Are there any jRPGs before the PS2 SMT era that have strategies

>>3589021

Gameplay is way too dated and abstract in these games. Avoid most of them.

Try Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre and Front Mission 3.

>>3589023
>abstract

What do you mean

>tactics games

That is not what I'm looking for. It's not even really the same genre. (And I already played FFT and I started Tactics Ogre)

>job/character/stance designed to inflict status in a game
>status attacks are useless

Great job.

Also,

>abilities with special secondary effects, like stealing
>has less than 5% proc chance

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest gets a bad rep, but at least it dropped the pretense that you had to do anything more than clobber enemies with your strongest attack to win.

The Final Fantasy 7+ games have a lot of character customization and some encounters that have weaknesses that go beyond attacks that deal extra damage.

>>3589021
PS2 era of RPG's I don't recall ever being exceptionally hard as an adult, however;

Phantasy Star 4
Treasure Hunter G
Can't remember which Suikoden
Bahamuts Lagoon
Pretty much all SRPGs but that's a different genre
Parasite Eve
SaGa Frontier II if you want to beat the final boss anyways
Seiken Densetsu III
Fuck remembering something that was challenging as a reasoning adult is hard
Baten Kaitos: Origins
Jade Cocoon to a lesser extent
7th saga
All PS1 and lower era SMT's
Chocobo's Dungeon 2 (all chunsoft RPG's really)
Valkyrie Profile
And Maybe MAYBE:
Xenogears and
Chrono Cross


Thing is, the further back you go the more basic you get. I think as a whole I enjoyed the RPGs of the Fifth gen compared to the 6th gen.

>>3589035
I disagree for various reasons, no final fantasy is particularly hard for an adult with cognitive skills.

>>3589021
>hitting enemies with strong attacks and healing when you are low on health

That's like 99% of games right there m8

>>3589038
You say they are hard, but you don't explain why you think they are. I remember dying in some RPGs with stupidly simplistic combat because I didn't load up on enough healing items or I avoided too many encounters.

>>3589042
Which is why I'm asking for the 1% that aren't like that. There ARE games that require decision making that involves preventing or dispelling status effects, pushing around party members on a grid, buffing/debuffing wars, deciding whether it's worth it to heal your party member this turn, or focus on re-applying status for the next two. Sadly, I can't think of any games before Nocturne that were like that. Again, tactics games are a different genre for the purposes of this argument.

>>3589045
What you want an explanation for each? Lucky for you I'm busy procrastinating the entirety of the shit I need to do today. I'll explain the ones I remember in depth.

>Phantasy Star 4
Strategy is hard
Bosses are hard
No strategy guide will save you from this bullshit

>Treasure Hunter G
Plays like a pseudo SRPG with all that involves. Think Arc the Lad before arc the lad.

>Parasite Eve
Real time movement, combat uses an ATB bar, enemies have resistances you must respect later on. Post(?) game tower can get bananas.

>SaGa Frontier II
100% preperation. (relatively) Limited grinding opportunities in a SaGa game which means that if you save your game before the final dungeon and find out you aren't prepared, you aren't beating the game.

>Seiken Densetsu III
Action

Baten Kaitos: Origins
>The card system is fun as fuck. Making a right dieck is all the strategy and they work that system well

>Jade Cocoon
Creature battle game, not too hard but it's strategy is almost exclusively elemental weakpoints

>Chocobo's Dungeon
Roguelike

>Valkyrie Profile
Action battle system. And you still must respect the preparation phase. Even for a reasoning adult that true ending gets fucking rough.

>Xenogears
Some fights are hard. No real grinding because your gear parts are locked by story progress. Most fights are like a puzzle you'll end up having to figure out... Until the second disc where the only thing hard is the final boss.

>Chrono Cross
HolyDrgSwd pretty easy otherwise

I'm missing a shit ton of RPG's that actually showed me the gameover screen. I'll get back to this thread some time later today when I remember them.

>>3589038
>I disagree for various reasons, no final fantasy is particularly hard for an adult with cognitive skills.

Well, the question wasn't for hard games, but for games that aren't simplistic. FF7, 8, and 9 definitely stand out because you have this plethora of skills and abilities to build strategies around. Whether these strategies are obvious or even required is a different question, but it sure as hell is more involved than "hit ice guy with fire."

>>3589054
Ah good point. No yeah you're right.

>>3589054
Yeah, there is a reason handicap runs are so popular with Final Fantasy games. There are crazy options to beat encounters with unconventional means. The same is true for Pokémon games.

Star Ocean 2
Star Ocean 1 to a lesser extent but the SNES version is buggy as shit and the PSP version is toned down in difficulty
Valkyrie Profile
Chrono Cross to some extent (it's a very easy game, even if the system has complexity, most players go through it without using the more nuanced features at all)

>>3589053
Chrono Cross definitely had some strategic elements to it. The only fight I remember being actually difficult though was that optional boss who gave you the best weapon in the game when you defeated him.

>>3589038
>Treasure Hunter G
Can confirm this. Almost finished it now, after having laying it around for almost a year. Really nice strategy RPG. But not too much strategy/tactic game so that i still like it. Most strategy games i really get bored pretty fast.
But this has a very nice balance.

>>3589078
Yeah it's one of those games I can throw on and not feel too much of the pressure.

>>3589045
>I remember dying in some RPGs with stupidly simplistic combat because I didn't load up on enough healing items or I avoided too many encounters.
You're more stupid than those rpgs then if you admittedly can't deal with what you yourself consider simplistic combat.
>>3589054
>Whether these strategies are obvious or even required is a different question

If you talk about games being hard, then no, it's not a different question at all,
the problem is FF in general doesn't require much thought, the games builds the characters for you and when it doesn't it's all about grinding the OP classes or getting enough levels to beat the boss of the week, coupled with linear progression, lackluster character design(in terms of stats and mechanics) and questionable battle design, yes, it is a problem, arguably a big one.
There's a big difference between "everything works", "most of these strategies might work depending on how much you're willing to focus on and develop them" and "this strategy completely and effortlessly breaks the game, but if you want to waste some time you can do this instead".
I sure can play FFVIII without playing card games and just drawing and slowly upgrading my weapons or not upgrading at all, the game's so easy it's perfectly beatable, but I can also choose to farm cards and become untouchable for the rest of the game in a few hours.
Mind you, this isn't a problem exclusive to FF, many other RPGs have the same exact problem, it's not easy to design a good system, but saying that a game gives you tons of ways to solve a problem isn't necessarily a good thing depending on how it handles it, because when every or too many strategies work there's no strategy at all, FF is one of those RPGs that has this crippling problem, but it's a light RPG series so I don't think it was even a problem to the designers, at least after FFII.

>>3589091
>at least after FFII
I should give special mention to you the 3DS version of III. Which turns the final dungeon into Super R-Type with all the no savepoints you'll have to deal with. "throwing my strongest shit" at something is considerably harder when all the enemies compared to the orignal:
Have more attacks
Do more damage
Have 6x to 10x the health
and fight you in a boss marathon.

>>3589091
>You're more stupid than those rpgs then if you admittedly can't deal with what you yourself consider simplistic combat.

I'm stupid for not meeting the invisible and arbitrary level requirement for bosses? I'm stupid for thinking 10 healing herbs was enough when I should have brought 30?
The game does not best me when I see exactly what is going on, I understand exactly why I'm losing, and I come back with just a few levels higher and beat the boss with the same strategy.

>>3589095
FFIII remake's final dungeons isn't really hard besides the final boss.

>>3589104
No? My memory must be fucked to ship.

>>3589106
Or maybe you were underlevelled. Or had a bad job set-up. Who knows! I beat FFIII remake twice, and I breezed through the final dungeon up until Dark Cloud, which killed me once on my first playthrough. I also beat the superboss on my second playthrough.

>>3589021
kinda hard to make a strategic game in a genre where most obstacles can be overcome by grinding levels (and if they can't, why even have levels in the first place?)
even SMT is mostly trial and error until you memorize your enemies' elemental weaknesses
enemies are also limited by their AI, so what chance do they stand against an adult human mind?
most of the challenge comes from resource management

I really welcome any gimmick that changes up the formula whether it's ATB (FFIV, Grandia), timed hits (Super Mario RPG, Legend of Dragoon, Mother 3), cards (Baten Kaitos Origins), action based levelling (FFII, SaGa) or something else entirely

try Vagrant Story or DS FFIV and III for some challenge

>>3589113
>(and if they can't, why even have levels in the first place?)

Levels are tied to unlocking new abilities, which allows for more complex combat, it enhances the storytelling and experience by making your characters stronger, it gives you the satisfaction of easily beating enemies on earlier areas, the game might tie levelling to character customization, such as giving you freely distributable stat point, it might incentivise you to switch up your party by only giving exp to participating members, or otherwise incentivise you to build a core party.... many, many, many reasons. Also, another important point is that levels are a difficulty modifier that punishes players who can't beat the game with strategy. Good players will strategize, players who struggle will have to grind.

>even SMT is mostly trial and error until you memorize your enemies' elemental weaknesses

Do you mean pre-Nocturne? Because for Nocturne and beyond that is barely the case. You can always look up what abilities your enemy has, and a smart player won't die to an enemy just because they don't remember their specific ability.

>enemies are also limited by their AI, so what chance do they stand against an adult human mind?

Yeah, that's why chess simulators are only played by children.

>>3589123
>chess
terrible example
you also can't level in chess, there are no stats and both you and your opponent have the same "abilities" (or units) at your disposal

>>3589128
You've missed the point he's making completely thanks to splitting hairs.

>>3589128
How is that a terrible example? You claimed AI can't beat an adult human, and I gave an example of a game where that clearly is not the case.
Actually, my argument is sort of pointless because yours is. A jRPG does not necessarily need AI that is "smarter" than you. AI can be super predictable but complex, because good boss encounters by their nature have special strenghths and weaknesses that make the battle naturally uneven. The point is that you come up with a strategy that the AI can't beat. Puzzles literally lack any sort of AI and an adult can still struggle with them.

>>3589138
>You claimed AI can't beat an adult human
yeah, your average jrpg enemy will always be at a disadvantage because of its limited moveset and AI, it can't adapt to whatever new strategy you've devized or if you've spent an ungodly amount of time grinding

that's hardly the case in chess

SMT isn't complex tho
It's 99% spamming elemental weaknesses

>>3589156
Don't forget triple buffing, because triple buffing breaks the game.

>>3589098
>I'm stupid for not meeting the invisible and arbitrary level requirement for bosses? I'm stupid for thinking 10 healing herbs was enough when I should have brought 30?
Yeah.
>The game does not best me when I see exactly what is going on
No shit, everything's easy as long as you see what's going on.
>>3589123
>Yeah, that's why chess simulators are only played by children.
Granted that I agree with your post, the problem with chess and other such tabletop games is that they work on a completely different framework from RPGs, even compared to tabletop RPGs.
Chess works on a strict ruleset based on making nuances in a closed, black and white environment, a horse will always be a horse, it will not be able to move in any other manner, you'll always lose if you lose the king, pawns can only go forward and beat pieces diagonally and so on.
RPGs work in an open environment with dynamic variables, you can make a barbarian, a cleric, a monk, whatever you want and you can also customize them to a degree, you have them interact with a world in many different ways, you have tons of variables that continuously blur the gameplay.
Basically, Chess is balanced thanks to a rigid moveset that allows function nuances without significantly altering the preset game balance, RPGs have a more open and modifiable system, so the rule enforcement isn't as strong, even if both rely on math it is significantly more difficult to make a good RPG AI.
What you should do instead is giving the RPG a more concrete and functional system and a better set of tools, you don't need a super refined and complex AI, Chess AI's aren't even that complex, it's just that they work on a much better and less "obtuse" framework.

>>3589152
>it can't adapt to whatever new strategy you've devized

That's the point, though. That is LITERALLY the point. You are supposed to come up with a strategy that the enemy can't deal with. Although in the end of the day there isn't any real reason why a jRPG's AI shouldn't be able to counter-act your strategy. The fact is, however, that the AI is not supposed to be super smart, but rather a complex but recognizable algorithm.

>or if you've spent an ungodly amount of time grinding
>DMC3 is bad because you can just grind healing items and tank all bosses
>Dark Souls is easy because you can just summon friends to beat the game for you

>>3589159
>hurr hurr that idiot ran into the invisible trap what a moron

>>3589027
>>abstract
>What do you mean

What is supposed to be happening:

>team comes across monsters. They battle.

What this event is represented in the game as:

>characters stand on one side, monsters on the other and trade attacks

ie these games are HIGHTLY abstract representations of what is supposed to be going on. So much so it mostly just boils down to two sets of numbers fighting.

>>3589159
>more concrete and functional system and a better set of tools
Double edged sword if you ask me. RPGs that have too many variables are no longer enjoyable to play. If we can pull anything from the 4th and 5th gen era of RPGs in comparison to now is that you CAN have a more smoother difficulty curve with less substantial tools.

>>3589157
Later SMT bosses usually have anti-buff abilities or put you under such pressure that you'll think twice before you buff. This actually often brings an additional nuance to the game where you lure the enemy into wasting an attack by dispelling buffs instead of attacking.

>>3589162
>invisible trap
Are you playing a rogue-likes or something? What RPG even uses hidden traps that you don't already know are there?

I was going to say Evolution but even that bridges off the boss gate from everything else.

>>3589163
A lot of people don't mind abstract representations of games at all. Creative gamers may actually cherish abstract representations of games because it allows them to imagine their own version of what is happening.

>>3589168
I didn't mean literal invisible traps.

>>3589163
>ie these games are HIGHTLY abstract representations of what is supposed to be going on. So much so it mostly just boils down to two sets of numbers fighting.

I certainly don't visualize two sets of numerical values clashing when I play Breath of FIre IV. Probably because presentation and sound mean every bit as much to a game as gameplay.

>>3589163
I find it a lot more jarring when a character performs the identical AwsumCool animation for the 100th time in the exact same manner without a bit of variation. I find the objection of "abstraction" baffling, to be honest. All games work with abstraction, even if the HUD is completely hidden. You are not actually supposed to imagine that humans can sprint exactly 7 seconds under all circumstances and won't notice a someone crouching in half shadow inside a candle-lit room. People generally just tend to give games a pass if they are more cinematic or actively represent more of the action.

>>3589021
>combo systems for even stronger attacks

Xenogears has that.

https://youtu.be/yL-_0Yo4ZMQ

>>3589164
That's what I was hinting at when I said "obtuse", you don't need too many variables, you just need good a good set of variables.

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>>3589179
>>3589173
>>3589170
I think he is referring to the fact that the game provide you these numbers but you have no way to understand how they work (ie: prefer the item that gives you +5 dexterity vs +5 to strength?, can you actually feel the difference?). A true abstract game would be Legend of Zelda, which doesn't display you any number, yet you can crealy understand your options.

What more could you want than making numbers go higher?

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>>3589053
>Xenogears
>Until the second disc where the only thing hard is the final boss.

Did you forget about pic related?

>>3589227
By your example Zelda is less abstract than the JRPGs talked about in this thread.

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>>3589504
I don't see it in that way. Because the numbers used in FF, given a formula, actually means something. Whereas zelda only provides you a simple graphic.

How much attack does a certain weapon gives you in FF? you can actually check out, but maybe you cannot make sense of it because the different is little.
In Zelda, you are not provided any stat. Blue sword vs Red sword. A different thing is that, in zelda, because there are fewer options very distinct between them, by experimenting you can understand which item is better, whereas in FF differences are so small that it won't affect your chars in the short term. With FF, improvements happens little by little.

>>3589021
If you try to do low level runs, you need some good strats.

>>3589021
Just to clarify: do you consider resource management and pre-battle preparation to be strategy, or are you only looking for games where the individual battles have a strategy element to them?

If it's the latter, I'm not sure I can think of a single game that qualifies.

>>3589021
I've noticed if I avoid excessive grinding, I have to use more strategy and almost every game is more interesting than if I was simply overpowered.

It's a hard temptation to resist, but I think it's worth it.

>>3589021
Your post implies that the PS2 SMT games have complex strategies, could you elaborate a bit more about that? What makes them complex?

As far as I know, JRPGs with good gameplay are generally classified as SRPGs and ARPGs.

I suppose you could say Phantasy Star IV and Persona 2 are a bit better than the rest due to emphasis on buffs, fusion attacks, team building, etc. but they're extremely easy so it doesn't really matter.

>>3589053
>>Xenogears
>Some fights are hard.
EtherDoubler was ridiculously powerful, especially with Elly's Aerods attack which did ether damage without using EP. Plus it stacks with other buffs, and EP is easy to restore after combat. Boss fights were easy with EtherDoublers.

>>3589608
The push-turn system adds a good deal of complexity by giving you a lot of options in deciding who to give turns to. You may decide to give a second turn to a character at the cost of letting another character lose a turn, either to maximize buffs, or damage, or getting additional healing in. Because of the variety and strengths and weaknesses, it is plausible, and in fact likely, that you will eventually have a character who is weak to a certain type of enemy, but who you have trained to have abilities that will be valuable enough to make the use worthwhile. Because hitting weaknesses gives you additional turns, you may be led to attack respawning adds, or prioritize attacking large enemies over adds -- the choices here are not always obvious. In other cases, you may opt to not relieve a character of a status effect because you have the option to skip the character's turn every round. When you are challenging a boss (especially secret bosses), you can come up with multiple strategies to beat them, and they may easily have strategies that counter-act crutches that you personally relied on, like buffs. In fact, a lot of enemies get harder if you decide to buff or debuff them (which you can even use to your advantage, by exploting the changes in their AI). When facing a hard boss, you will have to switch up your available abilities to come up with the best strategy, and applying that strategy may have its own unexpected hindrances. In some cases, you might have to get back with better abilities at another point (or grind, if you feel you need to).

>>3589021
A lot of strategy could be added to these simplistic jRPGs by making everything limited (e.g., shops carry limited items, monsters are limited to prevent grinding and farming, limited inventory space, etc.) Because everything limited, the player's choices have a huge impact on the game, which makes the gameplay much more interesting.

>>3589645
And then you get that fucker Mot.

>>3589614
Ether Amp was even crazier in Xenosaga. Slap it on something, boost Momo's stats, and STAND THE FUCK BACK

>>3589053
>xenogears: some fights are hard
the last and only time i played xenogears i fucking loved it. i was like 14 and i got super into the story, like it was the greatest story ever told and super original (i don't watch anime). i got to the second disk and couldn't win the boss fights. i got to the third final BS boss and i was low on health with no items and i refused to go back to an earlier save back on disk one. i just said fuck it and turned it off, never played again. fuck that game. the last disk is a visual novel as far as im concerned

>>3589670
The grinding and farming are the pillars of JRPG, you cannot avoid them. Some games like Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy impose a limit in your inventory.

Grinding may be less interesting, but adding more compelling combats would force you to reduce the number of encounters, and it eventually would work like any other tactic rpg. JRPG relies a lot in encounters to fill blank spaces (journey, dungeon exploration)

>>3589731
its an outdated mechanic though. i honestly can't go back and play old final fantasy / dq games anymore. the combat only really exists because of limitations in the hardware, these days it doesn't make sense to do when you can have visible enemies that don't pop up randomly, that you fight in real time. its why ff xv changed the battle system.

>>3589731
Only the worst RPGs will make grinding compulsory (superbosses not included). The better RPGs will let you overcome all challenges by simply facing a certain fraction of random/regular encounters. That fraction doesn't have to be small, but it should account for the possibility that you avoid some battles. Personally, I think games should make bosses feasably beatable if you only face 30% to 50% of encounters. If the bosses are the designed well, it should come down to whether your set-up is right rather than if your numbers are big enough, anyway. I think FF8 gave you an ability at a certain point to turn off encounters entirely.

>>3589731
>The grinding and farming are the pillars of JRPG
If you suck

>>3589765
Or if the game sucks. Digimon World 3 was notorious for this shit.

>>3589775
I dropped Suikoden when I realized the game wouldn't let me progress unless I faced every encounter I ran into. Not that the combat seemed that interesting. Breath of Fire 4 also seemed to think my level was too low to beat the final boss (which seems to take 40 minutes even if your level is "appropriate). Not that it stopped me. It was the only time in the game I had to use strategy (which barely worked).

>>3589765
So, when you are travelling from point A to point B and you encounter a new enemig, what do you do? press run?

>>3589804
Grinding is the process of purposefully engaging in encounters to raise your level. If you simply kill monsters you'd run into anyway, you are just playing the game.

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>>3589021
Arcana.

first person dungeon crawler. Had to manage MP to reach and beat the boss, and heavily relied on an elemental affinity system.

>>3589021

Final Fantasy IV was designed to be simplistic. It was a walk back from the job system introduced in final fantasy III that received mixed reactions from fans partially due to its complex nature.

I am playing through the Final Fantasy V (J) english translation now. I think the game is far superior to IV because it gives you a lot more options on what skills to bring into battle depending on which jobs you master and what role you select for your character. Many of the bosses are designed to be beaten by a certain character class. The bosses are also more complex than simply stocking up on certain anti-status effect items or being intelligent enough to cast fire spells on an ice boss. There are certainly drawbacks to the job system, though. The characters are cookie cutter and have very little backstories which cripples any kind of plot.

So my advice is to play FFV or FFIII for more of a challenge.

SMT espcially the PS2 era SMT are the best jrpgs out there

>>3589832
I played the remake of FFIII, and I only ever felt the need to switch jobs for a specific boss against that one boss who is super weak against Dragoons. Besides that, I could comfortably stick with the same set-up without any hassle. From what I've read, the original is even more limited in some respects, with a lot of jobs being straight-up better versions of earlier jobs. In the remake that's only true for white mage and black mage, which get better versions later on.

>>3589670
That's one thing I like about Dream Master. All of your resources are limited, so each area becomes like a puzzle to be solved. The combat itself is simplistic, but deciding when to engage an enemy and what resources you can spare in order to defeat it can take some thought.

>>3589053
>the only thing hard is the final boss.
The hardest thing in disc 2 is staying awake through the rushed clusterfuck writing and storyboards.

I heard somewhere that romancing saga 2 is really hard. Could someone elaborate on that? Is there a lot of depth to the battle system or is it just "hard" in the sense that you're at the mercy of the RNG?

>>3589021
Romancing SaGa.

>>3589819
Yeah, you definitely had to know what you were doing with the rotating support character cast.

>>3590154
Enemies are consistently dangerous throughout the entire game and fighting them through attacking with your best attack + healing is a huge waste of resources compared to using abilities that exploit what your party is good at and what enemies are weak to. On top of that, there's a strategic layer to the game which WILL make the game borderline unwinnable if you mismanage it by doing stupid bullshit like grinding off of weak enemies or ignoring learning higher levels of magic.

>>3589021
Games where you can customize your party can become very interesting if you limit yourself to certain limits. FF V is a good example of this: you can beat the entire game with just 1 White Mage and the rest of your party dead, but you actually have to do a lot of planning and think up new ways on how to approach battles.

>>3589819
>playing this over 10 years ago
>it's alright, definitely a decent game to kill time with
>run into a boss and lose an hour of progress
>never play again

>>3589021
The strategy in classic RPGs is in resource management, not induvidual battles.

'Should I head back to town or should I risk it and press on?' These are the sort of decisions you'' be making.

Phantasy Star 4 is hard your first time, for sure, but god damn it's a great game, play it anyways

>>3589159
>>I'm stupid for not meeting the invisible and arbitrary level requirement for bosses? I'm stupid for thinking 10 healing herbs was enough when I should have brought 30?
>Yeah.
Son, are you saying that kind of shit never happened to you? You're that cool or what? Calm the fuck down, his point stands true. Some RPGs are hard even if they're simplistic, if only because you need to grind to a certain level which can't be known until you've tried it. Trial and error you know.

>>3590589
>Some RPGs
But not most. Hell in general most of the time, as long as you don't run from any encounters you'll be safe from most woes. It's only recently in this DRPG heavy age where that's the rule rather than the exception.

>>3590154
>Is there a lot of depth to the battle system
Quite, though not as much as other games in the series..
The problem isn't just that battles are hard, the game itself is structured in a way that you must plan for both short term and long term success.
If you pick too many battles, as in simply entering a battle, the enemies wil quickly become too strong for you to deal with, if you don't fight enough enemies you'll not be strong enough to keep up with bosses, then depending on your choices and game history you also can trigger stronger forms of the main bosses that will rape you in one turn if you don't have the tools and strategy to deal with them, no matter how strong you are.
Then there's a whole other layer of tactics that revolves around developing your party repeatedly, creating facilities, smithing weapons and equipment or simply hunting for loot and developing magic, which is vital for not getting destroyed late on in the game, all of the above costs money and money is a semi limited resource since you can only get money from chests and taxes, chests are a finite resource, unless you're playing the recent remaster, and taxes only get decent once you have enough territory, which means beating story bosses, and taxes only come in by fighting battles, which brings you back to the previous dilemma of balancing battles.

It is considered one of the hardest SFC RPG in japan for a reason, if you play it like other casual RPGs you'll be very familiar with the New Game option in no time because the game will fuck you over, it's all a matter of planning and understanding how the game works, it's not impossible, even if there's stuff like the final boss getting seven actions per turn and spamming the strongest attacks in the game, it just requires thought and knowledge of the system.
It's a standard SaGa game, albeit more strict and on a complex, invisible countdown system, it's best not to start the series with this one.

>>3590695
This really intimidates me but i want to play it someday. Is RomaSaga 3 so fucked up as well?

>>3590696
>Is RomaSaga 3 so fucked up as well?
Nah, it's actually one of the best for beginners because it has the battle complexity of 2 without the balls to the wall difficulty.
It works on a radically different structure though, so it won't prepare you for 2 outside of making you familiar with the basic rules of the battle system, which is a polished and slightly more streamlined version of 2, but with a unique commander mode on top of it, you know The Last Remnant? It was made by one of Kawazu's co-designers which came up with RomaSaGa 3's Commander mode.
It's a great game, a bit too easy for the SaGa standard but one of the best to get you into the series together with Frontier.

>>3590703
I just tried to play Unlimited Saga once, but i guess that one has little to do with the others.

Grinding can destroy you in RomaSaga 3 too?
I have the bad habit of grinding in every RPG i play.

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Try 5th gen era SMT, specifically the Devil Summoner games.

>>3590730
>Grinding can destroy you in RomaSaga 3 too?
The BR doesn't go up nearly as fast in RomaSaGa 3, and most tougher common enemies are relegated as secret or rare encounters, it is better for you not to grind in general because BR is still a thing and if you don't know how to get waza or good equipment fast you'll spend hours grinding with little actual result.

You can up your weapon proficiencies up to high levels, but if you don't have a good formation/equipment/waza and the appropriate characters it's pointless.
The best way to get all that stuff is to know where to look for it, recruiting certain characters give you access to certain formations, only certain characters can spark certain waza and all the good equipment is either found in chests or is forged with materials you find in chests or from certain bosses.
In short, it's not like you outright can't grind, but if you want to you must know how and when to do that, mindlessly chasing up enemies around and beating them up is largely pointless and a waste of time.

Though you can also play it casually really, as long as you don't mind things getting rough frequently and getting wiped out by bosses, if you're a person that doesn't mind some punishment you'll hardly have problem with RomaSaGa 3, Unlimited, RomaSaGa 2 or Frontier 2 are way more strict.
I've seen many people in the /vr/ SaGa threads getting frustrated initially, the game also has a few traps for newbies, like Algernon or Harid's Greed rank, but once you get the pace it's a very newcomer friendly game, it's all about getting the right mindset, especially if you want to grind.

>>3590740
Everything sounds so weird and exotic.
There's a better game to start with SaGa?

>>3590743
Final Fantasy Legend 2 can be considered the "original" SaGa in terms of the stat system and is quite linear but the difficulty is pretty bullshit at times.

SaGa Frontier isn't as "open" as Romancing SaGa (unless you play Lute) so it's also worth a play but still a difficult game.

SaGa is just a weird and exotic series among JRPGs in general.

>>3590743
More or less this>>3590749, it all boils down to SaGa 2, RomaSaGa 3 or the first Frontier.

Frontier is probably the most exotic in terms of scenario, aesthetics and most about everything, though Unlimited is possibly even more than that, but the series itself is all about breaking and pushig forward the standards of videogame RPGs, it says a lot that the upcoming Scarlet Grace doesn't have normal dungeons and instead makes the world map as a giant, organic dungeon with dynamic events.
It's not a series for everyone, but if you can get into it it's a blast, I guess that if you're a fa/tg/uy you can appreciate it even more.

not really a jrpg but theres wizardry. The japanese liked it so much they've made clones and several spin off's which are true to the original game. JRPG's like FF and DQ are essentially watered down versions of wizardry made for the masses.

>>3593160
Anon show me wizardry's overworld map :)

>>3593181
Show us the overworld map of Mana Khemia, Final Fantasy X, XII, and Tactics, Disgaea, Shin Megami Tensei, Atelier, SaGa Frontier...

Overworld maps are not as common as you think.

>>3590749
>Final Fantasy Legend 2 can be considered the "original" SaGa

What about FF Legend 1?
Is it not part of the SaGa series? Or is it just a rough draft like Akalabeth where the next game is where the series actually begins?

>and taxes only get decent once you have enough territory, which means beating story bosses,

So I guess romancing is meant in the sense of Romance of the 3 Kingdoms then.

Why is the G in SaGa capitalized?

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8KB, 26x26px

>>3593331
>Or is it just a rough draft like Akalabeth where the next game is where the series actually begins?
Pretty much, many things from SaGa to SaGa 2 got either dropped or reworked, the first SaGa was very rough around the edges and it was an experiment at creating a system. SaGa 2 polishes the original SaGa system and sets some standards that are further elaborated in the Romancing Trilogy and the first Frontier title.
SaGa 3 is the black sheep of the series in the sense that it's basically a Final Fantasy game trying to be SaGa, the DS remake fixes that and makes it play like a SaGa game, though it's still an interesting title, for instance, it predated Chrono Trigger's "time travel" gimmick.
>So I guess romancing is meant in the sense of Romance of the 3 Kingdoms then.
Nope, originally, the Romancing stood in because of a particular quest in the first Romancing SaGa which involved an actual romance between a knight and a fair lady in which you have to help said knight, and also because it sounds cool.
All games in the Romancing Trilogy have some sort of quest that involves romance, though curiously, RomaSaGa 2's "romancing" quest doesn't have romance, there's another quest for that.
>Why is the G in SaGa capitalized?
Because it looks cool, it's like asking why characters in the series make dynamic poses like JoJo during battles, it's all about being cool and romancing, son.