I'm curious if anyone thinks we will see more epic and modern JRPG and WRPGs on the iDevice platform. Right now we get roguelikes, SNES style ARPGs and other cheaper mobile style rpg's. When we will begin to see higher quality epic RPGs on the platform? Discuss...
Ravensword II will a be a full-fledged RPG (unlike the first one, which was an action/adventure game with RPG elements) and should be pretty epic. Square Enix is partnering with Media.Visions to develop an RPG (though the project seems pretty vague right now). Final Fantasy I and II are coming -- technically NES games, but the versions we're getting are actually PSP ports. There's a secret online multiplayer RPG project that should be releasing soon -- not quite epic in story, but certainly modern in form. Then there's that rumor of a Kingdom Hearts port, and a supposedly forthcoming Bethesda project... Modern epic RPGs (either J or W) are probably some of the most expensive games to produce, particularly if they're going to have the 20+ hours of gameplay that fans demand. Considering App Store economics, we're more likely to see ports from other platforms rather than original productions.
Any idea when Ravensword II hits? I heard alot of disappointing reviews on the first so I haven't picked it up. Seems like it's only 8 hours or so, which is disappointing, but then it's not really an RPG either. Is there any additional info on it? I'd like to see what they are working on. I would love to see the Final Fantasy III and IV remakes that were released on the DS. Maybe if FF 1 and 2 do well we'll see those down the pipeline. I already played and beat FF 1 and 2 on the PSX (I believe remake was falled Final Fantasy Origins), but I might purchase those just to help sales. The Bethesda project, if true, is exciting. Their games can be buggy as hell, but they are also epic. Not sure what they would put on the iPhone, but hopefully it would be something of the same quality but on a smaller scale. I hope it isn't something gimmicky like the Mass Effect game Bioware made. Not sure if we will ever reach this point, but I'd love to see some Japanese developers jump on the iPhone. Handhelds have been the huge market for JRPG's this generation, especially the DS, and I'd love see taht spill over onto the iPhone. The only issue is I'm not sure how well the iPhone sells in Japan. If it doesn't do well, that will never happen. Finally, I guess this is more evidence the App Store needs some changes. I love the fact that big time games are only a few dollars, but it definately is preventing bigger developers and major projects, especially original productions, from coming out up to this point.
Something of the caliber of a Chrono Trigger, World Ends With You, or even more recent stuff like Fallout, Mass Effect or Oblivion? I don't think so. RPG's require of a lot of man power and a big budget (well, at least if you want the game to be relevant), and that's something that not many developers are willing to go for an iPod project that has to be sold for under $9.99 and whiny kids will still complain.
Well games like Mass Effect and Fallout aren't meant to carry over to handhelds in any case. For whatever reason, JRPG's seem to fit better as a handheld, which I'd like to see. I agree that price is an issue. I'd easily pay a premium for a high quality epic JRPG on the iPhone. It may not be the optimal platform, but it'll give me a excellent game to experience on the road, in line, at work, and so on. I payed $60 without question for Mass Effect 2 and will likely do the same for Final Fantasy XIII next month, so I can easily fork out $20-30 for a high quality RPG on the iPhone if that ever happens. It's unfortunate all the screaming that would occur here though.
You'll be surprised to hear that I actually agree with you. The iDevice may get ports of the DS versions of some of those games, depending on how FF1 and FF2 do on the platform. But, under the current market conditions, I don't expect anything original of quite that scope. @txag2005: A port of an existing DS property doesn't really have to sell for $20.00 to be profitable -- the costs of adapting the game for the iDevice are much lower than those of actually developing a brand new property. Omega-F will likely cry foul, but I think that the iPhone would be an excellent platform for a turn-based JRPG. The one thing I dislike about playing console RPGs is cycling through all the options. On the DS you can at least select with a stylus, but it would be great just to tap your character, select an action, then tap on the target.
Any idea if we'll ever see changes to the App store or at least specific to gaming? I think that will be a huge step is getting more complete game experiences on the iPhone.
Frankly, I don't thing so. But who knows -- it's such a young market, pretty much anything is possible at this point. As far as JRPGs are concerned, one encouraging sign is that the iPhone is selling extremely well in Japan. Perhaps that will encourage the usual players to invest more heavily on the platform.
That is a good sign. On the other hand practically everyone in Japan owns and plays the DS, which explains why the DS is the major JRPG platform this gen. I would like to see alot of the good JRPG developers look towards the iPhone, but I'm sure there are tons of Nintendo exclusivity deals that might kill that. I know Japanese game development has shifting towards handhelds also just due to the massive cost of developing for the PS3/360, and since the iPhone is definately cheaper to develop for, maybe that will pull some over. All that is irrelvant if the App store doesn't change. Big Japanese developers aren't going to want to sell their epic RPG's for $10 a pop, especially since outside of major names like GTA/CoD, it seems like $10 games sell terribly on the App store.
They are far too short to be considered "high quality". Ravensword was decent but dungeon hunter was extremely disappointing; it would have been better if there had been a different story line for each character
Well, if you want "long" rpgs, there's always Zenonia and Inotia 2... I haven't finished either. But that's because I lost interest in them mostly. But they each have like 40 hours of gameplay.
That's called quantity over quality. Seriously, Zenonia is 90% made up of grinding. Once you play the first level you know it all. Repetitive quests and heavy grinding, no wonder many people get bored with it. Yes it was a good game when released because there was no competitor, but compared with RPG games on other consoles it just plain sucks. Even compared to mediocre jRPGs on the DS, Zenonia is nothing. Let alone Zelda, Final Fantasy or The World Ends With You.
Will the iDevice platform ever see more modern/epic RPGs? Yes, definately. But that takes time... the most time, in fact.
