racketboy.com

I agree with Mozgus. If an RPG doesn't catch you within the first few hours it isn't worth playing. An RPG is a GAME and it should be fun. Making people slog through boring work with the vaporous promise of fun down the road is just no good.

vagrant story for the psx had an amazing battle system sort of a melee parasite eve
skies of arcadia on dc the ship battles not the character ones
xenogears/xenosaga but good luck getting into the story on xenosaga

I actually enjoyed Legend of Dragoon. I thought the combat system was fun because you really had to work for your characters to get off any damage at all and it was satisfying to pull of perfect combos. I liked the Dragoon transformations too, very cool game and the story wasn't too bad at all.

Grandia's combat system was defnitely superior to Grandia 2. I seem to recall them dumbing down the magic system in Grandia II. Grandia II, while a great game, was subpar to the original in every way in my opinion.

Vagrant Story's combat system was awesome, but god was that game complicated. Having a good faq helped me a lot. What a kickass intro that game had.

I've only played the first episode of Xenosaga, but I found its combat system to be rather dumbed down compared to the one in Xenogears, which I enjoyed a lot. I actually really dug Xenosaga ep 1's story though, but I never continued with the series after the horror stories about the second episode's combat system. Since I already didn't think much of ep 1's combat system, I just avoided the second one entirely. Shame too, ep 1 had some kickass characters and an awesome story, though the game was definitely weighted too much towards cutscenes than gameplay(hence the mediocre combat system)

Paper Mario had a cool combat system and I liked Legend of Mana's simple system. Honestly, I loved everything about that game

Big fan of Final Fantasy X2's combat system as well, though I disliked many, many other things about that game

One of the pioneers of the modern RPG featured one of the most bizarre and endearing combat systems ever. Still don't know what game I'm talking about? Well, think TurboGrafx-16 or PC-Engine if you prefer. Still stumped? Well, imagine a game with brilliant cut-scenes and music, applying the potential of the CD-ROM format to the RPG genre for the first time. Whatever, you fail! I'm talking about Ys Book I and II for the TurboGrafx-16, a pack-in game for the TurboDuo, the ill-fated console that rocked Japan's world but failed to take hold in any countries outside the land of the rising sun.

Moving right along, Ys featured combat where you simply moved your hero in the direction of the enemy, slammed into him/her/it, delivered damage according to your equipped weapon, and hopefully survived to tell the tale. Yes, it was really that simple. It helped to attack from indirect angles, but to my knowledge this is the only RPG in existence in which pressing only the directional pad (not even with diagonals!) in combat—not a single button—determines victory.

That said, I still think that Ys Book I and II fantastic examples of the genres. Try them, and the combat if you dare...

Tales of Phantasia marked the first use of the LMBS. Which I really loved.

There's many "Western" RPGs that have nice combat, I see everyone talking about the Eastern / Japanese style ones though

Ultima Underworld is a classic and handled weapons and magic in a rather unique and interesting way. Same goes for Daggerfall (although I never got around to playing Arena, so Daggerfall may not be that original compared to it?).

Baldur's gate and Neverwinter Nights are interesting, but of course based on AD&D rules. I liked how they sort of made it real time and turn based at the same time (IIRC from NWN at least, haven't really played it much).

But these aren't exactly turn based combat games, so maybe not quite what Racket had in mind.

Personally I liked Shadow Hearts battle sistem with its judgement ring, useful to train you reflex

I really enjoyed the FFVIII system of junctions. It added a nice aspect to normal RPG armor upgrades. Also I enjoy the Terranigma Jewelry box system of switching weapons, magic, armor etc. Its a way of streamlining the menu and the game without having an obvious action box.

I can honestly say I have not experienced a single Final Fantasy combat or play mechanic in the past 10 years that has been any kind of valuable. There have been some unique takes on things, but they've all been more gimmicky than truly functional or revolutionary.