FFXIII producer says FF franchise 'straddles genre,' not just a JRPG

"We're not sure what game he's playing, but early reports of the recently released FFXIII demo in Japan lead us to believe turn-based battles and spiky-haired androgynous characters are still par for the course"

Dammit joystiq, this is like the 3rd article in two days where you've said exactly what I was gonna say. Well played sirs.

what's say you find a way to make FFXIII straddle more than one country/continent simultaneously? Konami found a way to do it with the probably equally dialogue heavy MGS4, while keeping the quality in tact.

*shrugs*

maybe i'm asking too much for my $900+ PS360?

They can label it a pet simulator for all I care, I just wanna play it!!

I hope it's more WRPG than it is JRPG. I'm over the JRPG format.

Yeah, not quite. The series may introduce new ideas with each iteration, and I appreciate that greatly when so few of its contemporaries are doing the same, but Final Fantasy is still firmly a JRPG, along with all the positive and negative connotations.

"Spiky-haired characters" is a Japanese game phenomenon, not a JRPG phenomenon. If I remember correctly, Sakaguchi (the man who CREATED FF)'s Lost Odyssey didn't have any main characters that were stereotypical in that way.

That said, I can see where the man is coming from. Every FF game works hard to work in concepts started in other genres, and with FFXIII, doubly so. The ranking and combo system is just the tip of the iceberg. We haven't even seen the leveling system, movement outside of that one small area, etc. FF is a JRPG at it's core, but calling it a straight JRPG trivializes the effort its creators made to keep the gameplay new.

The guy in that picture is either an amazing ventriloquist or the stack of CDs is talking.

Ahh, that is the best computer desktop from the 90's I've seen in a while.

I love his vivid and colorful office and his enthusiastic expression.

I think he would have been better off saying it is a different take on the JRPG genre instead of saying its something completely different.

No, it's just a JRPG

He's only trying to lure in players who shy away from jrpgs, but like wrpgs. He may have just sold a few extra copies with his statements. Alhough many of us know better. I happened to like jrpgs, but I catagorize them seperately from the Fallouts and Mass Effects, out of love for both styles.

I never understood why the RPG genre is the only genre in the video game culture that is divided between white people RPGs and JRPGs. (And I use the term "white people RPGs" because "Western RPG" is very inconsistently used. For example, people seem to be willing to label Eastern European developed RPGs as "Western" too, which simply makes no sense.)

And I don't get why every RPG made by any white person in the entire world is immediately lumped into the WRPG genre. One country, Japan, versus the entirety of the white West? If this is optimal, why not begin to do this with every video game genre?

Ace Combat 6 - JFS (Japanese Flight sim) vs HAWX - WFS. (White Flight Sim)
Resident Evil 5 - JAG (Japanese Action game) vs L4D - WZAG (White Action game)
Street Fighter 4 - JFG (Japanese fighting game) vs Mortal Kombat DC - WFG (White fighting game)

Why haven't these terms caught on in the way JRPG and WRPG have? Are the stylistic differences too minimal? AC6 and HAWX are very similar, but RE5 and L4D are very different approaches. I haven't played Mortal Kombat DC, but I'm pretty sure it's way different than Street Fighter.

Can they stride back over to Final Fantasy VII after they are done and remake it al-frikkin-ready?

I'd like to play an updated version of my favorite game sometime this century.

Don't hate, you know most of you want it too.

After 23 seconds of footage, I can conclude it is in fact a JRPG.

Would I be out of line if I said that FF games are overrated twaddle.

Spiky-hair and girly androdgenous men aren't a JRPG phenomenon. they are a J(apan) phenomenon. Most of the guys you see walking around tokyo look just like that. Of course, the fact they are all incredibly thin also helps with the girly look.

I don't know which came first... did the JRPG hair inspire the boys, or the boys inspire the JRPG-hair?

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Frankly, I don't care about the hair or whiny characters much, its the endless annoying random encounters I hate. Played Chrono Trigger and loved it to death. Haven't been able to get far in a FF game (despite multiple tries) because the random battles get old so quick. (5 random battles in ONE HOUSE CORRIDOR!?! Seriously???).

If anyone could patch FF6+ to remove the random battles i'd be there in an instant... until then - Fire Emblem & Tactics.