(s) Archive
2021-05-02
Alana Hagues I started my Suikoden journey only two and a half years ago for this very podcast. Before these episodes, I’d only played the first two games (of which Suikoden II has become one of my all-time favourites), and with Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes on the way, this felt like the perfect time to jump into the next game… Read More »
2021-04-27
Spring is that wonderful time of year when chipmunks emerge from their burrows, snowpants are shoved to the back of the closet, and fresh new video games burst forth from the ground.
2021-04-07
Inspired by the Zelda series and Terranigma, Holomento is an open world action RPG with procedurally generated dungeons, a town reconstruction system, and the ever-present threat of permadeath. Follow generations of Travelers through a vast 3D world, battle elephant-sized rats and other monstrosities, and invest some money in the Stonk Market. Yes, that spelling was absolutely correct.
2021-04-01
You’ve heard of Warriors (or Musou, if you’re feeling fancy) games before. Of course you have! Ever since Dynasty Warriors 2 landed on the PS2 back in the olden days of the year 2000, the one-versus-one-thousand brand of beat-em-up has been a staple, hitting every major console release, most minor console releases, and a metric… Read More »
2021-03-30
Now that Sony has made it official that they are closing the PS3, PS Vita, and PSP PlayStation Stores this summer (boo), we wanted to take the opportunity to re-share this feature that we ran in 2016. While web-based store links for these platforms stopped working last year (we originally featured direct store links in… Read More »
2021-03-29
Eva Padilla Muramasa: The Demon Blade is a game that surprised and delighted me frequently, and not in many of the ways I initially guessed. Certainly, there was “Backgrounds are stunning” and “That is the best-looking, gosh-darn dango I’ve ever seen.” But then in comes “This game has 4 DLCs on Vita, and each one… Read More »
2021-03-20
Enjoy life during the Stone Ages in Roots of Pacha, a new farming game with vivid pixel graphics, an adequate number of prehistoric animals, and a focus on co-op.
2021-03-17
Sidequests tend to exist in a vacuum. The fetch quest you undertake for the old, toothless man in the mushroom hut? Yeah, nobody’s going to know about it. Rarely is extra content acknowledged by an RPG’s world or characters; side quests are inconsequential to the bigger picture these games are trying to paint. They’re great… Read More »
2021-03-13
Quick, what’s the first thing that pops into your head when someone mentions PokĂ©mon Sun & Moon? For me, it’s Team Skull, and I’ll bet most of you would say the same. Imagine PokĂ©mon Sun & Moon without Team Skull for a moment. Pretty “meh,” right? Indeed, those guttersnipes with their sick rhymes, ill dance moves, cartoony… Read More »
2021-03-03
The tentatively titled Project Triangle Strategy was a standout at February’s Nintendo Direct. A promising SRPG entry into Square Enix’s HD-2D series that started with Octopath Traveller, Project Triangle Strategy looks to evoke classic politically charged SRPGs like Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre. And hey, it’s shaping up pretty dang well from the early… Read More »
2021-03-01
Kaleb Curry Radiant Historia is not Mega Man Battle Network. That may seem obvious to most, but to me—a decade younger and craving some more of that sweet, sweet MMBN action—it was a deal-breaker. I played 15 minutes of this lovely game and then never gave it a second thought for ten years, all because… Read More »
2021-02-27
Welcome to Beacon Pines, a quaint mountain town inhabited by a wide assortment of anthropomorphic cuties and filled with an even wider assortment of dark secrets and bizarre occurrences.
2021-02-24
If you’re a big JRPG fan, you’ve probably heard of Shin Megami Tensei. Atlus’ demon-summoning RPG series has been around for nearly 30 years under its original Megami Tensei moniker. In the US, however, releases were sporadic at best and often underwent heavy localization to fit Western sensibilities. It wasn’t until the 2007 release of spinoff title Persona 3 that… Read More »
2021-02-19
After more than 530 days, Nintendo finally gave fans what they have been waiting for for the past year and a half in the form of a 50-minute Nintendo Direct. Many thought that this would be the time to provide details about one of their most anticipated upcoming titles, the sequel to The Legend of… Read More »
2021-02-11
Welcome to RPGFan’s Games of the Year 2020! First of all, we know we’re releasing these a little later in the year than we have in the past, but with some big titles releasing late in the year, we wanted to be sure we gave our staff the appropriate time to come to a decision… Read More »
Winner: Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: Sephiroth & Byleth RPG fans have been spoiled for representation in Super Smash Bros Ultimate. This year, we got two RPG powerhouses: Byleth from the Switch hit Fire Emblem: Three Houses and Sephiroth from the all-time classic Final Fantasy VII. While fans might have balked at yet more sword-wielding RPG… Read More »
Winner: Hades The best new intellectual property of 2020 is, ironically, steeped in one of the oldest collections of folklore to survive antiquity. Hades‘ charming characters, tightly designed action, and faithful—even gleeful—interpretation of Greek myth captivated existing lovers of roguelikes and even made some roguelike-disdainers into new fans (including yours truly). The residents of the… Read More »
Winner: Final Fantasy VII Remake First, they got playful. It’s just what you wanted. Your high-fidelity bombing mission, your Reno grudge matches, your Buster Sword flexing. They leaned into your dragon-summoning power fantasies, your “heartfelt adoration” of Tifa, all that goodwill and honeyed, late ’90s nostalgia. It’s a trip down memory lane, to the simpler… Read More »
Winner: Moon Love-de-Lic’s “lost” 1997 PSone classic Moon: Remix RPG Adventure is less of an RPG and more of an adventure-styled puzzle, a series of increasingly poetic Zelda sidequests without combat or weapons. Still, it’s obsessed with the JRPG myth, the Dragon Quest story of “the hero,” the familiar knight wielding his father’s legendary sword,… Read More »
Winner: Final Fantasy VII Remake When crafting the gameplay of Final Fantasy VII Remake, Square Enix knew that mainstream audiences generally prefer action-oriented combat in modern RPGs, but older fans of Final Fantasy VII would be hesitant to accept something so wildly different to the 1997 combat they loved. The solution? Action combat with full… Read More »
Winner: Final Fantasy VII Remake There’s this moment in FFVIIR where you board an elevator and slowly descend. As that elevator lurches down, you have nothing to stare at but your own party, and it’s just lovely. The wispy particles around Cloud’s hair. The subtle warping of the metal on Tifa’s gauntlets. The woven fibers… Read More »
Winner: Final Fantasy VII Remake Many remakes have crumbled under the pressure to get the sound right, but Remake set a new bar. With an entirely new cast of voices, from Britt Baron’s Tifa, Briana White’s Aerith, to the members of Avalanche (voiced for the first time), they have breathed new life into established characters.… Read More »
Winner: Final Fantasy VII Remake What a tremendously dizzying task it must be to sort out Final Fantasy VII Remake‘s massive amounts of texts, spoken dialogue, animated cutscenes, and complex battle lingo, but also to keep in mind fans’ impossibly high expectations and acute understanding of the franchise. To say that the localization team did… Read More »
Winner: Ichiban Kasuga (Yakuza: Like a Dragon) Ichiban Kasuga, the hero of Yakuza: Like a Dragon, isn’t Kazuma Kiryu, the hero of Yakuzas 1 through 6 (and 0). He isn’t a paragon of virtue among gangsters, a stoic samaritan who resolves the Tojo Clan’s crises reluctantly, or a legendary Dragon of Dojima whose sterling reputation… Read More »
Winner: Sephiroth (Final Fantasy VII Remake) Whatever you choose to call him, Sephiroth has been a landmark villain in gaming history. One-Winged Angel, the look, and the pure cruelty toward Cloud make him easy to hate in the most affectionate way possible. Well, if you can see past his murderous tendencies. Anyway, what makes him… Read More »
