Why are there no love in wrpg?

for me, i hate them because they lack imagination, the stories are terrible almost 95% of the time, and the characters are almost certainly bland and forgetable

the battle systems are generally the same, overhead dungeon crawler, or 3rd Person dungeon crawler, or first person dungeon crawler.. uh that's about it.... the camera views change, but the games are still the same... just hack and slash your way through a million robots or giant spiders until you fight the final crappy boss in the dungeon... blah...

the skill systems are almost the exactly the same in these games too.. do quests big or small, gain experience, kill monsters gain experience, finally gain a level and then you sort out skill points to whatever atributes you want them to go (usally limited for 3-4 for some lame purpose)...

some of the better WRPGs I've played have been Jade Empire and Gladius so far... and next on my list to play is KoToR and Fable, but I'm sure Fable will disapoint...

for me, i hate them because they lack imagination, the stories are terrible almost 95% of the time, and the characters are almost certainly bland and forgetable

the battle systems are generally the same, overhead dungeon crawler, or 3rd Person dungeon crawler, or first person dungeon crawler.. uh that's about it.... the camera views change, but the games are still the same... just hack and slash your way through a million robots or giant spiders until you fight the final crappy boss in the dungeon... blah...

the skill systems are almost the exactly the same in these games too.. do quests big or small, gain experience, kill monsters gain experience, finally gain a level and then you sort out skill points to whatever atributes you want them to go (usally limited for 3-4 for some lame purpose)...

some of the better WRPGs I've played have been Jade Empire and Gladius so far... and next on my list to play is KoToR and Fable, but I'm sure Fable will disapoint...

zh666

wow...sounds like you've played about 2 wrpg's your whole life.

I would go into a large explanation of why you're wrong but i suggest you look up games like Deus Ex, Fallout, Freedom Force, Morrowind, Neverwinter Nights, Mass Effect, System Shock, Vampire the masquerade, STALKER, Baldur's Gate, Planescape, Shadowrun...

and that's not naming any of the action RPG's like Diablo, Fable, Guild Wars, Gauntlet, Dungeon and Dragons Heroes

or any of the MMORPG's...

so there goes about 20+ exceptions to your rules.

wow...sounds like you've played about 2 wrpg's your whole life.

I would go into a large explanation of why you're wrong but i suggest you look up games like Deus Ex, Fallout, Freedom Force, Morrowind, Neverwinter Nights, Mass Effect, System Shock, Vampire the masquerade, STALKER, Baldur's Gate, Planescape, Shadowrun...

and that's not naming any of the action RPG's like Diablo, Fable, Guild Wars, Gauntlet, Dungeon and Dragons Heroes

or any of the MMORPG's...

so there goes about 20+ exceptions to your rules.

smerlus

I've played enough, like Mirrowind, Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heros, Vampire the Masquerade from your list... plus Blood Omen, Dark Alliance I+II, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-men legends, Nox, Bards Tale, and buttloads of others I'm forgetting.. and older games like Ultima, Bards Tale, Might & Magic, Drakkan and other crap...

I've always perfered the JRPG... much more compelling to me... heck, I'm TRYING to find a good WRPG... or else I would give up completely a long time ago.. but so far most of what I've played has been crap and bored the crap out of me...

Sure they do. Practically anything by Bioware has at least a sprinkling of romance in it, as do a collection of other WRPGs, like The Witcher.

And zh666, you've obviously never played a good WRPG. I pity you.

I've played enough, like Mirrowind, Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heros, Vampire the Masquerade from your list... plus Blood Omen, Dark Alliance I+II, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-men legends, Nox, Bards Tale, and buttloads of others I'm forgetting.. and older games like Ultima, Bards Tale, Might & Magic, Drakkan and other crap...

I've always perfered the JRPG... much more compelling to me... heck, I'm TRYING to find a good WRPG... or else I would give up completely a long time ago.. but so far most of what I've played has been crap and bored the crap out of me...

zh666

95% of your list comprised of action RPGs, not actual RPGs. Its like judging jRPGs based off the Dynasty Warriors series.

Not for nothing, but no one is tellingzh666 why these WRPGs that you're all mentioning are good. Please state specific reasons. I'm in total agreeance (if that's a word) with him (or her). Most WRPGs have generic characters (because most of them let you make your own) and it's all about hacking and slashing your way to a powerful character.

MMO's are even worse because the stories are much less developed, since that isn't the main goal of an MMO.

I defend JRPGs because you have cool, if crazy, characters. And granted, they're not all cool. I hate animals as characters or children with bunny ears, but at least they're memorable and not bland. And the main part of turn-based RPG's at least is the strategy involved in selecting spells or attacks or whatever other option there may be.

so wait, wrpg's are boring cause they're all the same (supposedly), but jrpg's are not? I can't recall ever playing a jrpg that didn't involve a spiky headed hero either A) oddly cheerful all the time or B) emo all the time, a story that usually starts off with your hometown getting owned by some kinda disaster, boring turn based combat where the only thinking involved is selecting attack, and a strictly linear experience.

Now some jrpg's are trying to become more western, like blue dragon has no random encounters and eternal sonata's combat lets you move around, but just keep in mind they're copying that stuff from wrpgs.

Not for nothing, but no one is tellingzh666 why these WRPGs that you're all mentioning are good. Please state specific reasons. I'm in total agreeance (if that's a word) with him (or her). Most WRPGs have generic characters (because most of them let you make your own) and it's all about hacking and slashing your way to a powerful character.

Grieverr

somethings aren't worth explaining.... If i said all JRPG's have stories aimed at tweens and feature metrosexual characters and stupid bunny women... would you bother to prove me wrong?

Most of those games i listed have won RPG of the year awards at various gaming sites while others are featured in this site and other's greatest games of all time... that has to say at least something for those games.

for me, i hate them because they lack imagination, the stories are terrible almost 95% of the time, and the characters are almost certainly bland and forgetable

the battle systems are generally the same, overhead dungeon crawler, or 3rd Person dungeon crawler, or first person dungeon crawler.. uh that's about it.... the camera views change, but the games are still the same... just hack and slash your way through a million robots or giant spiders until you fight the final crappy boss in the dungeon... blah...

the skill systems are almost the exactly the same in these games too.. do quests big or small, gain experience, kill monsters gain experience, finally gain a level and then you sort out skill points to whatever atributes you want them to go (usally limited for 3-4 for some lame purpose)...

some of the better WRPGs I've played have been Jade Empire and Gladius so far... and next on my list to play is KoToR and Fable, but I'm sure Fable will disapoint...

zh666

That pretty much sums up my complaints, but to add to that.

WRPG almost always lack good story telling techniques. It is always just character standing still and talking. No movement, no action, no gestures. Just standing there and talking like bad soap opera.

I've found that most WRPG's are based on the old paper and pencil RPG's like Dungeons and Dragons and similar systems, which emphasize creating a blank-slate character and filling in the blanks with yourself. It's why WRPG's more frequently prompt you for dialogue choices rather than play out dialogue in a movie.

JRPG's tend to be more heavily influenced by anime, driven by exotic stories and populated with fleshed out characters with their own personalities. They know what to say because they aren't 'you'. By traditional definition, they really walk a line between RPG and Adventure.

It doesn't make either one better. It's all a matter of preference. Being an old fart table top gamer, I prefer the WRPG, but I've logged plenty of hours enjoying my Final Fantasy games.

so wait, wrpg's are boring cause they're all the same (supposedly), but jrpg's are not? I can't recall ever playing a jrpg that didn't involve a spiky headed hero either A) oddly cheerful all the time or B) emo all the time, a story that usually starts off with your hometown getting owned by some kinda disaster, boring turn based combat where the only thinking involved is selecting attack, and a strictly linear experience.

Now some jrpg's are trying to become more western, like blue dragon has no random encounters and eternal sonata's combat lets you move around, but just keep in mind they're copying that stuff from wrpgs.

tmacairjordan87

the thing is, most JRPGs TRY to be different gameplay wise... you have games like Final Fantasy, then Dragon Warrior, similar but differnet, then theres games that used a similar formula but changed the gameplay like Grandia, Chrono Trigger, Legend of Dragoon, Shadow Hearts.. then you have the Strategy RPGs like Fire Emblem, Tactics Ogre, Ogre Battle, Final Fantasy Tactics, Romance Three Kingdoms, Blazing Heroes, blah blah... then there's the action RPGs from Zelda to Ys to Kingdom Hearts to Vagrant Story, then theres the virtua pet games like Pokemon, Digimon, Guardian's Cruesade, Jade Cocoon and so on... then theres side scroller games like Castlevania, Odin Sphere and some others... there's also a ton of original and quirky RPGs out there worth mentioning, but I won't bother... this is purely talking about these games battle systems and not their character developments or graphic styles... alot of these games use new game engines each time, rather than whore themselves over and over again with 'new' quests like the Dark Alliance engine for example.. how many games have used that? Dark Alliance 1 and 2, both Champions of Norrath games, Fallout Brotherhood of Steel and I'm sure a dozen other games... that's one of my biggest gripes about WRPGs is they just use other games engines to pump out a quick game, with little changes over the previous games that use it... it's so boring...

as an above poster mentioned in this thread, I hate dialog scenes in WRPGs, it's just the character standing there with little or no emotion in their face or movements, that was one of my few gripes with Jade Empire, when people are happy, they don't show it, and when people are mad they don't show it... they have the same generic emotion from start to finish...

another big problem I have with WRPGs is randomly generated dungeons, these things are so boring to crawl through because it's the same pallets over and over again, there's nothing creative or imaginative about the dungeons of most of these games I've played...

I'm looking for a good WRPG, don't get me wrong, I'm playing as many as I can, I'm looking for that GOOD WRPG, but so far I've only found a handful worth playing...

...alot of these games use new game engines each time, rather than whore themselves over and over again with 'new' quests like the Dark Alliance engine for example.. how many games have used that? Dark Alliance 1 and 2, both Champions of Norrath games, Fallout Brotherhood of Steel and I'm sure a dozen other games... (snip)

...another big problem I have with WRPGs is randomly generated dungeons, these things are so boring to crawl through because it's the same pallets over and over again, there's nothing creative or imaginative about the dungeons of most of these games I've played...

zh666

Umm... none of those games you mentioned are traditional western rpgs. Similarly the only game to have featured randomized dungeons in years is Hellgate London, and again that's not a traditional western rpg, it's a hack & slash multiplayer game.

Like someone above said, what you're doing is like if I were to judge Chrono Trigger as junk because I hate Dynasty Warriors... what, they're both jrpg's, arn't they? They're obviously both crap then.

See what I did there?

Finest and most original story I've ever encountered was in a wrpg named Planescape: Torment. So before you judge all wrpg's as unoriginal hack&slash braindead pulp stuff with bland stories, try playing Planescape, it just might change your mind and encourage you to try other classic wrpg's.

As for the original question, what're ya talkin about no romance? It's tradition to have atleast one romance in most wrpg's. Bioware always tends to put atleast one into their games, same with Obsidian and many other wrpg developers. Even The Witcher has it's choice of fine ladies to woo and charm at your whim.

*Sigh* Why is it that everytime the word "WRPG" or "JRPG" pops in a thread title there's a war between the subgenres?

As someone who has played both I can honestly say in terms of gameplay both have their advantages.

JRPGs often have better battle systems, better story telling, better level grinding systems, and better party mangement.

WRPG's often have more freedom, better exploration, heavy emphasis on role playing, better atmosphere, and far less linear.

Obviously there are exceptions to these rules such as Silent Storm, Final Fantasy XII, Planescape Torment, and Contact, but in my eyes this is how it more then often is.

The two subgenres seem to be apples and oranges, you can't really compare the two. However you can't go wrong with either since they both have amazing games to choose from (which is why the genre has survived for so long). Actually scratch that, the only wrong thing you could do (IMO) is to not choose both (assuming if you enjoy both).

Being fair I can see why there is much dislike between the two, because from both sides people. Most of those that prefer JRPG's see WRPG's as being too open ended and not enough direction, so most see them as in terms of The Elder Scrolls series. In reality this is totally false as their are titles such as Deus Ex, Vampire: Bloodlines where there is much direction in the game, and open ended games very well designed such as Fallout 2. Most of those that prefer WRPG's see JRPG's being high on story and low on gameplay, when in reality their are plenty of JRPG's that gameplay focused such as Grandia, Vagrant Story, and SMT: Nocturne.

To end with this post, stating that WRPG's or JRPG's are all the same is a little silly.

With WRPG's you have games like: Deus Ex, Fallout 2, Knights of the Old Republic, Baldur's Gate, MorrowWind, and World of Warcraft. Not two games I listed are very similar.

With JRPG's you have games like: Persona 3, Valkyrie Profile, Panzer Dragoon Saga, Disgaea, Vagrant Story, Shadow Hearts, and Terrigama. And again not 2 games on that list are very similar.

Both sub-genres are good for their own reasons, it's all a matter of preference of which one you choose.

To the TC's topic I often think it's the stylle and themes WRPG's often have. JRPG's you have some games that try to be like interactive stories like Final Fantasy which is somewhat trys to be an epic adventure.

In most WRPG's the tone is usually darker, so love isn't usually in the main quest. However many of them are open ended and let you choose who to love, so in reality you can create the love story on your own.

[QUOTE="zh666"]

...alot of these games use new game engines each time, rather than whore themselves over and over again with 'new' quests like the Dark Alliance engine for example.. how many games have used that? Dark Alliance 1 and 2, both Champions of Norrath games, Fallout Brotherhood of Steel and I'm sure a dozen other games... (snip)

the_mad_madman

Finest and most original story I've ever encountered was in a wrpg named Planescape: Torment. So before you judge all wrpg's as unoriginal hack&slash braindead pulp stuff with bland stories, try playing Planescape, it just might change your mind and encourage you to try other classic wrpg's.

that game uses the Baldur's Gate game engine... which is one gripe i was talking about earlier... I'm sure its a fine game, I haven't played it, so before you get your panties in a bunch, couldn't you of used a better example?zh666

So if a game uses the same engine as another game it's the exact same?

By your logic God of War and Kinetica are very similar.

that game uses the Baldur's Gate game engine... which is one gripe i was talking about earlier... I'm sure its a fine game, I haven't played it, so before you get your panties in a bunch, couldn't you of used a better example?zh666

I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about here. The same engine? Better example? I seriously have no clue what you're talking about.

Planescape: Torment does indeed use the old infinity engine and that was the engine that powered Baldur's Gate 1 and Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn. It's an isometric view engine that used animated sprites on drawn background, usually used tactical turn-based combat that would proceed real-time untill you pressed the space bar at which point it would pause and you could que up the spells or actions you want to use. Nothing fancy, but it was extremely versatile and the artwork still holds up well today.

As for story, what do you mean use a better example? Planescape: Torment simply has the best story in a game I've played, and I mentioned that because you said earlier that you believed wrpg's dont have good stories. You know, show you that your presumptions might not really be correct. I can mention other wrpg's with fine plots, but that wasn't the point. I don't see what you're saying.

this thread is just full of so many old stereo types that it's not funny.

i think the last 4- 5 years, WRPG's have won more RPG awards across the board than JRPG's, you had Morrowind, KOTOR, Oblivion, Neverwinter Nights 2... the only JRPG that got a ton of recognition was Dragon Quest VIII and guess what? that's as traditional a JRPG as you can get.

then you ahve Fallout, Deus Ex, Planescape, Baldur's Gate all in a bunch of "greatest games of all time" lists

This year there's not a single JRPG this year that can hold a candle to Mass Effect or The Witcher so all those awards will go to these games.

out of all these games listed, only two pairs share the same battle system and 3 share the same graphics engine.

you have morrowind that takes place in a totally original world, you have KOTOR in the star wars universe, NEverwinter Nights is D&D, Fallout is post apocalyptic, Deus is future conspiracy theory, Planescape is in a world all it's own... Mass Effect has a fully fleshed out world different than anything I've seen and the witcher doesn't rely on goblins, orcs and things like that.

so there goes the proof against 90% of the posts in here

Kotor, Oblivion, Neverwinter Nights 2, Deus Ex, Mass Effect, The Witcher all have NPCs that show emotion

This year there's not a single JRPG this year that can hold a candle to Mass Effect or The Witcher

smerlus

I highly disagree since I've played 2 JRPG's which I could consider to be some of my favorite games of all-time.

Also I really don't see why using Game of the Year measures the games quality. Especially since Gamespot is noctrious for giving lower then average scores to legends of the RPG genre (Deus Ex, Valkyrie Profile).

I know you're trying to defend you're points here from the ignorant posts in this thread (believe me I know how off they are), but I'm just pointing out it isn't good to judge a niche genre by scores (especially with a certain controversy going on).

Though I'm not surprise there is so many off generalzations, people who play RPG's usually play one or the other. I think this is more due to the fact that there isn't really a system that widely contains both genres. If you have a PC or a 360 your going to get almost only WRPG's, if you have a PS3 or Wii your almost always only going to get JRPG's; I can use a similar statement to the PC, PS2, GC, and Xbox last gen. (Though I'm not saying that you only play one genre Smerlus since you stated that you were an Ogre Battle fan)

EDIT - Wow this thread is off-topic.

Diablo: Not an RPG

Gauntlet: Not an RPG

D&D Heros: Not an RPG

Blood Omen: Not an RPG

Dark Alliance I+II: Not an RPG

Fallout Brotherhood: Not an RPG

Champions of Norrath: Not an RPG

X-men legends: Not an RPG

Nox: Not an RPG

Bards Tale: Not an RPG

Drakkan : Not an RPG

Phew... hey look at those similarities. Those games have... stats. Hey, X-Com has stats. Is that an RPG? I have hit points in Doom! That must be an RPG. Hey... I can level up units in Total Annihilation based on the kills they get. That MUST be an RPG too! I can assign stats to my player in Tiger Woods... ASSIGN STATS THAT'S AN RPG!!!

Those are action games. Sadly, they get stuffed in the RPG genre.

Getting back on topic...

I have no idea why there aren't love stories more often in games. Maybe developers feel that they're unimportant in the overall scheme of things and gloss over them, maybe they feel they're difficult to write and handle properly, who knows.

I still think Baldur's Gate II had some of the best written and often touching romance subplots of any game...not that there are a ton of other titles vying for that category, but still. In contrast Mass Effect's romances are a lot less interesting, which I feel bad saying.

I haven't played a JRPG that's engaged me with a romance aspect, though. I think FFVII was trying to pull that off at certain stages, but it felt really forced. And I thought FFVIII made a total mess of its romance by making the female lead obnoxious as all hell.

Diablo: Not an RPG

Gauntlet: Not an RPG

D&D Heros: Not an RPG

Blood Omen: Not an RPG

Dark Alliance I+II: Not an RPG

Fallout Brotherhood: Not an RPG

Champions of Norrath: Not an RPG

X-men legends: Not an RPG

Nox: Not an RPG

Bards Tale: Not an RPG

Drakkan : Not an RPG

Phew... hey look at those similarities. Those games have... stats. Hey, X-Com has stats. Is that an RPG? I have hit points in Doom! That must be an RPG. Hey... I can level up units in Total Annihilation based on the kills they get. That MUST be an RPG too! I can assign stats to my player in Tiger Woods... ASSIGN STATS THAT'S AN RPG!!!

Those are action games. Sadly, they get stuffed in the RPG genre.

ashtaka

wow.. haha... just wow....

I've played enough, like Mirrowind, Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heros, Vampire the Masquerade from your list... plus Blood Omen, Dark Alliance I+II, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-men legends, Nox, Bards Tale, and buttloads of others I'm forgetting.. and older games like Ultima, Bards Tale, Might & Magic, Drakkan and other crap...

zh666

Wait, those are your examples of the best WRPGs that you have played?

Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heroes, Blood Omen, Dark Alliance, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-Men Legends, Nox, Drakkan and the Bards Tale are all action RPGs, which don't really compare to actual role-playing games.

I can see why you thought that 95% of all WRPGs have terrible storylines, because it looks like 95% of the RPGs that you have played are bad RPGs.
The fact that you keep buying these games is...odd. You probably don't hate them, or else you would have bought better RPGs, such as anything made by Bioware, Black Isle or Troika.

Anyway, back on topic, WRPGs do have romances in them...

[QUOTE="zh666"]

I've played enough, like Mirrowind, Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heros, Vampire the Masquerade from your list... plus Blood Omen, Dark Alliance I+II, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-men legends, Nox, Bards Tale, and buttloads of others I'm forgetting.. and older games like Ultima, Bards Tale, Might & Magic, Drakkan and other crap...

Planeforger

Wait, those are your examples of the best WRPGs that you have played?

Diablo, Gauntlet, D&D Heroes, Blood Omen, Dark Alliance, Fallout Brotherhood, Champions of Norrath, X-Men Legends, Nox, Drakkan and the Bards Tale are all action RPGs, which don't really compare to actual role-playing games.

I can see why you thought that 95% of all WRPGs have terrible storylines, because it looks like 95% of the RPGs that you have played are bad RPGs.
The fact that you keep buying these games is...odd. You probably don't hate them, or else you would have bought better RPGs, such as anything made by Bioware, Black Isle or Troika.

Anyway, back on topic, WRPGs do have romances in them...

for me, i hate them because they lack imagination, the stories are terrible almost 95% of the time, and the characters are almost certainly bland and forgetable

the battle systems are generally the same, overhead dungeon crawler, or 3rd Person dungeon crawler, or first person dungeon crawler.. uh that's about it.... the camera views change, but the games are still the same... just hack and slash your way through a million robots or giant spiders until you fight the final crappy boss in the dungeon... blah...

the skill systems are almost the exactly the same in these games too.. do quests big or small, gain experience, kill monsters gain experience, finally gain a level and then you sort out skill points to whatever atributes you want them to go (usally limited for 3-4 for some lame purpose)...

some of the better WRPGs I've played have been Jade Empire and Gladius so far... and next on my list to play is KoToR and Fable, but I'm sure Fable will disapoint...

zh666

Exactly.But I must admit,as long as I can play a Hack´n Slay with a Pad (like BG:DA) I really like it.With exeption of MMORPGs,klicking with the Mouse on a Monster to kill it feels a bit stupid...like Diablo for example who is more slaying then anything else.

But why is there no love in WRPGs?Because the Characters miss a lot of personality and without it,it whould be meaningless.Why should your Character or a side-character have a love-story if you don´t even care?That´s the problem with custom-characters...

Personality can be found in both western and *** RPGs. I really can't imagine any real RPG fans hating Planescape Torment or Final Fantasy VII.

WRPGs are my favorite type. BioWare is probably my favorite developer.

The thing that really kills it for me in JRPGs are random encounters and turn-based battles. Especially random encounters - I know there are JRPGs out there with no random encounters (FFXII - which I like).

Icant play JRPG's any more because of the grind that was involved, and FF12 is no differant they took out random encounters but have you noticed the encounter rate is twice to three times as high.

Basically I prefer WRPG's because the stories are often more understated even when your the son of the Lord of Murder.

Some WRPG's remembered for greatnessare Plnescape torment and Baldurs Gate 2. This is kind of unfair on Japanese RPG's because many of these RPG's have rich pre created source material.That said a lot of the subtlety in JRPG's is probably lost in the culture transition or even not put in Shin Megami Tensai comes to mind.

I think the BioWare-Titles are the only ones that got me really motivated.But in the end Jade Empire and KotOR had the same problem.Well created source and poorly executed Storyline.There had been so many Sidequests,that I can´t even remember the Storylines.It was totally short and just gone under.KotOR 2 (which wasn´t made by BioWare) was even worse.But there are also JRPGs that suffer from a well created World and idealess or just flat Storyline.FFX and FFXII for example.

Well after all,WRPG suffer from the custom Characters in every point,because they don´t have a personality.You give it to them but that seems to eliminate the possibility of a good storyline.The Idea behind FFX wasn´t bad after all BUT that doesn´t mean FFX made it well.Not because you can do whatever you want with your characters,no,just because they made a great world and forgot the Storyline on the way.

I never understood people complaining about making their own characters and saying that they are personality-less... they are yours to create and do whatever you want with them.

like i said in another topic, you can pick up Morrowind, make a character with blond spikey hair who carries a big sword and you can go through the whole game being good and always doing the right thing just like playing Cloud in FFVII... or you can make a Sephiroth character and go around killing everyone in your path something FFVII enver let you do.

Name some JRPG's where I can amass the power of a God and wipe out everyone in the world like Morrowind, Where I can play as an insane vampire, or a hideous Vampire that has to travel through the sewers the whole game to avoid blowing the cover of Vampires...Where I can play as a ruthless Sith lord, let alone the 5000 different types of characters you can play in the D&D universe ranging from 1/2 demons to elementals, to fruity bards, dark assassins... The variety of characters is endless and only restricted by your own imagination.

Designing you own character and saying he/she sucks is like me giving you a blank check, telling you that you can buy anything you want and you come back saying "man everything i bought sucked"

in the end it's your fault.

A lot of the games the topic creator have played shouldn't be considered WRPGs as much as beat em ups or shoot em ups with some rpg style customizising of characters. For example the Baldur's Gate Dark Alllience games on the Playstation 2 are just hack and slash fests while the PC games Baldur's Gate are full fledged rpgs complete with romance, turn based combat and more stories and quests.

I think the differences in wrpgs and jrpgs, of which I like both are more in that wrpgs have less linear storylines and usually a lot of side quests, more customizing of characters. This usually means that they feel freer but less focused, and that most of what happens isn't as pre-determined. For example, the games Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2 have potential love interests but it's up to the player to try to pursue those, if he even wishes to.

There's bound to be generalizations in a discussion such as this unless one compares specific games to each other. I'm just happy both styles are being made because they both have their fans and it's not too dissimilar a discussion as say, the difference between arcade racers and sim racers.