently this game adds two new heroines to the team. I am going to feel really bad if I wind up ditching Sumire for one of them. Probably one of the downsides of having a serialized game continuity where the protagonist gets romantically involved in the very first game, rather than starting over with a new protagonist like SW5 and Shin Sakura Wars did.

Interesting. During the timed dialogue segments, a new option not initially listed can appear half way through, so you don't want to select the first option that appeals to you immedietely.

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Oh wow, so holding off can actually remove dialogue options. This is getting pretty complex.


Interesting. This game allows you to be late. In the other games I played, once the appointed time arrived your character was forced to go to the destination. So now you have to actually pay more attention to the clock beyond just prioritizing which activities to do with your limited free time.

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Well at least I got dressed just in time.


Oh dear.

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Post by methoxetamine »

That looks really nice actually, I haven't played the first one though
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Post by spookyheart »

Mana Khemia and Tales Eternia i got recently saving those for my bday also suikoden 1-2 as well too i got not too long ago im also saving my bday just leaving this here.
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

methoxetamine wrote: April 26th, 2025, 23:07
That looks really nice actually, I haven't played the first one though
You can start at either the first one or 5. Whichever one appeals to you the most. SW5 because was the last game the team made before they went on to make Valkyria Chronicles, and is pretty much a proto-VC in terms of level and mission design. The missions can get pretty engaging and there are cool setpiece aerial battles where you have to transform between landed mech mode and flying around to reach other platforms. Battle wise, I preferred 1's detailed spritework and backgrounds, but the battles were boring and never engaging. Story wise, 5 had a more proactive hero but overall they are the same in quality.

spookyheart wrote: April 27th, 2025, 04:47
also suikoden 1-2
The Suikogaidens are also worth playing after 2. They are short, tightly paced visual novels.
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Post by spookyheart »

daily reminder that thousand arms is the best thats the post
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Post by methoxetamine »

I bought a New 3DS XL a couple weeks ago. I had a DS when it launched but I didn't play any JRPG's on it, and I've not played a single game on the 3DS catalogue. I didn't realize until recently how nice of a library it has, especially for JRPG's. What are the essentials?

Here are the games I have installed and plan on playing at some point, but I need more suggestions and recommendations what to play first. DS/3DS/emulatable games all accepted, with a preference towards 3DS games for now

SMT 4 and 4A (I'm about 5 hours into 4, it's the first game I'm playing on it)
Etrian Odyssey 4, 5, Nexus (never touched the series)
Radiant Historia
Fire Emblem Fates/Awakening (only played one game in the series ever, one of the GBA games)
FF 4/5/6 (only haven't played 4, due for a replay on 5/6)
Tales from the Abyss (played Symphonia and Arise, not my favorite series but I've heard good things about this one)
Ever Oasis
DQ V, VII, VIII, IX (newfag, only played XI, V is the most interesting to me and I plan on playing it soon)
Bravely Default
Gurumin 3D (started it, wasn't really feeling it)
Stella Glow
Rune Factory 4
Kid Icarus
Zelda ALBW (honestly I'm not really a Zelda guy at all, I could probably be convinced to give it a shot)

Forgive me for listing a couple non-JRPG's, I just listed all of the games I downloaded already. As of now I was planning on playing Radiant Historia next, or SMT 4A if I want more SMT. I know there's a bunch more SMT/Atlus games on 3DS, but I don't know **** about them. Many of these games I just downloaded because I heard they were great but don't know anything about them, like Ever Oasis, Kid Icarus, and Stella Glow

I got mad lucky on the 3DS itself, I found a really cheap listing on Amazon I took a chance on fully preparing to return it if it was in bad shape, but this thing doesn't have a scratch on the device anywhere, has a top IPS screen, and I would believe it was brand new if it came with the box. It's a pretty cool device, I hadn't owned a handheld in 16 or 17 years. My kid is too young for vidya but I let her hold the right half of it and told her when to press jump and we got through a few Mario Land levels, she loved it
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

methoxetamine wrote: April 28th, 2025, 00:39
What are the essentials?
Just the 3DS Pokemons (XY, ORAS, and S&M), Xenoblade Chronicles 1 for the New 3DS, and the 3DS Fire Emblems (Awakening and Fates).


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If you have played the earlier gens, then Pokemon X & Y is a disappointment. You get a team wide exp share so you don't have to pick one or two main Pokemon to focus on. You aren't lacking for money to buy potions to heal up, and the enemies are not threatening enough. There is no interesting world design. So the game is overall easy and boring. There is also almost zero side content or postgame to do after beating the story. There is just the short Looker storyline that you will finish in a couple hours, the battle tower. The battle tower's extra facilities having been removed, so now it's just simple 1v1 or 2v2 runs and that's it. The transition to 3D was poorly executed and the game is an aesthetic downgrade from the prior games (including the 3D GameCube Pokemon RPGs, Colosseum and XD, by Genius Sonority). The story is also overall boring, and the main antagonist is poorly written, which is shocking coming off of Black & White which had a genuinely very good JRPG story. I also wasn't a fan of how mundane the new setting of Kalos was. It did not feel like a unique fantasy world unto itself like prior gens. It was just real life France.

However, the game is only a 20 hour long commitment, and I thought it was overall solid enough. I didn't like most of the new designs, but you get Mega Evolutions which are cool. A couple of moments got me a little teary eyed (Professor Sycamore's letter, the AZ subplot, and then the Looker postgame quest). You'll want to play XY anyway to transfer your Kalos favorite designs out to ORAS (not sure if the Pokemon Bank is still accessible now that 3DS internet service has been terminated, you might need two 3DS' or need to use some sort of online service).


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Pokemon Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire is not a replacement for the original RSE on GBA. The original RSE was more challenging, where you did not have team wide exp share, constant teleporting, or easy access to healing. It was much more of an RPG where you had to wisely spend your money, stock up on items for the long journey to the next town and the attrition that involved as you bushwhacked your way through the marsh in the middle of storm, and you had to decide which Pokemon you would focus on levelling. The GBA version also had better aesthetics. It might not look like it if you just google screenshots on your LED monitor and see emulator screenshots, but on the unlit GBA screen the world had a much more desaturated look that made it look like 90s cel anime backgrounds. It looked more like the rough outdoors. ORAS' world on the 3DS however, has a much more oversaturated and brighter look to it and feels more plasticky and fake. The ORAS version also traps you a lot in long, unskippable cutscenes, which wasn't a thing in the GBA version.

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However, the upside is that ORAS has far and away the most content and features of any 3DS game (I didn't buy USUM). Once you beat the story, you get easy access to nearly 500 Pokemon, including past legendaries from other games like Reshiram from BW. And you also get more mega evolutions. So you can run around with pretty much almost any of your most favorite Pokemon in the franchise released up until that point (except for Kalos Pokemon, which you will need to transfer in from XY). I consider ORAS to be the last hurrah of the franchise. I somewhat regret transferring all of my Pokemon from ORAS to S&M. I wish I had left them on ORAS.


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Pokemon Sun & Moon was the last Pokemon game I bought, and was where I stopped. S&M has major issues with its story, which is the longest to date, and constantly traps you in long unskippable cutscenes every 5 feet. Now, I like story heavy JRPGs, but GameFreak is awful at executing them. S&M is very story heavy, but it isn't even about you the protagonist character you are playing as. Instead, you are standing there as a bystander to the main heroine Lilie, who relies on you to solve her family problems for her. It feels like either the protagonist should have been allowed to talk, or Lilie should have been the character you were playing as. The story also has a copout ending. If GameFreak's writers wasn't going to follow through on the consequences, then they shouldn't have set them up.

The setting is also just Hawaii, and yes it is more appealing than Kalos but it still doesn't feel like an immersive fantasy world like gens 1 through 5. And before anyone says "well gens 1 through 4 are based off of Japan!", I have spent years of my life watching hundreds of animes and live action movies and playing games set in Japan, and those early gen settings did not feel like "oh it's just Japan" like how the later gens feel like copypastes of our world.

The same fundamental gameplay issues in X&Y are here too (no challenge, nonexistent world design, no side content or postgame, etc). Transferring Pokemon from ORAS here was a mistake IMO, because you can't bring your Mega Stones with you, and most Mega Stones in S&M were unobtainable for regular players and could only be gotten from limited time online distributions, so you would need to cheat to get them now. And even if you did transfer your favorites in from ORAS, you have no postgame content to use them for. It's just more 1v1 and 2v2 battle tower runs which I had already gotten bored of years before.

That being said, it's only a 20 hour long campaign and generally pretty 5/10 okay. Some of the characters are pretty funny. I liked a few of the new designs. Some of the music is neat. But the 3DS generation of Pokemon games and the XY anime's bait and switch robbing Ash of his league victory really soured me on the franchise. SwSh was announced and looked unattractive, and then we found out about Dexit. That was the last straw for me. Since then I have only occasionally popped my head in to look at the new anime movies and show.



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I preordered Fire Emblem Fates so I got the version that had all three versions in one + DLC content. I must have sank 200+ hours into that game and touched the third route or finished all of the DLC content. Sadly the English localization was bastardized by Nintendo Treehouse, but there is a fan translation patch. This game has quite a hatedom against it, but I thought it was okay. Honestly, Fire Emblem plots are usually never nothing to write home about. I did felt disappointed by Conquest, though. The premise is that you stick with the evil empire and conquer the Japanese kingdom, but you don't get to do that. Instead, it turns into this bizzare imitation of World of Warcraft where you're on the side of the conquering faction, but you play as characters who are doublethinking themselves as the good guy heroes. I wish I could have just been a straight up evil conqueror. For Birthright, the medieval Japanese aesthetics were quite refreshing.



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Xenoblade Chronicles 1: the game is overrated (mainly by people who haven't played many JRPGs), but it is very good nonetheless. It has good cutscene direction and an above average English dub. The first half of the story is engaging as the protagonist sets out on a manhunt for a mass murderer. After reaching Prison Island, the tension deflates and the story becomes boring "kill the angelic god monster" schlock, but it's still worth finishing. I found most of the cast unlikeable, I only liked Shulk, Dunban, Dickson, and Riki. While the setting is conceptually interesting (the world is set on the backs of titans), most of the actual environments were rather boring to walk through and look at. The MMO combat is meh. The sidequests are bad and a waste of time. Some of the musical tracks are memorable.



I might sound like I am being overall a downer (I get accused of that a lot), but I think all of these games are solid and are worth playing. Just go in with tempered expectations.

As for DS games, I am not going to do a comprehensive list. Off of the top of my head, the worthwhile ones are Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 2, the DS Pokemon games, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Sky, and... I am struggling to think of any others right now.


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Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 2 is my personal favorite of the Tactics series (Tactics Ogre, PS1 FFT, Ogre Battle 64, etc). It has the most fun combat and character building and at no point does it feel frustrating. The game is themed after light fluffy adventuring with a huge amount of missions to go through, as opposed to a serious plot of a set duration. There is also no permadeath of characters. The prior Tactics games are frustrating and stressful because you are trying to feel out what you can or can't build with the system but the clock is ticking and you are approaching the end of the game and don't know if you are going to have that cool spearman build you were dreaming of before the end, or if it is even possible. And ofcourse, you are constantly trying to keep your guys from not dying, and then resetting if they do die. FFTA2 just sidesteps all of that, if someone gets KOed for the mission then no biggie. The main story is short but inconsequential and there is a lot of missions to do after that, so you just keep playing and trying out different builds until you are FFTA2ed out.


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Pokemon Mystery Dungeon - Explorers of Sky: it's a roguelike. The earlygame is meh because you're not high enough level to learn cool moves and don't have enough money to buy any, and don't have a large party to command yet. Once you reach the midgame and your options open up and you have 4 party members and you're customizing their moves, the game gets pretty fun. That being said, the gameplay begins to wear out its welcome around the 40-50 hour mark, near the end of the story. The story was surprisingly good, probably the best written story in a Pokemon game I've played (not going to oversell it as super amazing, though). There was a postgame storyline which was okay. Has some great tracks towards the end of the game.


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Pokemon Black & White: the first story heavy mainline game, but executed well. You're not trapped in 5+ minute long unskippable cutscenes every 10 feet. I overall liked the cast. Probably the best story in the mainline games. The new completely brand new roster of Pokemon was exciting. The Pokemon League was brutal and I game overed on the final boss, and beating him felt really satisfying. I disliked how linear the world was, and the lack of side activities like Pokemon Contests or the Trick House. The game did have some postgame content in the form of hunting down the Sages.
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Post by spookyheart »

conception 1 is dogshit and don't bother play that game play elemental gearbolt instead thats the post.
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Post by methoxetamine »

Thanks for the comprehensive post, I actually haven't played a Pokemon game since Crystal (not counting stuff like Stadium and Snap), not sure why, I kinda just lost interest. Maybe I'll try Black and White at some point. I want to play Xenoblade but is the 3DS version actually good? I almost got it but figured I might want to emulate the Switch version instead

Oh and yeah FFTA2 is great, I said I didn't play any JRPG's on DS but I just forgot about that one
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

methoxetamine wrote: April 28th, 2025, 03:32
I want to play Xenoblade but is the 3DS version actually good? I almost got it but figured I might want to emulate the Switch version instead
The New 3DS version is good. IIRC the textures might have been lower rez but I didn't complain. I did not have any technical issues with it at all. Pretty impressive that you can get a high production value JRPG experience on the 3DS.

Emulating the Switch version will allow you to enjoy the environments at a higher resolution, but you will lose the painterly Vagrant Story/FF11-esque character models that the game was originally envisioned with, instead getting generic moeblob anime faces. Also, some of the visuals have been unfortunately tweaked, such as the loss of trees swaying in the wind, or the colors of the some of the environments desaturated.

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Post by methoxetamine »

Oh hell yeah, you convinced me to play the 3DS version. I still might play Radiant Historia first, but that is now moved up my list to either after RH or possibly even next. It'll probably make me appreciate playing XB2 and XB3 at 4k 60 even more, too (even if the characters aren't as soulful)
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

Seeing a difficulty option in Eclair Obscure: Expedition Pastry-Three made me wonder: When did JRPGs start including difficulty options?
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

Val the Moofia Boss wrote: April 28th, 2025, 03:40
Emulating the Switch version will allow you to enjoy the environments at a higher resolution, but you will lose the painterly Vagrant Story/FF11-esque character models that the game was originally envisioned with, instead getting generic moeblob anime faces. Also, some of the visuals have been unfortunately tweaked, such as the loss of trees swaying in the wind, or the colors of the some of the environments desaturated.
Could emulate the original Wii version instead, bump up the internal resolution/find a 60FPS patch probably
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

rusty_shackleford wrote: April 28th, 2025, 06:36
When did JRPGs start including difficulty options?
IIRC the Tales games started doing them in the early 2000s, but they hadn't become common in the genre yet. Ys, Trails*, and Valkyria Chronicles didn't start doing them until the late 2000s/early 2010s, so I would say that is the turning point. Pokemon Black & White 2 in 2012 had a hard mode but you had to beat the game first to unlock it, no other mainline Pokemon games did a hard mode. Final Fantasy didn't start doing hard modes until FF7 Remake part 1 in 2020 and FF16 in 2023, and in both cases you had to first beat the game first to unlock it. Square's SaGa games like The Last Remnant have experimented with dynamic difficulty where the more side content you beat, the harder the final boss becomes.

*The 2004 Trails in the Sky game on Steam has difficulty settings but those weren't in there originally, they were added by XSEED in imitation of the difficulty settings added to the later Trails games.
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Post by Oyster Sauce »

Always thought Pokémon could be a fun series for grown ups if they had difficulty levels where higher ones would allow enemy trainers to use more moves, strategies, items.
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Post by Val the Moofia Boss »

Oyster Sauce wrote: April 28th, 2025, 08:16
Always thought Pokémon could be a fun series for grown ups if they had difficulty levels where higher ones would allow enemy trainers to use more moves, strategies, items.
You might enjoy Pokemon Colosseum and XD. There are no wild Pokemon to catch. The select 50 Pokemon you steal from enemy trainers is what you get. There are no wild Pokemon and most trainers cannot be refought, so you cannot level grind or farm money to buy items. The moves you can learn are limited. All battles are 2v2s and some of the enemy trainers have strategies for such. Beating Colosseum felt really satisfying. You might also like Pokemon Stadium 2 and you can pick from a roster of almost all Pokemon released up through Gen 2, though it does not have an RPG story to go through or world to run around in like Colosseum/XD, but it was really fun and I sank many hours into playing it when I was kid. I think the Little Cup where you play with unevolved Pokemon was probably the most unique, and it had fun minigames too. There is also Battle Revolution on the Wii which is also a double battle format, but you are back to limited selection again. Some of the stadiums like the one with the roulette that allowed you to get the mons of enemy trainers for one battle was neat.