Are RPG's getting worse every 5 years? (List your top 10 RPG's ever to help!)

There have been some relatively recent gems namely Valkyrie Profile. Here is my bias:

1) Valkyrie Profile
2) Wild Arms 4
3) Wild Arms 3
4) Wild Arms
5) Romancing SaGa 3
6) Secret of Mana
7) Grandia 2
8) Terranigma
9) Tales of Phantasia
10) Final Fantasy V

I had genuine fun with the top 7 of them. Valkyrie Profile is easily my favourite with all the overkill finishers and incredibly ingenious story, different from most others.

As for Wild Arms 4...LOVE the hex system and overkill princesses Yulie and Raquel. Breaking past "9999" is always attractive to me in an rpg. The Wild Arms system in general is also very sexy (they really fight for second place with me), because I'm just a sucker for the way how in all the games, the strangers just coincidentally meet and then journey on. Together, the strangers get involved in much grander plans than they originally intended. Lots of references to familiar concepts in the games too, and ARM means something different but equally dangerous in each game. This should be saved for a Wild Arms Appreciation thread though.

8) and 9) annoy me in the fact that I got REALLY far in them, but never actually beat the game.

10) was lots of fun trying to master every job by wandering around in the Cleft of Dimension to be able to use any skill you wanted after fighting lots and lots of Movers.



Most newer games are skimping too much on the endings (eg. Radiata Stories :@) and always have some kind of glaring flaw that detracts from how good the game could fully be (eg. recruiting Claudia? That took me hours and hours and she was pretty weak in comparison to the effort and times required)

I admit that even my almost-most favourite game, Wild Arms 5, felt like there could have been a better ending, but it definitely wasn't as terribly dissatisfying as Radiata Stories.

I can still rely on blockbusters like Final Fantasy to give me the endings I crave (nice touch in FF X with that corny but touching moment at the end...you know which one I mean ) As well as for a decent battle/menu system.

The offshoots (yes Radiata again) try new stuff, but I'd rather they fix certain flaws (the time thing...ugh!) to make them even better.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Including Strat based stuff then

Disgaea
Vandal Hearts
Final Fantasy Tactics

also rank in my list. They did much right with all the exploding exaggerated attacks in Disgaea, as well as the very colourful depiction of the netherworld.

Vandal Hearts was loads of fun, for some reason I can't pinpoint. It could have been the class changing options, or the blood fountain inducing attacks.

Tactics required careful strategy which I respected a lot. Lots of memorable moments such as being stuck at the execution site battle, beating Queklain with Agrias, and my favourite: Nuking the entire field in the Izlude Battle with a Calculator who used Level 4 Holy.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Same here! I was obssessed with trying to make the Chronolex rather than going after Amalgam. The synthesis portion of the game was one of the highlights, although the battle system was rather simple. Most people would be rather turned off by Atelier Iris, what with the anime styled characters and material respawning.
I guess different games would have different criteria for "suckiness".

I mean, Baten Kaitos was gorgeous looking, but out of all the voice acting in the world, Xelha has sinned unforgivably. The card system turned lots of people off, but drew in people like me.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.