The GWJ JRPG Club Version 2.5 HD Remaster: Now Playing Sea of Stars (Q1 2025)

Oh! It’s so shiny in here. Maybe I will get out of the level 0 status sooner or later.

If playing Kingdom Hearts is what it takes to level up, I'm just going to have to be content with being under-leveled.

Yay?

I'm sitting out DQVII (its hard to find at anything other than full price here and to be honest I have enough games on the go already) so I am sure everybody will catch up.

I second this so that I can second and vote and upvote and do whatever else is needed to get this horse in the running.

I really hope you guys get to play it even though I will sit it out (I already finished it) One of my favorite rpgs in a long time.

Nice!

I got distracted for a few days and am catching up on GWJ things today. This is most excellent, and thanks for putting all this together!

Now to get back to Dragon Quest!

One thing I've noticed is that this club gets hit by platform divides a lot more heavily than the other game clubs. (Which isn't to say this is the only issue, but I think it contributes.)

You have the handheld and console split, to start with. Not only is there not a lot of overlap between handheld and home console in terms of games, but there's not a lot of overlap in terms of players. Personally speaking, I'm considerably less likely to play a long JRPG on a handheld than a console or PC.

Looking beyond that, you also run into the problem that most JRPGs are effectively platform exclusives, if you think of it in terms of availability on current release platforms. The current release platforms are: PC, Xbox One, Playstation 4, Nintendo Switch, and (for only a little bit longer) Nintendo 3DS.

I can't think of many JRPGs that are available on most of those platforms. I'm having trouble thinking of many that seem like good picks for the club that are available on more than one. Octopath Traveper? Switch only. Persona 5? PS4 only. Xenoblade Chronicles 2? Switch only. Radiant Historia? 3DS only.

We're starting to see more dual releases on PS4 and PC: Ni No Kuni II, Dragon Quest XI, Nier Automata, Final Fantasy XII, etc. But that still mostly leaves handheld players out in the cold.

The other clubs have a de facto understanding that everything nominated and chosen should be on PC, and that works since this is a pretty PC-centric forum. You can join in on whatever platform you want, of course, but a game won't get ruled out if it's only available on PC, and it won't get consideration if it isn't on PC.

Maybe this club needs to consider something like that, although whatever platform is the standard, someone is going to be unhappy. (It seems most logical to me that the PS4 be the standard platform here, but it pains me to admit that.)

Games that have chapters seemed to help keep the conversation going, its easier to lets say, you have a month to finish first 4 chapters then its open spoilers for those four chapters. I'll be honest, I've struck out on last couple club games, they just ended up not being for me, I gave them a fair chance but after 10+ hours you gotta decide if you want to keep forcing yourself to do it. I am glad I gave each game a fair chance though.

I've given this a bit of thought and, perhaps, dropping in to ask a few questions about contentious, controversial, or interesting points in a game's story/gameplay portion/other could help keep the conversation lively. Much like a moderator in a round table?

EDIT: Heck, even a monthly or weekly survey, and one at the end of the 3 month and 6 month milestones to gauge what people thought about the game, etc, could be worthwhile and interesting.

I can say that the reason I dropped Earthbound is due to some game mechanics that frustrated me way, way more than I was willing to tolerate (and I'm pretty sure I've Female Doggoed about them in the thread as well), and did not have anything to do with the graphics or the age of the game. Then again, I'm sort of an exception because I mostly play older games and rarely buy anything that is not discounted. I can't remember why I stopped playing Dark Cloud 2 after a few hours. Probably FOMO or something like that. Really liked Suikoden though.

The good news is, assuming Trails of Cold Steel wins next quarter, the game is available on Vita, so people who play on handhelds AND people who play on consoles should be happy. (I will be the contrarian playing on both Playstation TV and Vita.)

Nooooo! I don't have it and my budget can't take it! (j/k! Also it's on sale on PSN at the moment.)

One thing to keep in mind is the confusion with the a game's catch-all thread and the one for the game club. I think we struggled at bit with this during the Final Fantasy XV game club, where the discussion in the catch-all was still relatively active as the game club was going on. (I don't know if that is the case with Persona 5.)

I actually have Persona 5 (PS3) but by reaching back a bit further I feel like you can catch both people who have it on their backlog and those who played it when it came it but are ready for a replay (or even a NG+ in this case). I know P5 is at least a year old which fits in the club rules. Probably should have mentioned something a bit earlier huh :).

As others have said I think given the platform splits, personal playing preferences, long playtime and high pricing/low availability we are always going to have a situation where a certain portion of club members just don't start a selected game.

I like the ideas of monthly/weekly check-in or goals and having some book-club style questions or discussions to try and promote more activity during the playthroughs.

For anyone who wants to get in on the current game, Dragon Quest 7 is 19.99 on the Black Friday sale for a few more days. Based on my initial impressions, it's well worth buying this version and just shredding your PS1 copy.

My only objection is that Trails of Cold Steel isn't out for PS4 until Jan. 22nd.