Jrpg Jungle

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...

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...

During September, apart from playing some of the usual suspects and small bits of other games, I felt like I was playing the waiting game. The first new release I was picking up since God Wars: Future Past was coming out at the end of September and since I missed playing new stuff, I was really excited and spent most of the month anticipating that fateful day. But I couldn’t just play nothing until then, so I did my best to get into the games I’ve been trying to complete throughout the year, along with some DLC and demos to satisfy the need to play something new. With a mix of various series I love and new ones I hope will keep me interested, here are the JRPGs I played in September. Feel free to watch the video version here! JRPG of the month: Persona 2 I’ve been waiting for a while, but I’m please to say Persona 2’s story has finally hooked me. After a tension-filled timed dungeon and another that revealed a big secret about what was going on in the story, I find myself ready to pla...

I love Final Fantasy XV on PS4 . I love it enough to have played it for almost 200 hours. I’ve watched Kingsglaive and the Brotherhood anime, played A King’s Tale , a little bit of King’s Knight and having also played the Episode Gladiolus and Prompto DLC, I’m eagerly waiting for the Episode DLC based around my favourite XV character Ignis. When they first announced the Final Fantasy XV Universe, I was ecstatic. I was in the group who loved the characters and the story of XV and was excited to get more background into some of the main group. That was until the universe kept expanding. Feel free to watch the video version here! Final Fantasy XV began as a universe from its Uncovered release date announcement event. The (intended) release date was announced, along with the anime, movie, a demo with content separate from the main story and a mobile game. The Final Fantasy XV Universe started off nothing short of beefy and gave enough to satisfy the fans who needed something to hold th...

E3 2017 wasn’t amazing for JRPG fans this year, but that doesn't mean it was without a few great JRPG announcements inserted between the usual E3 stuff. There were a few good surprise announcements in Nintendo’s show and other trailers for big titles sprinkled through the week of E3 that still made it a fun week to be looking out for game news. There are certainly some JRPGs deserving of hype that had me either excited for their story, gameplay or long off releases that I’ll be keeping in mind for awhile, so here’s a list of what I was personally excited by during E3 this year. Code Vein Code Vein is absolutely one of my top picks for E3, which is surprising since Microsoft’s conference usually isn't something I usually leave hyped. Code Vein has been described as ‘Anime Dark Souls’ by a few and I am completely okay with that as someone who hasn’t played Dark Souls despite being interested in it. Code Vein seems like the version of this game style that will get me in, with its ...

There was once a time when video games didn’t support screenshots, a dark time indeed. But enter the social media age and it’s an assumption most games will support them in some way. It’s a feature that has had its effect challenged recently, with some developers implying that a screenshot has the potential to ruin a story heavy experience. At the other end of this is Final Fantasy XV , which embraces screenshots to their fullest potential and helped make a JRPG with a lot of customisation features such as costumes and mostly a non-linear exploration feel even more personal. Feel free to watch the video version here! Since every current gen console supports taking and sharing screenshots in some way, Final Fantasy XV took this idea and ran with it, making one of the core characters, the cheerful Prompto, a photography lover and photography AI. They developed a unique AI system that takes photos in real time and at the end of the day, Prompto (like any good photographer), shows you the ...

On March 10th at 8pm, you can bet I was grinning pretty hard as my platinum trophy for Final Fantasy XV popped. Not only is it my little badge of honour for a game I've had over 100 hours of fun with, it's my first platinum trophy since 2015 and my second JRPG one since I platinumed Persona 4 Golden in 2014. Platinum trophies are my excuse to stay in worlds I don't want to leave yet, and this Final Fantasy XV trophy gave me another 60 hours of gameplay to satisfy my addiction to its open world . The extra time I spent in Final Fantasy XV going through the trophy list and finding out what I needed to do was actually pretty fun and it isn't that difficult of a platinum to get compared to my three (or more? I can't remember) playthroughs of Persona 4 Golden. Final Fantasy XV’s platinum was mostly pain free because it simply requires time and if you waited until the end game like myself to explore the open world, you'll probably find a lot of new things that you di...