Final Fantasy 7 Remake

Square Enix

They don't make JRPGs like they used to, but maybe that's a good thing.

While classic JRPGs thrived during the PlayStation 1 era and saw major innovations during the PlayStation 2 era, the PlayStation 3 era marked a major fall from grace for the genre. Save for a few major titles like Dark Souls and Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, fresh JRPG releases had grown increasingly scarce, and even the more major titles like Final Fantasy XIII were plagued by mixed reviews.

But with the PlayStation 4, JRPGs have seen a return to prominence. Sure, there may not be as many individual releases of bizarre, unheard of IPs like there were during the PS1 era, but PS4 era JRPGs have more than made up for quantity with quality. These are the best-of-the-best:

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CULTURE

The 9 Best JRPGs of the PS3 Era

JRPGs experience growing pains, too.

Final Fantasy 13 Lightning

Square Enix

The PlayStation 3 era was a weird time to be a fan of JRPGs.

The PlayStation 1 era was a creative boom for JRPGs as a genre, and the PlayStation 2 era was a period wherein many previous JRPG innovations were honed and perfected. But by the PlayStation 3 era, JRPGs had largely fallen out of favor in the wider world of gaming, with many critics regarding their classic turn-based mechanics as stale and boring.

The action RPG style of gameplay popularized by Kingdom Hearts, which combines active combat with menu navigation, became the most prominent mechanic in newer JRPGs. Some of these newer titles worked incredibly well, while others faltered and dug the genre further into the trenches. Ultimately, the PS3 era offered far fewer JRPGs than previous generations, but even so, there were a few gems that are still absolutely worth playing. These are the best JRPGs of the PS3 era.

Also, as a side note, I'm not including Persona 5, as it came out on both PS3 and PS4 simultaneously, and I consider it to primarily be a PS4-gen title.

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Final Fantasy X

Square Enix

By the mid-2000s, the classic JRPG formula was giving way to new innovations intended to keep the genre fresh.

The best PlayStation 1-era JRPGs were largely defined by the ways that they built upon the turn-based combat a menu navigation mechanics of their predecessors (with the most famous example being Final Fantasy VII's Active Time Battle system, which put turns on an always-running timer instead of a set order).

PlayStation 2-era JRPGs largely benefitted from the fruits of these labors, keeping the things that worked and playing around with the things that didn't. As such, the PS2 featured a diverse catalogue of JRPGs that ran the gamut from classic throwbacks to entirely new combat systems that seemed to throw the entire playbook out the window. These are the best of the best.

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