Anime Poll: CRPGs and the Japanese Question.

[koyota]

What remakes? You have a list & links?

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.square_enix.android_googleplay.FFPR&hl=en&gl=US

There`s the link for Final Fantasy, just click on the Square-Enix list of games and you can get to the rest of them.

Almost all of the 8/16-Bit remakes have had auto-battle / 2x speed added to them.
The final fantasy ones have the touch and go support.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Japanese Personal Computers aren't the same thing as Western / Eastern European Personal Computers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_personal_computers#Japanese_computers

A key difference between early Western and Japanese systems was the latter's higher display resolutions (640x200 from 1979, and 640x400 from 1985) in order to accommodate Japanese text. Japanese computers also from the early 1980s employed Yamaha FM synthesis sound boards which produce higher quality sound. Japanese computers were widely used to produce video games, though only a small portion of Japanese PC games were released outside of the country.

Maybe it's unfair to classify them as consoles, but they aren't the same thing as the computers we were using at the time either.

The graphics on these games are incredible, check out the Codex thread on them, but as we know, better graphics capability doesn't always mean better gameplay.

 

[Bruma Hobo]

Japanese Personal Computers aren't the same thing as Western / Eastern European Personal Computers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_personal_computers#Japanese_computers

A key difference between early Western and Japanese systems was the latter's higher display resolutions (640x200 from 1979, and 640x400 from 1985) in order to accommodate Japanese text. Japanese computers also from the early 1980s employed Yamaha FM synthesis sound boards which produce higher quality sound. Japanese computers were widely used to produce video games, though only a small portion of Japanese PC games were released outside of the country.

Maybe it's unfair to classify them as consoles, but they aren't the same thing as the computers we were using at the time either.

The graphics on these games are incredible, check out the Codex thread on them, but as we know, better graphics capability doesn't always mean better gameplay.

However, many Japanese games made for their personal computers were actually pretty close to western PC classics; companies like Koei, Nihon Falcom and Alicesoft have a strong PC pedigree, and among them there were many other developers, unfortunately unknown to us. Their console apocaypse happened in the late 80's though, while in the west it was in the early/mid 00's and halted thanks to digital distribution and steam, but it was all the same, the moment western developers tried to cater to the console crowd their products immediately degenerated into action games with cinematic storytelling. It really makes you think, huh?

The thing is that whether you think it failed or succeeded, Dragon Quest was originally conceived as a union between Wizardry-style combat and Ultima-style exploration. Yes, the subsequent entries better fulfill this ambition (especially DQ3), but DQ1 is still tightly designed with a fun world to explore and secrets to find. I am unsure why you would call it a storyfag game when the story is extremely barebones. I also think that you’re wrong on the plot/gameplay matching each other. It is not divorced from its systems at all. The gameplay is very simple, and in my opinion, elegant. It’s nowhere near as rigid as you’re implying, except in the case of character development because as you said, it is set in stone. While this likely disqualifies it for many people as being an RPG, it is still an elegantly designed game. It still has RPG combat, and great exploration.

It's clearly inspired by both Wizardry and Ultima 3 (although I would argue that there's more Questron than Ultima in there both mechanically and plotwise, just look at this), and yeah, gameplay options are scarce but kind of impactful, something that can be described as elegant. But as I said, it doesn't scratch the same itches.
While Wizardry and Ultima tried to make simulationistic environments so players could live their own adventures through their choices, Dragon Quest deliverately constrained these options to tightly portray its version of the hero's journey, where the player's just being told the story.

I personally don't like the original Dragon Quest, but that doesn't mean I that I can't appreciate what they were trying to accomplish: I actually like Dragon Quest 2 more than 3 because I'm not really that interested in a pseudo-Wizardry for beginners, while I find the anime feel of DQ2 quite charming (the second half of the game is a mess, though).