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With Final Fantasy XIII hitting the shelves and fans either praising it like the second coming or others praying to God for it all to end, I thought I would bring up what would be needed in order to give the RPG genre a shot in the arm, and nowhere else would be a good place to start than listing off the things in RPGs that should die once and for all.

To start off, I think that this fascination with the "emo stock character" has gotten beyond the point where it's beating a dead horse. I can understand if a character's child/parent/significant other got killed by the main bad guy, but I don't want to see him/her cry about it for a solid portion of the game that would go great with Linkin Park .

In your opinion, what do you think just needs to die in modern RPGs?

You mean by the Spiky haired protagonist wielding a sword confronting a villain threatening the world?

Final Fantasy XII was almost a much needed refreshing change for the seires. Then they decided to make Vaan the main character because they didn't think japan would like a game where the main character wasn't a moody prettyboy. (Seriously that's why Vaan was in the game).

Just get rid of Nomura, at least then I can look at a JRPG without cringing.

How about more emphasis on gameplay?
FFXIII is very pretty, but I'd rather have more battle scenes
then movie scenes.

Make it more like Persona 3 and 4. Those two games are easier to relate to for example the locations somewhat exist, it has a more mature setting and plot, choices do matter (dating wise), and awesome game play. I have a better shot of being in Japan than on a aerial fortress high about the clouds.

AppleQueso wrote:Final Fantasy XII was almost a much needed refreshing change for the seires. Then they decided to make Vaan the main character because they didn't think japan would like a game where the main character wasn't a moody prettyboy. (Seriously that's why Vaan was in the game).

Just get rid of Nomura, at least then I can look at a JRPG without cringing.

Yeah, but a few hours in you forget Vaan's even in the party. Just as soon as you get past that damn "I'm Captain Bosch!" part.

Emo feminine main characters need to go or be toned down a bit. Let's move back to a stronger lead character that doesn't have so much emotional baggage to deal with. Sub characters can hold those traits if they must be in game. Also the lolita stile as of late has really worn thin. I am an anime fan but I think my tastes are not progressing any more with modern anime works. I know it's popular in Japan but I really liked the older 90s-early 00s style of more rugged type characters. For example characters from Shining Force III or Grandia.

Maybe my gaming roots are a tad bit old. I still enjoy modern RPGs but I wish they all weren't written to be so "deep". Not every game needs to be overly epic or give us ground breaking concepts and game play every time. I think RPGs have reached a point where nothing's really new anymore so why reinvent the wheel every time a game is released? I'm completely fine with an RPG that is fun but knows how to take its self lightly. Can we have another Skies of Arcadia already?

It's not really what needs to die in RPGs, but what needs to die in RPG fans.
W or J RPGS. Stop it. It's ridiculous to categorize a game or other media by where it came from. I know that Japanese RPGs and Western RPGs are (for the most part) different, but what do you do if a Western developer develops an RPG similar to Final Fantasy or Xeno Gears or if a Japanese developer develops an RPG similar to Elder Scrolls or the original Fallout?

IF you are referring to JRPG's, yeah I do agree with some of the above - give us a new age of heroes instead of following what was done before. I haven't played FF XIII yet, but my bro does like Lighting as a main hero, but ponders if she would developed further than Terra from FF VI.

Also, with HD and fully 3-D, I think random battles should be eliminated completely, unless someone wants to do a retro-themed JRPG, or some kind of in-game situation. I don't know if JP game developers will try to include multiple in-game branching and ending such as featured in SMT: Persona, Suikoden, to expand the storyline more and add re-playability.

people get on about the emo pretty boy stock character for rpgs, but the bald, gruff tan space marine is just as overdone as well. In regards to Vaan, as far as I'm concerned Balthier was the main character. Although after a certain point I stopped caring and was playing to stare at Fran's ass. Final Fantasy X at least gave Tidus some depth despite in reality Yuna being the main character. I think that the rpg world needs more badass protagonists like Kaim from Lost Odyssey.

Also, grinding. Grinding needs to die. Forever. If I have to spend more than three hours chasing down wild pigs in order to defeat Killfuck Soulshitter over in the tower, screw it. If you don't run away from every regular encounter, you should be able to defeat bosses normally. The Nippon Ichi games were especially bad about it, getting a character to level 9999, then reincarnating him back to 1 and repeating 12 times. Where's the fun in that? If I wanted to mindlessly watch numbers go up as things die, I'd play world of warcraft.