Jrpg Jungle

Somehow, I’ve been writing and talking about JRPGs on the internet for a few years and I’ve still never played a Dragon Quest game. This might be because one of the first JRPGs I fell in love with in high school was Final Fantasy X since Final Fantasy is much more popular in Australia and since Final Fantasy X is a more of a modern-looking RPG, it definitely influenced the kind of aesthetics I like in JRPGs. Despite being a big fan of what some consider to be its rival series, Dragon Quest seemed interesting the first time I heard of it. Akira Toriyama’s art looks great in it which makes its aesthetic more appealing, it's got a cute slime mascot, turn-based battles and I’ve always wondered how its fantasy stories and worlds compare to others in the genre. With the English release of Dragon Quest XI coming up soon, I’m strongly reminded again that I still haven’t touched this series, so here’s a list of games in the series I want to try to help me get into this classic JRPG series. ...

As DLC tied to my favourite character of Final Fantasy XV and two satisfying previous DLC episodes, I had high expectations for Episode Ignis’ story. As expected based on the last two Episodes, Episode Ignis gives unique fighting mechanics to Ignis to suit his fighting style and reveals what happened in a part of the game he was absent. Unique to Episode Ignis however is a special Extra Verse portion that puts a new twist on big moments of Ignis’s story that had a fan of Ignis and XV’s core story like myself captivated in all the right ways. Delivering the kind of quality expected from the last few DLC chapters coming to XV, Episode Ignis mostly delivers and is a story chapter that fans of Ignis and Final Fantasy XV won’t want to miss. Spoiler note:  Due to the nature of when Episode Ignis is set in Final Fantasy XV's story, mild spoilers may follow. Episode Ignis starts off strong in the epic Leviathan portion of Final Fantasy XV’s story and details what happened before Noctis wa...

When playing a big open world JRPG both at home and out of the house, it’s hard to imagine playing much else during the month. My December JRPG time was full of the two releases I intended to fill it with and not much else on the side, apart from finishing my November JRPG .hack//G.U. Last Recode and the very occasional stray into other games I’ve put to the side during my open world journey with Xenoblade Chronicles 2. With it being the holiday season in December though, it felt good to sink my teeth into a big open world and get immersed in mostly one game before a year full of new ones, so here are all the JRPGs I Played in December to round off 2017. JRPG of the Month: Xenoblade Chronicles 2 It’s interesting to me that I found myself immersed in another open world JRPG again during December this year. This time last year I was playing Final Fantasy XV and quickly realising the time sink it would be and I’m currently feeling that with Xenoblade Chronicles 2, but in a different way....

Since 2015, it’s been my own tradition to make a few JRPG resolutions to improve my gaming life for the year ahead. I do this to encourage myself to play the experiences I think I don’t have time for and to finally catch up with any JRPG urges I had throughout the previous year that I didn’t take the time to cater to. These resolutions always come with mixed levels of success , but they always help me improve my gaming time and are a fun way to start planning what I want to play each year. While keeping up with new releases is a challenge in itself, there are a few things in my JRPG life I’ve been wanting to do since I found some new things I liked last year and also things I’ve been wanting do for a while and never got around to. With those things in mind, these are my three JRPG resolutions for 2018. 1) Play an Atelier game In 2014, I saw the trailer for Ar nosurge and was flawed by it . First from its music, then from its stunning visuals and all together with its interesting premis...

Last year, I tried to make my JRPG Resolutions more realistic . I was over ending the year with a bunch of Resolutions I didn’t end up having time for, so I tried to be a little smarter and just do three. In hindsight, I ended up doing an unofficial resolution that I wanted to try keep up with new JRPG releases as much as possible in 2017 and I did that very well. However it also took a bunch of time away from my intended resolutions and while I think I had more success overall than failure for my 2017 JRPG Resolutions, I didn’t end up with the 100% completion I hoped for. In any case, I’m thankful for these resolutions that encouraged me to go deeper into at least one of my favourite JRPG franchises and fully completed or not, I’m happy to take what they taught me about my gaming time into 2018. 1) Play an old game from a JRPG series I would call my goal of playing an old game from a JRPG series fairly successful, even if I didn’t completely finish the game I was playing for this goal...

With a brand new Switch in hand, I entered October with pure excitement after an August and September fairly quiet on new JRPG releases. My main goals for October were to finish Blue Reflection and play my new Nintendo Switch, so I made sure to play any new Switch demo on the go that caught my eye and at home give my time to my new favourite JRPG magical girls in Blue Reflection. As usual, I also attempted to finish what I was playing before I dedicated myself to newer releases, but I let lots of little things use my time in between too meaning I didn’t get to focus on them much. I don’t regret a bit of it though as I wasn’t ever bored last month, so here are all the JRPGs I played in October. JRPG of the Month: Blue Reflection While it’s not perfect by any means, I was won over by Hinako and her magical girl friends in Blue Reflection. The emotional story was filled with great characters that I enjoyed getting to know and I was genuinely moved multiple times while playing thanks to it...

If you’re coming to Japan, forget maid cafes. Seriously. They’re overpriced and you can just look at the maids on the streets like everyone else does for free. You can also do this with a Tapioca drink in hand that you damn well know Ifrit spit a fireball into for about 600 yen if you take a detour and go to the Square Enix Cafe first. Regardless of whether or not fireballs are actually in your drink*, if you’re a fan of Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, NieR or other big Square Enix titles, the Square Enix Cafe in Akihabara is worth a visit if you’re looking for exclusive merch that you won’t always find in other stores. It even is a restaurant with regularly changing themes and corresponding foods based on their games, such as Ignis’ recipes from Final Fantasy XV or the fish caught in NieR Automata. But these are more expensive and require a booking and well, do you really want to spend your money on a delectable dish that's price is the same cost as a Moogle plushie? Of course not! T...

Tokyo Game Show this year was pretty good. Even if there wasn't an announcement that particularly blew my mind, there were enough trailers of games I was already keen for to keep my hype going hopefully until the end of the year. TGS 2017 for me is mainly just a reminder that the next 12 months are already looking fantastic, with interesting new IPs coming out, great remasters and spinoffs, and some of my favourite series getting new additions. With plenty of hope that it's given me hype that will last, these are my favourite announcements and trailers from TGS 2017. Code Vein Code Vein continues to show itself as a title to watch for JRPG fans, especially if you like the idea of Dark Souls but in an anime style. Most people know by now to expect challenging gameplay and quite a few games media sites wrote about Code Vein’s difficulty after playing it, which I’m looking forward to experiencing for the first time as someone who hasn’t played the Souls series yet as I think this ...