Ten years ago, turn based RPG action ruled the gaming world. Titles such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest had gamers craving multiple discs, turn based battles and logic defying haircuts. Not only were these games massively popular with both their fan boy audience and casual gamers but, in the case of Final Fantasy, were some the best games of their generation. Due to the fact that the majority of these games originated from Japan and shared similar themes, the genre was affectionately crowned the ‘JRPG’. Hours were chalked up, bosses were beaten and potions were thrown, all in the name of this eccentric and engrossing brand of gaming.

It’s no exaggeration to say that in its golden age, the JRPG really was the most popular gaming genre of its time. There’s not a gamer in their twenties that hasn’t at least heard of Final Fantasy VII and almost ten million of those gamers bought the game.  This giant fan base has inspired everything, from the standard geek fare of cosplay, to the big budget heights of films and energy drinks. This success allowed other JRPGs to break into the mainstream, with Pokémon becoming a global Gameboy phenomenon and Square going on to release a host of other Final Fantasy titles, each gaining commercial and critical success.

However, when the new millennium rolled round and the then ‘next generation’ consoles were unleashed upon the world; the JRPG struggled to conquer this new format. The four year cycle of the Playstation 2 and Xbox, saw only a handful of JRPG titles emerge that were worth the time and money of seasoned gamers. While the then renamed Square Enix did its best to keep the dream alive, (by releasing both Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest) to combat the slew of sub standard hack and slash titles, that claimed to be JRPGs simply by including characters with pointy hair, something had changed in the world of gaming that would curse the genre forever.

The growing popularity of traditional RPGs such as Fable had meant that gamers were bored of the turned based combat and repetitive themes of JRPGs. Casual gamers argued, that the new power developers had to play within the new consoles, meant there was no need to have turned based combat and endless streams of text to make an RPG compelling. Put simply, gamers were bored of JRPGs and needed something new and innovative to sate their hunger. This prophetic statement was answered by Final Fantasy XII; the game featured fluid real time combat, while incorporating all the elements that made Final Fantasy and JRPGs so popular. This game proved to be a massive success, however it was too little too late, as the generation of consoles came to an end. Many consider Final Fantasy XII to be the Playstation 2’s last epic swansong.

Lately things have been looking up for RPGs in general. Bethesda has given gamers both the Epic Oblivion and the massively popular Fallout 3, while their British cousins Lionhead put out another excellent Fable title, not to mention the countless hours gamers worldwide spent trying to seduce aliens on the awesome Mass Effect. With these games cemented firmly in the hearts of hardcore and casual gamers alike, the genre looks set to provide many more titles in the future with game such as Borderlands and Mass Effect 2 to look forward to. However, the JRPG has still yet to deliver a seminal title on the current platforms. The genre is still cast aside to the realms of portable gaming and obscure niche market imports. It came close with the hardcore but impressive Lost Odyssey and has given us a few fairly decent ‘weekend wonders ‘but a game has yet to come out that rocks our gaming worlds.

The question is “Have we, as gamers, tired of JRPGs?” Did we spend so much of our time collecting potions and gaining experience points, that we cannot bear another role playing game where we have to wait our turn to blow something’s head off?  The current climate of hyper-violent blockbuster gaming has left little room for JRPGs to squeeze into our disc trays; it could also be argued that the genre hasn’t tried too hard to evolve and the time commitment that we, as gamers, are asked to make is pretty huge. However, JRPGs were once a massive gaming institution and, with the impending release of Final Fantasy XIII, maybe it will get a title worthy of its history while still being great fun to play.