Best pre 6th gen RPGS with out the words Fantasy or Phantasy in there title

At one point we had a few threads alternate to mario kart for instance which did just went a way with time but with Stu back and him all ready talking about retro and some reason final fantasy was brought up in admintendo.

I just thought is there some great games pre Dreamcast, Cube, PS2, Xbox in the genre that are great without either spelling of fantasy in the trilte as at one point both ruled the genre one on SNES the other on Mega Drive then during the PS1 era.

All I can think off that I've played is
Secret of Mana
The Granstream Saga

The only RPGs I played before the GameCube era that I enjoyed were all of the main-series Pokémon games and Monkey Puncher (a sort of pet sim/RPG combo on the Game Boy Color. The very first RPG I ever played (Final Fantasy VII) put me off RPGs until the dawn of Pokémon, because at the time I'd never played one before and I didn't get the concept of grinding.

Does Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga count? I loved that, but it was a GC-era GBA game.

What Stu said. Pokémon and the Mario RPGs. Great things.

I wasn't really thinking off handehlds but yes they are great things but Mario RPG didn't really get me into tile TTYD which was of course cube.

DAMN! How could I mention Mario & Luigi and forget Paper Mario, which is my second favourite N64 game? That's a proper pick!

I had to go for handheld RPGs because most of the RPGs I've played and enjoyed have been on handhelds.

Chrono Trigger.

I've never played it, is it as good as people say.

It's absolutely brilliant. I'd be tempted to say it's my second favourite JRPG (behind, Xeno)

Which Xeno

The only one that matters

Gears on PS1 thought so.

What system did you play Trigger on and have you played cross. Also gives me a idea for a thread something along the lines of great game people haven't played, So for me I've not played Xenoblade or Trigger but both great games.

I played through it fully on DS but I do own it and have played a bit on Wii VC. I've not tried Cross, it never really caught my eye.

Something about Chrono Cross appeals to me more than the idea of Chrono Trigger, though I've never played either. My copy of Chrono Trigger on DS remains sealed to this day.

I absolutely heart The World Ends With You on DS, but that's both a handheld game and too new a title for this thread.

I played CT on the DS. Didn't get on. Great plot but lousy characters, and a dour aesthetic in this day and age. Battle system wasn't anything to write home about either.

I'm telling mandlecreed on you.

Yeah maybe Balla aesthetic wise but you got to remember it's a SNES game, that might of been great back in the day.

Two things about that:
1. The SNES gave us Yoshi's Island and the Final Fantasies, among others. Absolutely no need for its games to look drab.
2. When I talk about retro games, I'm always assuming that I'm talking about how they fare in the modern day. Do they stand up? Not how good they were at the time. Yoshi's Island and Gunstar Heroes, to pick two, do stand up, so it can be done.

I think that Chrono looks alright though to be honest.

I was going to say if Andy didn't play it into recently and enjoyed it that its his second favourite JRPGs. It might hold up fairly well and not everything has to look like yoshi island balla, some games need to have darken ton if it suits the game.

I hope this comes to the Wii U VC now.

I'm biased here, so I'm probably not the best to ask, but I generally find that if a 2D game has clearly had some effort put into it, chances are that will reflect positively on my opinion of the visuals. Several NES and Master System games still blow my mind by how detailed they manage to look based on their ridiculously underpowered hardware.

I firmly believe that games were better when developers had to work under huge memory constraints. It's why I love the creativity found in lots of, say, DS games.

SMB3 look fantastic still doesn't it.

Your post is the reason I love indies so much but some like No Mans Sky seem to be pushing the envelope though.

masofdas wrote:

SMB3 look fantastic still doesn't it.

Your post is the reason I love indies so much but some like No Mans Sky seem to be pushing the envelope though.

Precisely. The best indie games benefit from their tight budget, all design choices must be deliberate and solid, and they need to stand out to get such attention.

Yeah, Chrono Trigger wasn't drab - at least to these knackered eyes. I liked the idea of the combination attacks but the multiple endings did get a bit tiring. My friend Dave really rates it and says he loves the plot, alongside the fact that there were no ruddy fetch quests.

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Dragon Quests IV and V count in these criteria, I believe, although the best way to experience them is on the DS. V has the best plot of any RPG I've ever played, and IV is good fun.

Maybe we should do a RPG vote instead of Platformers.

We don't need to start off a voting chain again Mas I like votes as much as the next guy but occasionally is the best way to keep them fun.