Its easy to get pulled into shadow heart's story with its basis in ww1 era china with horror movie monsters everywhere.  If the story had an unlikeable character like squall in it....

strange fighting systems?  im betting you hated ff12 too?   FF8 frustrated me because of how you could use the summons.  there was no reason to even use the strange magic system

ROTFLOL

(just wanted to lok even more confusing than poster above)

also, i find it hard to believe that the people posting in this thread dont already own the best psx rpgs so using epsxe should not be a problem

I would like to point out to everyone saying the psx graphics put you off to the games should go download epsxe.  This emulatpr has shaders that give ps1 games ps2 level graphics.  Sometimes better.

Actually there has never been a system called the ps1.   This is a slang term, with less basis than the psx as the playstation was called psx prior to the name change.

There was a system named PSone released but not ps1.

Actually the psx was the code name for the playstation.  This is what everyone called the playstation during its life.  It wasn't untill the ps2 that the psx became the ps1.  By not knowing this I wonder if you were there in 95 for the release

why would you bring in other consoles when comparing the PSX and PS2?

some psx greats:

wild arms 1,2
suikoden 1,2
final fantasy tactics
tales of destiny 1,2
LEGACY OF KAIN
legend of the dragoon
Persona 1,2
Valkyrie Profile
Lunar 1,2
arc the lad collection
breath of fire 3,4
alundra 1,2

So who do you believe had the best line up.  The playstation really brought rpgs to the masses, but the ps2 has an overwhelming number of rpgs.

My opinion:

The psx beats the ps2 because of 3 games, all in my top 5 games of all time.

1) FF7 (obviously)
2)xenogears
3)grandia


These 3 games really stand above and beyond any thing that came out on ps2.  The ff series really took a dive in fun factor after 7 with the extremly easy gameplay/poor characters of ff8.  And all most every ps2 game took away the players ability to explore.


I'm currently playing through thousand arms and loving it.  We need a thread were everyone plays an old psx rpg through woth pics or something.  Great times!

wild arms does a good job at this you collected points to spend on different starting perks for your next game. 

it seems my topic has been misunderstood.  now i have to admit i am a FFVII fanboy as i think its the greatest game EVAR.  but i didnt mean to get the FFVII haters all stirred up.

anyway,  before 7 i played FFVI (3)  FFV (2) chrono trigger, Phantasy Star (my first RPG ever)  on the psx some of my fave games are xeno gears, grandia, suikoden, Wildarms series.  but on the PS2 it seemed games started changing to the more cinematic route.  that being said there are still alot of great games.  SMT seriers even though its basically dungeon crawling (playing persona 4 now) wild arms 3,4,5 all pretty good imo.  but the quality seems to be declining to me because of the focus on cut scenes.  i just wish every RPG had a wold map that i could explore and find optional dungeons, towns, and then a great storyline on top of it all.  any game with a map that i just click on locations seems like it should be out dated, not the other way around.  we have went from openness and exploration.  to being closed in by a 2d map.

this is just a thought i had so bare with me.

now i must say first that FFVII is my favorite game of all time.  it brought together story and character development like none other.  it then took advantage of the CD format like none before.  It also had world success like none before.  especially in America.

If you look at what was new with FFVII what you find is a more cinematic gameplay, and to me it seems the japanese companies have taken this to the extreme.   Almost no games have a world map.  most do not have the optional town, or optional play in general.  the majority of the games have a point and click map and is dungeon cinematic, dungeon cinematic.  by taking so much control out of our hands the games seem less engaging and more and more like playing through a movie.  Final Fantasy games especially seem to be getting worse and worse.   look at FF10.  the game was on rails and was basically several dungeons tied together by cinematic.


i don't want to get bogged down in a FF10 flame fest, but am just asking the question.  did FFVII change JRPGS for the worse?