Brevity.
If I had to levy one complaint against the entire genre of JRPG's, it'd be that they are nearly all way too long. I've played dozens upon dozens of them over the course of my life, but I can count on one hand how many I've seen through to the end. Generally speaking, a core tenet of JRPG design seems to be stretching very repetitive gameplay (especially when it comes to combat) incredibly thin over a wide expanse of runtime. This, naturally, is almost always at the cost of pacing, which is a real detriment to a genre that has historically prided itself on storytelling as one of its key strengths.
Now, back to Chrono Trigger. You know it, you love it. Everybody loves it. It's widely considered to be easily one of the best JRPG's ever made, and many believe it to sit comfortably at the top of the pack to this day. There's a lot to praise when discussing Chrono Trigger, from its art style to memorable characters, time-travel conceit, and snappy combat that eschewed random encounters before that was en vogue for the genre. And you'll often hear developers working in the industry today citing Chrono Trigger as having shaped their interests and tastes as both players and developers.
But by god I think if there's one aspect of Chrono Trigger's design that I wish more JRPG developers would implement in their games it's its perfectly reasonable length. CT is a game that can be finished in the range of 20-25 hours on a first playthrough. And you know what? That's a huge part of why its pacing is so highly regarded. There's just far less filler and repetition at the heart of CT's design, and I think that enhances the experience beyond what many people might even be conscious of. With its many alternate endings and manageable runtime, CT is one of the few JRPG's that is genuinely fun to replay. How many 70-100-hour slogs can you honestly say you'd like to revisit one day?
What sparked the thought behind this article is playing through Ys VIII after finishing both Ys Origin and Ys: Oath in Felghana before it. The Ys games are ARPG's, but while the earlier games were very lean affairs, the modern entries like VIII and IX lean much more heavily into modern JRPG conventions when it comes to length and padding. Don't get me wrong, I'm still enjoying Ys VIII quite a bit, but the whole time I keep wishing that it had the focus and brevity of its predecessors. For me, at least, very few games' gameplay can stand up to 30, 40, or god forbid 50+ hours.
The end result of this trend for me, personally, is that I damn near never finish most JRPG's no matter how enthralled I am by their opening 25% or 50%. What say you, ERA?
If I had to levy one complaint against the entire genre of JRPG's, it'd be that they are nearly all way too long. I've played dozens upon dozens of them over the course of my life, but I can count on one hand how many I've seen through to the end. Generally speaking, a core tenet of JRPG design seems to be stretching very repetitive gameplay (especially when it comes to combat) incredibly thin over a wide expanse of runtime. This, naturally, is almost always at the cost of pacing, which is a real detriment to a genre that has historically prided itself on storytelling as one of its key strengths.
Now, back to Chrono Trigger. You know it, you love it. Everybody loves it. It's widely considered to be easily one of the best JRPG's ever made, and many believe it to sit comfortably at the top of the pack to this day. There's a lot to praise when discussing Chrono Trigger, from its art style to memorable characters, time-travel conceit, and snappy combat that eschewed random encounters before that was en vogue for the genre. And you'll often hear developers working in the industry today citing Chrono Trigger as having shaped their interests and tastes as both players and developers.
But by god I think if there's one aspect of Chrono Trigger's design that I wish more JRPG developers would implement in their games it's its perfectly reasonable length. CT is a game that can be finished in the range of 20-25 hours on a first playthrough. And you know what? That's a huge part of why its pacing is so highly regarded. There's just far less filler and repetition at the heart of CT's design, and I think that enhances the experience beyond what many people might even be conscious of. With its many alternate endings and manageable runtime, CT is one of the few JRPG's that is genuinely fun to replay. How many 70-100-hour slogs can you honestly say you'd like to revisit one day?
What sparked the thought behind this article is playing through Ys VIII after finishing both Ys Origin and Ys: Oath in Felghana before it. The Ys games are ARPG's, but while the earlier games were very lean affairs, the modern entries like VIII and IX lean much more heavily into modern JRPG conventions when it comes to length and padding. Don't get me wrong, I'm still enjoying Ys VIII quite a bit, but the whole time I keep wishing that it had the focus and brevity of its predecessors. For me, at least, very few games' gameplay can stand up to 30, 40, or god forbid 50+ hours.
The end result of this trend for me, personally, is that I damn near never finish most JRPG's no matter how enthralled I am by their opening 25% or 50%. What say you, ERA?
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