Intriguing JRPG Monark Now Has a Demo on PS5, PS4

Cool art, as is generally the case with anime looking JRPG’s… but still… cool art!

I've been playing JRPGs since the 80s. Its really where I became a diehard gamer. But for a long, long time the genre pushed the envelope with graphics and gameplay quality, and now, nearly everything is Anime.

Its just not really what I'm looking for at this point in my life. I want a deep, huge, party based RPG that has at least semi-realistic graphics, and no one seems to be making those games.

Neat idea, but graphics look disappointing for a new game.

@Unlucky13 I sort of feel the same way. I got a late JRPG start, for me it started on Xbox 360, when MS had a big plan for making XB the "home for JRPGs"

At the time, loved Lost Odyssey, Eternal Sonata, Final Fantasy XIII, Blue Dragon and others. XB kind of gave up on JRPGs, and so did I. Eventually I got into Dragon Quest on various platforms as my go-to. Last JRPG I really played was DQ XI. But I don't know...something about the style now, very linear and limited, I am not as into them.

I see new JRPGs like Tales of Arise (which looks great) and I think, now I will get back into them! But I watch the gameplay and I think...maybe not. Not sure if its the art style or maybe I am spoiled by newer RPG true open-world games with realistic 4K graphics.

Guess maybe my tastes have changed over time.

@Unlucky13 It does feel like that for sure. I love (good) anime but I don’t need it battered over my head at every opportunity. The problem with JRPGs is that even if the artstyle isn’t anime, the writing and voice acting absolutely will be.

@frankmcma For me, its not that my tastes have changed, its just that the gaming industry has. I started back on the NES with Dragon Warrior (now Dragon Quest), and then Final Fantasy. By the time FF switched over to the Playstation, 7, 8, 9, X, X-2 and XII all came out basically over a decade. Always giving us something new with each edition.

Then it took forever to get XII and its sequels on the PS3, and the games were pretty, but so empty and void of feeling, and the stories were so depressing. Then it took even more of a forever to get 15, and it was even more empty and depressing, and they took away the ability to even add members to the party for the most part.

For me, JRPGs peaked with FF12. It was exactly and absolutely what I wanted it to be at the tail end of the PS2 era. It had a wonderful, thoughtful and deep story, a great cast of characters, and a great battle system. I was so excited to see where things would go from there as consoles got better and faster, ect.....and.....they really didn't.

At the very start of the PS4 era, we got Dragon Age Inquisition, which was a Western game featuring a lot of the elements that I love, and it was terrific. But aside from a few small studio projects, the whole genre is mostly in hibernation since then. But its what I want more than anything. These games are my hobby. Its what I want to play. So, all I can do is hope.

@nessisonett I mostly agree. I enjoy Anime. Some is really good. Some is crap. But its a passive experience. I watch for a while, then do something else. Its not a 100-150 hour gaming experience that I'm deeply into for a month.

And I do agree that the writing can be really, really lame. Dragon Quest XI was a fine game mostly, but the dialogue was absolutely terrible. Like it was written for young children, despite it being a Teen rated game. The others I've played in the PS4 era are largely even worse in that respect.

Let me give it a shot then

@Unlucky13 FF12 is one of the all-time greats. To an extent, I do agree with you in that it feels like that 'era' of JRPGs ended with 12 and the genre was never quite the same ever again.

@ShogunRok I've read that Square/Enix lost some important members of their team during the development of XII and after it was completed to other studios. It might be that they just couldn't keep things going and the momentum died, sadly.

@Unlucky13 The industry sure has changed...great comments. I think it was the Final Fantasy XIII games for me, the first one I liked but it was so on the rails, then XIII-2 opened things up, and then I think I lost steam by the time Lightning Returns rolled around. I still would love to revisit that trilogy...see what I think now. Probably did not have the deepest stories compared to earlier JRPGS, but at the time, it looked stunning. But during and after that trilogy western RPGs started to gain traction and I just kind of settled into those. Oh and Dragon Age Inquisition was awesome! That one just seemed more...epic..huge. I remember everyone starting to play it, and I was like this is huge, and the devs did a post saying "umm..guys..that's just the first area...you can move on from there...'. What I thought of as a large open game changed after that.

@frankmcma I've played all three DA games as soon as they came out and loved them. I thought that DA:I was setting the table for what could be an awesome generation of party-based RPGs on the PS4, but.....there has been so very, very little since then. It breaks my heart.

We have some terrific individual hero RPGs of course, and I enjoy those two, but the party ones are my thing.

Looks pretty bad honestly. So tired of the school settings. They wonder why they are losing ground to other studios across the world. When did JRPG become synonymous with school based emo anime?

Jeez, this looks terrible. And to think you gave the Stranger of Paradise trailer stick the other day 🤦🏻

@Unlucky13 Yakuza Like A Dragon?

@CrimsonKing97 Others here have given me a lot of great insight on that series. I looked into it deeply and decided that it wasn't for me.

@CthulhuFhtagn in more than three decades of playing RPGs, it stands out at the top of my list. Its a fantastic game, and would be my template for what I want moving forward if I could choose.