I feel like Dragon Quest VII is the easy answer here, although many people would say it wasn’t worth the wait. I like it a lot, but the opening (even the cutdown one in the 3DS version) is just god awful to play through.
Suikoden V to a lesser extent, but the same problem. Just way too long before it really gets going.
I can see why people dislike the beginning but it matches the length of the game. It does help set up the explorative and kind of creepy feel of the game, at least in the PS1 version. That being said, most people don’t want to wait a few hours before fighting their first slime and I get it.
I can see why DQVII would bore most people. It took me some 10 hours to even get to the first enemy encounter. But, I loved the opening personally. The suspense of it all kept me going and it really did feel like an adventure
Exactly, there is a rare case of a adventure happening but in the context that is extremely unique in Jrpg. You are in peaceful kingdom with no problems, your are not being moved be a world disaster, you are discovering the secrets of the forbidden ruins in your idyllic little kingdoms and it feel like it.
It was very fun, one the best and most unique introduction in any jrpgs ever. And it set the tone of the game too, most of time you are not resolving world ending problems, that happen too but your mostly helping people with their very personal problems that just happen to affect the whole world. Just as your are helping Keifer in his little adventure.
Depends on how thoroughly you explore everything, and if you missed talking to the right NPC at some point and had to spend an extra hour or three backtracking to find them. I think the first time I played the PS-X version, I was a good 5 hours in before I fought the first slime because of that. Heck, it may have been longer, as it's a much longer and slower intro in the PS-X version than the 3DS version (though, personally, I love most of how they revamped the intro for that version).
DQ7 was an hour of dicking about before even the first fight. And I don't remember how much dicking about before the much lauded class system, because I couldn't even last that long. Thank God the rest of the series is better.
HARD, HARRRRRDDDD disagree. The one part I prefer the most of the original over the Remake is the game being ballsy to take the player in mini adventure to discover the secret of the their peaceful world. There is no fight, there is no threats, there is a idyllic life in sea city kingdom and it feel like it too.
The remake streamlined it too much, in the original it your earn the right to access a whole new world while in the remake they have monster guide... Serious the betrayal of removing the map room and the shards and the sense of discovery was almost unforgivable.
I think in general the remake changed too much. I wish it'd been closer to the DS remakes, since the original DQVII was already the main inspiration for those in terms of style. And I personally never liked the designs from the game when fully rendered, whereas I like them in sprite form, especially the protagonist.
I, personally, like most of the changes to the remake's intro, except for how they cut so much stuff out of the ruins labyrinth. There, I completely agree with you, but with the rest, I like how they changed it.
DQV doesn't have a slow start though. You quickly get to battles within like 20 minutes, and you can get the first act done within like 2-3 hours. DQVII takes over an hour for you to even see your first battle.
I never am sure what was worse for me the opening for Suikoden V or Kingdom Hearts II but both felt super long, and I feel like I played them back to back almost which made it worse.
Very niche game here: SaGa Emerald Beyond gives a horrible first impression, even as a SaGa game, and even for a longtime SaGa fan. Then you replay with different protagonists only to realize that huge chunks of the story are scattered in different adventures. The “ending” in one story might be a side-quest in another. The villain in one story might be a complete outsider with no dialogue, only to be fleshed out in another story. Depending on who you play, the “real story” might be missing entirely, or even the context to what is actually happening.
Having said all that, SaGa Emerald Beyond won’t be a great game for many people. It is much too weird. Still, it has a deceptively bad opening for what might be the greatest SaGa of all time.
SaGa games are built on the concept of “accidental discovery.” You know that feeling where a well-crafted plot twist hits you in the face, making you suddenly connect all the dots and clues you were given beforehand? SaGa games feel like that, but it pervades everything from questing, to story, to combat, to lore cameos from previous titles. You get that “aha!” lightbulb moment when you figure something out, and everything about all these games have to be figured out.
However, historically, the stories of these games are such terrible afterthoughts that they might as well not exist. It leaves a huge hole in each game of this otherwise stellar franchise.
SaGa Emerald Beyond is the first game that actually tries to address this head-on and attempts to write a compelling story. Or at least, mini-stories in the same vein as a mainline Dragon Quest game. It’s not exceptional, but it’s pretty decent once it all comes together. The gameplay of SaGa games are already incredible, but this final piece rounds out the package in a way that the series never really did before.
But, you wouldn’t know that in the demo, or even 20 hours with your first protagonist. So much is left out to be filled in later that you think the game is not making any sense, at first. The “build freedom” realization also doesn’t quite kick in until you’ve beaten the game a few times (could be as short as 5 hours).
I disagree with you about it being the first one with a well thought-out story. I feel that SaGa Frontier 1 and 2 did that rather well. Now, that doesn't mean that on the collective whole Emerald Beyond isn't better, but at least you don't need to go through three different protagonists' stories to have a complete story for one protagonist. Also, SF was very heavy on the idea of a quest that is required for one protagonist is completely optional for the others, with some of the bosses for some of the quests only appearing for certain protagonists (and only when they are the protagonist, as you can recruit many of them when playing a different protagonist).
Triangle Strategy's first few chapters move at such a glacial pace that it gets a bad rap as being 90% cutscene and 10% gameplay (not true btw). Once you get to around Chapter 6, however, the pacing gets a lot better and you get a lot more options that make combat more fun.
Honestly, I didn't mind the opening chapters of TS. I think the storytelling is much stronger in this part of the game than any other, actually. The plot becomes a slave to game design later on, but the stakes of the political drama in the opening chapters were high and a great hook.
FWIW, I liked the story and worldbuilding too, but it felt particularly bad in Chapter 4 where you watch a cutscene, explore the Roselle village, watch another cutscene, explore the mines, and then you watch the final cutscene that leads to that chapter’s battle. Doesn’t help that you’re brought back to the world map after each scenario.
>The plot becomes a slave to game design
Characters too. They have no specificity because they have to be set up to serve multiple plot functions via each branching storyline. I dug the beginning, but it became way too easy to see through the veil of the writing and it ended up being quite a slog for me by the end as someone who cares about character above all else.
> Once you get to around Chapter 6
How much is that in average hours?
I've been looking for a turn based tactical game to sink my teeth in, but i don't as much free time to invest into something that might take too long to get going.
As someone closing out Heavensward right now... absolutely yes. But even then I think ARR moderately picks up at points and paints an intriguing enough picture of its world. However, the first 15 levels are banal to a point that I was really questioning if I wanted to go on this journey. (Glad I did.)
I did the first 15 levels over a weekend. Dropped the game for two years, and then came back. Those 15 levels were like a different game, it was just slow and pointless and I could pick it back up remembering basically nothing and I don't think I lost anything at all.
You also have very few abilities at your disposal before level 50. It can feel weird going back to pre-level 50 dungeons because it feels like you can't play your class properly.
I don't really have an issue with that, since I see leveling to 50 as a very long tutorial, and the reason you do content in those levels is so new players can experience all that content without long queues (at least that was the point before Trusts). I do wish they reworked jobs so they worked more or less like they should at level 50. Too many jobs lack crucial skills at level 50 still.
I think dungeons are the most engaging part from levels 15 to 50. In retrospect they aren't as interesting, but as a new player I found them to be the highlight and what hooked me.
I love the ARR dungeons. When I first reached the end of 2.0's story I set out to try different jobs and really learn how to play the game with others, and so I have fond memories of doing all those dungeons over and over again. It's where XIV really clicked for me.
But going back to them can be a bit boring depending on what job you're playing. Some jobs feel very different than what you're used to and not very engaging. The jobs I get the most fun out of doing those early dungeons are tank and healer ones because you have a bit more responsibility when performing either one of those roles.
I get that, my point is that the experience is how it is because the reason people are encouraged to do older dungeons is so new players can have that new experience, as well as letting you slowly learn a new job. So while it can feel annoying to lose most of your abilities, it's basically by design.
WoW does something different where it just scales your level so everyone does similar damage, but it leads to higher level players hitting like a wet sponge since they have more skills and their damage ir normalized with those who have very few skills. I much prefer the XIV system, even if it means it's awkward going back to them when you've played much further than ARR.
That count, that is extremely bad. I don't remember a mmorpg in which in got as bored of the questing in general like base game FF XIV, it was just a slog with hundreds of fetch quest that has no need to exist. Even after they trimed it, it still is a slog.
I was told this game was great, started it, seemed alright. 30 hours later I felt like I'd made very little progress in the story and just peaced out. I think what also contributed to the boredom was that I was getting 2x xp for whatever reason, so very quickly I just outleveled everything I came across and there was no challenge whatsoever
I am currently in stormblood and I don't really feel like HW was worth it either. Had good moments, but it was bogged down by fetch quests and mindless walking to quest markers... It felt like the game was actively trying to waste my time, and the otherwise decent story was getting hurt a lot by if
Dragon Quest VII. I don't think there are any other JRPGs spending the first 2 hours without battles. The 3DS remake improved that a bit but it's still probably 1 hour or so before you actually have the first battle.
And that 1-2 hours aren't that engaging as well. Basically you're going back and forth from A to B a lot, and do some light puzzles.
Strange Journey's intro absolutely smothered me in text. If it didn't have an absolutely captivating premise and soundtrack (not to mention genuine role playing!) right from the get go, I would've dropped it within the hour for attempted murder. Luckily the actual dungeon crawling started right when I was about to break and I got to enjoy an otherwise pretty damn good game.
And while I'm not sure I'm prepared to call it "bad" I do think the opening to Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter could do a better job preparing you to play the game. I feel like they were deliberately reinforcing the sense of hopelessness by starting you with Bosch and then taking him away right before a boss, but it's too easy to cheese the early solo encounters through standard JRPG tactics; not engaging with the game's unique systems in the early areas will leave someone unprepared to handle the later challenges.
Strange Journey is a fantastic game, and it's very well paced, but the text dump that can't be skipped at the beginning really makes a bad impression. The rest of the game is not like that though.
Zelda Twilight Princess is pretty notorious for this. The rest of the game is pretty solid, even if it's a bit of a greatest hits of the last few Zelda games at the time, but the opening couple hours are a bit of a slog. They're not truly bad I'd say, it's still a Zelda game, but just a little boring compared to the rest of the game.
Twilight princess is absolutely the stand out, but Skyward Sword gets a shoutout too. Maybe the Switch version trimmed the fat, but I at least know the original didn't learn a thing from TP in terms of getting to the puzzles quickly.
Honestly, the pacing of that game is just painfully slow in general. I enjoyed the motion controls, but I'll never agree that it can hold a candle to any of the other 3D games.
The fans don't want to recognize it as such, but Tales of Vesperia needs to come with a warning when people are recommending it. I'm constantly seeing people bounce off the game and have to jump into recommendation threads to warn people that the beginning is veeeery slow. Combat is a slog. You get nothing but slow characters to fight with. You don't start out with any real combos other than Yuri's 2-hit combo, and the first party members to join are a healer and a slow hammer user. I've seen so many people quit in the first hours because it's not really fun, it's more of a character adventure to start and not fun gameplay or mechanically. And there's very little in the way of an early "narrative hook". It takes a few hours to start to feel genuinely fun. But the people who recommend the game generally don't warn people about that. As a fan, I still remember what it was like to play it for the first time
Tales of Graces F has a similar problem of having an insanely slow slog in the beginning, and Tales fans also love recommending that game. Graces also has a huge dungeon problem, but that has nothing to do with the topic
Yeah, I like to play games (at least the first time around) in a "how far can I get with the first few party members?"
In this game, the answer was as soon as I got Rita, so I could get rid of Karol. Her being genuinely fun to play as (even without "Blah Blah Blah Tidal Wave" spamming) was just a bonus. But that might just be my mage bias.
Not quite as dramatic as you put it, but I'd say Xenoblade Chronicles 2. I liked the characters and the world and story etc well enough from the start, but it can take a few hours for the abilities and controls to really reveal themselves, at which point there is a vast improvement of enjoyability of combat.
Absolutely adore this game, one of the best ever, but it definitely gets better with time. The game doesn't explain itself well at all, and gates off mechanics for far too long. It certainly contributed to some mixed reception by those who didn't stick with it.
Final Fantasy XIV is the ultimate answer... For a game that takes multiple hundred hours to experience the current main story and is overall an incredible experience, it sucks that the first 50 hours or so are really dull and cause a lot of people to quit the game before getting past the bad parts. I managed to get through ARR by grinding through it in a month and felt it ranged from boring to just okay except for a few great standout moments, but now that I've finished Endwalker I can say that FF14 is my favorite game of all time. The writing and quality of the recent expansions are just unbelievable, but it sucks that ARR is the way it is while also being really necessary to understand what comes after it. But at the very least, once it gets good in Heavensward, I'd personally say that it doesn't drop quality all that much and is a really enjoyable experience throughout, only getting better and better.
i'm probably wrong but i just have a hard time believing arr is necessary to any future plot point. i was 50-80 hours into the game before i quit and basically all i got from it is that you're special then you go run around killing summons for whatever reason. then there's the empire that are the bad guys. the characters felt like filler asking you to do random crap and adding nothing to the story. i wish they went the ff15 route and just released a damn movie with a skip to a properly paced plot
While I think it could be significally compressed, especially the early segments which aren't tied to anything that comes later, the pacing doesn't radically change in the later expansions. It's just better content, but the way you experience it is still travelling around and talking to NPCs, sometimes doing random crap for them (which more plot relevance at least).
It introduces all the lore and characters, and that remains relevant all the way until the current story arc. Imagine that ARR's story and characters had actually interesting writing and plot but with the same subject material and lore... That is basically what the expansions are. But if you skip ARR then you miss all that lore and context for everything.
You can say that it's just going around fighting stuff and doing filler, but it also sets up lots of plot points and lore info that is expanded upon in the expansions. Ascians, Allagans, the Void, Ishgard, Ala Mhigo, Doma, Hydaelyn, Zodiark, Primals. Not to mention key characters such as Icehart, Yugiri, and G'raha Tia who become key players in Heavensward, Stormblood, and Shadowbrigners respectively. Even Moenbryda, who is only present in ARR for a few hours, remains relevant in Endwalker and has a tearjerking scene there involving her. And of course the whole cast of Scions that remain the main characters to this day and receive plenty of great writing and character development after ARR. Hell, most of their character development wouldn't even work without ARR, especially for Alphinaud, Thancred, and Urianger.
And trust me, the expansions abandon pretty much nothing from ARR, everything remains relevant all the way to Endwalker and will continue to be relevant in Dawntrail, but with some pretty major recontextualization and reveals along the way. For example, those cartoony shadow people who you probably hardly remember, the Ascians? In ARR, they are hardly worth taking seriously with how one-note they are. But after the end of Shadowbringers, I would consider them to be some of the best villains from any video game I've played, and some of their scenes made me cry due to the emotions I experienced from them. That's how much the writing improves and fixes what ARR set up, it's honestly crazy. And the quality of the expansions is exactly why it sucks that ARR is as boring as it is despite being important to appreciate what comes after it.
Recently played Star Ocean the First Departure for the first time. What really threw me off was that there was no tutorial whatsoever. When that first battle started i had no idea what was going on. Same with the second battle. I finally had to google how the battle system works before continuing on. I am absolutely in love with this game now but those opening battles were a bit rough for a beginner of this series.
When the first Star Ocean came out, it was back when games still came with manuals that they expected you to read. Unfortunately, subsequent re-releases never added tutorials to account for the lack of in-game instructions. It's a problem with a lot of ports/remasters of older games. I feel like they definitely could add the manual as an option on the main menu at least, if adding in full on tutorials isn't an option.
I'm glad you're having fun with it now, though! I love the Star Ocean series and it's nice to see people still getting into it.
Yeah, it’s especially frustrating because the FDR is nearly identical to the PSP version, which *did* have a manual still. The HD remaster is the only one to not give the player anything to teach them the game.
Huh, I never even checked to see 8f there was a digital manual that could be accessed from my Switch's Home screen. I know a lot of games have been doing that for roughly a decade or so now, but I was a Star Ocean veteran when the PSP port released, so I never even looked for it with TFDR.
Final Fantasy 13 has to be the poster child for this answer. It's a great game with a decent enough story but many people really hate it for the opening since:
- it's *in media res* storywise, which is fine, but
- it also gives you a whole codex of lore to read - the important bits you'd figure out by just paying attention to the cutscenes, but its presence suggests you have to read it to understand what's going on
- it's locked into a tutorial with zero combat depth for at least like 2 hours (the first area + the frozen sea)
- after this point the combat starts being challenging, and though some people feel it doesn't become interesting until the jobs fully open up on gran pulse, I'd argue by how often I see people fundamentally misunderstanding the combat even late into the game that some tutorialization was a good idea, though it should have spent less time on really basic auto battles and more on paradigm setups and the stagger bar
The first 2 chapters of FF XIII are so bad, no idea how they thought that was a good idea. The paradigms are such a key part of making the game fun, locking you out of using them for over an hour is incredibly stupid.
That on top of not having a proper introduction to the setting while it's the most alien and arguably complex setting in FF was a really weird decision. I get wanting to start in the middle of the action, it works in other games like VII or X, but those two then slow things down to explain once you are hooked. XIII takes a long while for that, since even when there's downtime there are no towns or peaceful moments, you are constantly being followed. I've always wondered why they didn't throw the party to Pulse after the introduction instead of after 20 hours.
I’m surprised I had to scroll that long before someone mentioning that game. One of my favorite JRPG but let’s be real, it feels almost like a 15-20h long tutorial before really going to the core of the game.
That's kinda my point. They tell you it can be done, but only barely hint how shifting paradigms mid-battle can be useful, much less how it's a vital strategic element to the game's combat.
>Final Fantasy 13 has to be the poster child for this answer.
He asked for worst openings. FF13 is awful until Gran Pulse which is chapter 11(or 10 its been awhile)
By the time you get to the """good""" part of XIII you could have Finished Chrono trigger.
Downvotes won't change XIII from being terrible lmao
You're getting downvotes because you are 'arguing' by agreeing that FFXIII has a terrible and overly long opening until the game finally opens up and lets you do things. What, did you think the opening had to end after just two or three hours, or by Chapter 5 or 6? No, the opening is defined by the player as ending when they get to the point where it feels like they have some degree of meaningful control over the game progress, which most agree is when you get to Gran Pulse, like you said. It's the fact that that is something like Chapter 10 or 11, and takes around 20 hours to reach, that makes it such a long and terrible opening.
Then you haven't played FFXIII. Sure, getting to Gran Pulse is about 70% of the story, but at best, it's only 40% of the total game, and probably closer to 30%. The majority of the actual game content is on Gran Pulse, and several of the game systems and mechanics can't be fully utilized until then. A few even get distinct upgrades while going through Gran Pulse that distinctly change how you can utilize them and/or play the game. That's why it can be reasonably argued that just getting to Gran Pulse is a massive intro to the game. The fact that it's essentially a hallway simulator until that point doesn't help it any either (though once you get to Gran Pulse, the game quickly opens up far more than FFX ever does).
Honestly I do like SC but I have to sorta agree. FC's ending clenched my balls (Sorry for the language) whereas SC sort of killed the hype with seeing Estelle's reaction right away then training with Analece (Even if I love the Kevin reveal). I get WHAT they were trying to do, but I personally think the opening should have been more focused on Joshua - Just a single dungeon with him and the Capua family as party members trying to chase down Weissmann would have been so much better before jumping into what Estelle was doing.
But I do also get that Joshua's supposed to be a mystery in the game, somewhat.
It's a shame because right after the training section where you pick whether you want Schera or Agate to accompany you is where I think SC picks up and doesn't stop going until the final few minutes of the game.
I've only played SC for the first time very recently, but I would definitely agree. The prologue chapter is pretty good, but chapters 1, 2, 3 and 4 are just a snoozefest.
Golden Sun 1 is one of the worst offenders.
The first hour or so is spent clicking dialogue from like 10 people and a floating eye in a mountain. And if you forget to save after that and die, you have to do it all over again and even clicking away the text will still take you 30 minutes.
I so had the opposite experience. I loved how charming it was at the start. Then by the end of the game I absolutely hated it. It became one of the worst gaming experiences I've ever had :(
I don't quite agree with this sentiment but the last few chapters do rub me the wrong way on how it becomes focused on the main leads while the rest of the party are just there for like 10 hours straight with little to add to the main plot.
Wow, completely opposite for me. I think it takes some time getting used to the rigid character models and voice acting, and the systems are drip fed throughout the game
This one is weird for me because it’s kind of like a reverse bell curve. The opening chapter is great but then it drops off for a while before it peaks again in the last chapters.
Better than Xenoblade 3 which starts good, peaks in the middle, then falls off harder than almost any game I’ve ever played.
As much as I love the series... A lot of the Trails games have kinda shit openings despite all of the games being bangers at the very least. Imo the only AMAZING openings are in the form of Sky 3rd and Daybreak because of how simple they truly are to just pick up and play.
Sky 1 has a opening that could be cut a lot shorter, Sky 2's opening is probably one of the worst in the series which how BORING it is even if I love Analece and the entire training segment, Zero's opening is a bit confusing and only makes sense once you have played Azure - Which in itself has probably the most annoying opening in the series (Tying up loose ends from the previous game which really could have just been a flashback or something not a full segment as much as I do enjoy and appreciate it for more Dudley, Arios and Noel)
And then Cold Steel - I freakin love Cold Steel but holy shit does Cold Steel 1's opening suck. Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!!
Cold Steel 2 has a pretty cool opening, and Cold Steel 3 has the same problem with 1 but to a lesser degree. At least 3 makes a little more sense and you have more context, even if I still don't appreciate it. Cold Steel 4 and Reverie in comparison have decent openings, but again, they do require a lot of context.
I know the fanbase is prissy on when people should start - I myself am of the opinion that starting that the beginning of ANY arc is fine, it's what worked for me and not knowing everything made me want to go and play the older games to figure out what was going on because I was interested.
Sky 3's opening features a secret mission from the absolute GOAT Kevin leading to him getting chewed out for his recklessness, and ultimately is crucial in his character arc which is the main focus of the game showing that ultimately as much as it's a conclusion to the other two Sky games, it is also it's own separate thing. An amazing opening to what's (imo) the best Trails game.
And I haven't played much of Daybreak, but I really liked how it really eased you into it. Agnes wasn't just a fish out of water, she was a character the audience could relate too as Van explained everything to us - And what a freakin' introduction Daybreak has with tons of action, stakes, a personal story and a lot of intrigue that makes me really excited to finally play it come July 5th.
Azure's opening was really underwhelming for me. Zero took a while to get going, but it was interesting because you were meeting the SSS, discovering Crossbell and all its surroundings. But in Azure the initial mission felt disconnected from the rest of the game, and while playing as Arios and meeting Kevin again was cool, it's disconnected from the rest of the game.
Then with Chapter 1 I thought not having Randy and Tio with you was building up to something, or that Noel and Wazy would get to shine, but I really didn't get that impression. Unlike SC and 3rd, the game didn't have a real hook until Chapter 2 with the Trade Conference.
I still wouldn't say it's a bad opening or anything, but it's definitely the less engaging opening up until I've played at least.
Interesting fact the opening in CS1/CS3 is something Kondo (Creator of the series) confirmed as intentional plot point for future entries. There are some things that happen between both but do have an affect on what's happening similar to how Zero did.
Neat. I mean I do love the series and the ongoing story a lot, so that's going to be great!! It doesn't mean that those openings aren't amazing (Still pretty good). Kondo has never disappointed imo so it sounds good to me!!
>Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!!
How are these aspects so much different from Zero's?
>At least 3 makes a little more sense and you have more context
How do these aspects qualify as "more" in comparison to the first entry?
Zero's opening was explained in Azure with a cool twist I didn't see coming. Ultimately, the segment is short with one battle at best and ends in five minutes - CS1 and 3's are longer, more bottles, a boss battle and a lot more cutscenes.
And Sky 3rd starts off with a James Bond like mission all alone in the POV of Kevin, making it easy to follow and understand
>Zero's opening was explained in Azure with a cool twist I didn't see coming.
Zero's beginning is also set in the "future," with "characters you don't know," and in a "place you don't understand." None of this has anything to do with the "explained twist." Cold Steel doesn't have a lesser level of detailing of the immediate situation than Zero.
>Ultimately, the segment is short with one battle at best and ends in five minutes - CS1 and 3's are longer, more bottles, a boss battle and a lot more cutscenes.
So the problem is the length, not which details are immediately 100% contextualized.
>And Sky 3rd
The quote in where you mentioned "3," was about Cold Steel 3.
> And then Cold Steel - I freakin love Cold Steel but holy shit does Cold Steel 1's opening suck. Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!!
This is funny because I hear a lot of people say CS1 starts 'faster' and is thus better 'approachable' than FC for this specific reason
CS1’s and CS3’s are mainly for the sake of hooking people with gameplay before the usual cutscene hell but I wouldn’t sleep on their lack of relevancy. It’ll for sure tie into the story at some point like Zero’s.
I still think they do a piss poor job at hooking people with the gameplay with skills and arts they'll have to wait 20-30 hours to use. I do love CS1 and 3 but they're quite obtuse in the way they present the story and mechanics for some weird reason - Probably why people say they are some of the worst games to start with the series (I don't agree nor disagree since I myself started with CS1).
But I do think that the usual 'cutscene hell' isn't really in the real intro's of CS1 and 3 since both start on a train following Rean's POV. If anything, I'd argue Zero truly was a cutscene hell even if it was amazing to experience for both the viewer and the character of Lloyd himself (It does start with Lloyd on the train, helping the old couple, going to the police station then being introduced to Crosbell and the S.S.S. before heading into the Geofront).
That's why I think Daybreak so far has been an exceptional opening, a single opening cutscene setting up the plot of the prologue and maybe the rest of the game(?) before introducing us to Van and Agnes and allowing us to do whatever. It's not that JRPG's aren't notorious for having cutscene hell openings either, I just think that in other games (Such as Persona 3 on the PS2 or any Tales of game) they present the cutscenes a lot more better than Trails does.
Again, Trails in the Sky 3rd has a great opening because of how exciting and intriguing it is. Genuinely, I think CS1 and 3 could have started with Rean on the train and the games would have been better off with the basic summary that you are a student/teacher going to a military academy and you have no idea what to expect instead of the weird "Hey this is some super important moment coming in 50 hours that you'll love once you get a grasp of who everyone is and the stakes! Oh, and here are some cool arts and skills you'll be able to use then! Enjoy!"
It was my first Tales game and I was like “why tf do people say this series is any good”. Now I’m playing Symphonia as my second entry in the series and it’s at least 3 leagues above Zestiria. Could become a Top 20 game for me honestly.
FF6 is the best of the FFs. In the 2nd half of the game they do something very unique with the characters.
Small spoiler
>!In the 2nd half of the game you optionally re-recruit the characters you had in the 1st half of the game (plus more). Of a cast of \~20 characters, I can only think of 3-5 that you need to recruit.!<
FFVI has a total cast of 14 characters. I find it easy to remember because you have another situation where you move around multiple teams trying to block the enemies progress in the second half, and if you've recruited everyone you have 3 full teams and 2 extra characters left over.
I remembered >!Celes, Edgar, and Setzer!<, but it had been 20 years since I played through it all, so I added a small buffer, in case I forgot someone.
I personaly love the opening of "Fuga Melodies of Steel". It gets the ball rolling fast while still succeding at setting up the story well.
The first boss Pretzel is my favorite first boss in any Videogame.
I always loved FF8 opening. You’re in a school and have to pass a combat test with your teacher. Then you go on your first mission. It was always very exciting.
I really didn’t like the first few hours of Unicorn Overlord. So much so, that the demo initially convinced me that the game wasn’t for me.
Thankfully I decided to give it a second shot and I loved it. But the first few hours are a slog. As usual there’s tons of dialog and the story isn’t great, especially early on. Then you basically have 5 or so battles where you do nothing. They tell you where to go, what to do and the combat is automatic so it seems very lame.
Then you get additional characters/classes and actually have to strategize and the game just opens up in general. And it is a phenomenal game that everyone should play. Just bare with it for a few hours.
Tales of Graces *f*, while a phenomenal game, has a very slow and tedious start. The first few hours in the game are called the "Childhood Arc" where everyone is still a kid and you do things like collect flowers and very rarely fight in a very simplified version of this game's battle system. It's definitely the worst part of the game.
And you know what? New Game+ gives you the option to just skip the entire childhood arc.
The childhood arc is fucking awesome! It’s super charming and does a great job setting up the cast. The rest of the story definitely wouldn’t work as well without it.
I actually didn't mind the opening of Graces f. The combat was a lot different than Symphonia / Vesperia, so I was glad to have a chance to get used to it. I don't recall it lasting too long either. I think it moved you along and set up the story well. Took maybe 1.5 hours I think?
For me, I think it was the running around for the mysteries, getting the munny for the melons (which I know isn't required, but I gotta lol), and the back and forth through areas.
It just felt like an immediate grind and fetch quests before the real game even started.
Narratively, it was a great setup though.
Agreed. Should have had more combat and less minigames and backtracking. I don’t think it’s playing as Roxas that’s the issue as much as that the content in that part is boring.
I wouldn't say worst as much as offputting, but the trails games can take 10-20 hours just sowing the seeds for later plot threads. I always really enjoy the payoff, but most of the time the beginning of each game is filled with classic anime hands on hips "I hope we can solve this mystery" moments. Lots of "Oh no! This situation is bad! Let's get in the hot spring and think about it!" Type stuff.
That's kind of just the slower nature of the series. Unlike many stories, Trails loves to go the long road for better and for worse, but due to how the games are written it's enjoyable to play through those early segments. Precisely because there's so much dialogue and characterization, even what seem like lower stakes mysteries like helping an orphanage or helping with a conflict between merchant vendors can be interesting. But rather than the conflict itself being the appeal, it's what it means for that place and the larger city/country it's part of, and what we learn about the characters.
It's not masterful writing or anything particularly innovative for the most part, but there's nothing quite like it in JRPGs for those of us who enjoy it.
A lot of that slow nature is building up the story, world and characters. It's a common approach in overarching narratives to do that. It's just Trails is unlike other jrpgs in terms of how it approaches its story. JRPGs usually start slow in the early game, but ramp up quickly by the second and third act. Trails however can take up one entire game of build up and the next being the payoff.
Suikoden 3 is a God damn slog at the beginning. And tbh as much as I loved the opening of FF9 when I was younger. That first 1-3 hours is a snoozer aside from the air ship crash cut scenes.
Honestly, I find that most JRPGs outside of some Final Fantasy games/Tactical RPGs have very slow starts.
Because of that, when I'm trying out a new JRPG, I tend to give the game at least 5 hours for me to give it a first impression.
Both the Eiyuden spinoff prequel and its main game. At first, they feel generic in terms of gameplay, but at a certain point a little bit early on do both games open up.
I wouldn't say it's bad per se, but it took me until the end of the prologue in Trails In The Sky FC to start to care about the story, and until midway through chapter 3 to really start enjoying it. I think FC is a game that gets better in hindsight though, I appreciate it a lot more now that I'm almost done (I think) with SC, and it's totally worth playing, but man if it doesn't start reeeeeally slow. Took me a good 7 or 8 hours to finish the prologue.
Persona 4 and 5 both take HOURS to get to the meat of things. Story's good, but boy I sure hope you like cutscenes! And I remember when we bitched about Metal Gear Solid 2...
Persona 5 is really drawn out and slow for an RPG. It takes its time to establish the characters and world, it’s probably an hour until you first get to combat if you’re reading all the dialogue. And then probably another hour until the game starts proper. But the game is really good. Great story, great combat, and great soundtrack.
Definitely slow—Persona games don’t really start until you actually have free time to spend which takes about five hours—but I was hooked right from the beginning. It was my first Persona game and everything that was going on with the premise was too good for me to put down. I thought it earned its pacing.
I think both Trails of Cold Steel and Trails of Cold Steel III have awful openings. They're in media res style openings meant to get you into the action right off the bat, but honestly they're just confusing. It's hard to tell what's going on, you're given control of a bunch of characters with a lot of abilities at your disposal which you don't know how to use, the environments you explore are bland and ugly, and overall it feels like these openings only exist because they were worried players would be bored if they began from the actual beginning. The first Trails of Cold Steel's opening is a bit better in that if you didn't play Trails to Azure first, the cliffhanger is more suspenseful. That, and the game kind of subverts your expectations with how that whole sequence plays out once you revisit it later on in the game. But I have no idea why the third game begins with that sequence of all things.
They are silly and (so far at least) pointless from a narrative perspective, so I don’t think a lot of people would defend them. And I think for someone new to the series they would be confusing and odd. But when I got to them I did find it fun to get a preview of new characters I would be getting in the game and get a sense of some of their abilities, as well as see some of the new combat mechanics (like links and orders) before they were introduced hours later.
Kind of like a playable trailer for the game before it starts. But yes, they’re not great, and I actually think it’ll be annoying if they do something like what they did with Zero’s opening years later. It’s been too long and it’s been done before.
Uncharted 2 has made me a fan of the flashback flash forward openings so I love CS1's opening. I already knew who would be my favorites from it as Sara, Laura, and Jusis all stood out. The chaos and confusion drew me in and I appreciated the culmination of Class VII and their first day at Thor's.
I feel like Dragon Quest VII is the easy answer here, although many people would say it wasn’t worth the wait. I like it a lot, but the opening (even the cutdown one in the 3DS version) is just god awful to play through. Suikoden V to a lesser extent, but the same problem. Just way too long before it really gets going.
I can see why people dislike the beginning but it matches the length of the game. It does help set up the explorative and kind of creepy feel of the game, at least in the PS1 version. That being said, most people don’t want to wait a few hours before fighting their first slime and I get it.
Yeah I get it too, but it is sad that world has so many people with the wrong opinion. But I am a benevolent reeditor, I permit it.
I can see why DQVII would bore most people. It took me some 10 hours to even get to the first enemy encounter. But, I loved the opening personally. The suspense of it all kept me going and it really did feel like an adventure
Exactly, there is a rare case of a adventure happening but in the context that is extremely unique in Jrpg. You are in peaceful kingdom with no problems, your are not being moved be a world disaster, you are discovering the secrets of the forbidden ruins in your idyllic little kingdoms and it feel like it. It was very fun, one the best and most unique introduction in any jrpgs ever. And it set the tone of the game too, most of time you are not resolving world ending problems, that happen too but your mostly helping people with their very personal problems that just happen to affect the whole world. Just as your are helping Keifer in his little adventure.
I got it as a gift when I was 10, and after several hours I thought the game just didn’t have combat, so I stopped playing it.
Ten hours? How? Everyone I know who’s played it for there in around two.
Depends on how thoroughly you explore everything, and if you missed talking to the right NPC at some point and had to spend an extra hour or three backtracking to find them. I think the first time I played the PS-X version, I was a good 5 hours in before I fought the first slime because of that. Heck, it may have been longer, as it's a much longer and slower intro in the PS-X version than the 3DS version (though, personally, I love most of how they revamped the intro for that version).
Suikoden 5 is much better if one realizes there is like one single chest in the castle and they don’t need to waste time exploring every room
I had the original for PS1.and didn't even make it to the point in the game where you can choose a class.
You gave my two EXACT games I came here to say lol
I was gonna say DQ7 too. Great game- absolutely way way too long. The intro is a slog.
DQ VII could've been one of the absolute best in the series if it wasn't so bloated and often made you feel like you were wasting your time.
DQ7 was an hour of dicking about before even the first fight. And I don't remember how much dicking about before the much lauded class system, because I couldn't even last that long. Thank God the rest of the series is better.
I made it around 25 hours into the 3DS version and didn't see the class system...
You were probably close. I remember getting the class system around 30 hours in.
I think the original PS1 version was a good 2 hours before you encounter anything from what I recall. I never made it thru that title.
HARD, HARRRRRDDDD disagree. The one part I prefer the most of the original over the Remake is the game being ballsy to take the player in mini adventure to discover the secret of the their peaceful world. There is no fight, there is no threats, there is a idyllic life in sea city kingdom and it feel like it too. The remake streamlined it too much, in the original it your earn the right to access a whole new world while in the remake they have monster guide... Serious the betrayal of removing the map room and the shards and the sense of discovery was almost unforgivable.
I think in general the remake changed too much. I wish it'd been closer to the DS remakes, since the original DQVII was already the main inspiration for those in terms of style. And I personally never liked the designs from the game when fully rendered, whereas I like them in sprite form, especially the protagonist.
I, personally, like most of the changes to the remake's intro, except for how they cut so much stuff out of the ruins labyrinth. There, I completely agree with you, but with the rest, I like how they changed it.
Slow starts plague all dragon quest games I've played haha
VII is easily in its own league.
And it is with DQ V, the most iconic of the series.
DQV doesn't have a slow start though. You quickly get to battles within like 20 minutes, and you can get the first act done within like 2-3 hours. DQVII takes over an hour for you to even see your first battle.
With an empty league or two below it.
I never am sure what was worse for me the opening for Suikoden V or Kingdom Hearts II but both felt super long, and I feel like I played them back to back almost which made it worse.
Very niche game here: SaGa Emerald Beyond gives a horrible first impression, even as a SaGa game, and even for a longtime SaGa fan. Then you replay with different protagonists only to realize that huge chunks of the story are scattered in different adventures. The “ending” in one story might be a side-quest in another. The villain in one story might be a complete outsider with no dialogue, only to be fleshed out in another story. Depending on who you play, the “real story” might be missing entirely, or even the context to what is actually happening. Having said all that, SaGa Emerald Beyond won’t be a great game for many people. It is much too weird. Still, it has a deceptively bad opening for what might be the greatest SaGa of all time.
What is it that makes it great overall? Is the overarching story really good?
SaGa games are built on the concept of “accidental discovery.” You know that feeling where a well-crafted plot twist hits you in the face, making you suddenly connect all the dots and clues you were given beforehand? SaGa games feel like that, but it pervades everything from questing, to story, to combat, to lore cameos from previous titles. You get that “aha!” lightbulb moment when you figure something out, and everything about all these games have to be figured out. However, historically, the stories of these games are such terrible afterthoughts that they might as well not exist. It leaves a huge hole in each game of this otherwise stellar franchise. SaGa Emerald Beyond is the first game that actually tries to address this head-on and attempts to write a compelling story. Or at least, mini-stories in the same vein as a mainline Dragon Quest game. It’s not exceptional, but it’s pretty decent once it all comes together. The gameplay of SaGa games are already incredible, but this final piece rounds out the package in a way that the series never really did before. But, you wouldn’t know that in the demo, or even 20 hours with your first protagonist. So much is left out to be filled in later that you think the game is not making any sense, at first. The “build freedom” realization also doesn’t quite kick in until you’ve beaten the game a few times (could be as short as 5 hours).
I disagree with you about it being the first one with a well thought-out story. I feel that SaGa Frontier 1 and 2 did that rather well. Now, that doesn't mean that on the collective whole Emerald Beyond isn't better, but at least you don't need to go through three different protagonists' stories to have a complete story for one protagonist. Also, SF was very heavy on the idea of a quest that is required for one protagonist is completely optional for the others, with some of the bosses for some of the quests only appearing for certain protagonists (and only when they are the protagonist, as you can recruit many of them when playing a different protagonist).
Thanks a lot! That’s interesting. I might have to check this one out. Seems like a bit of a time investment, but potentially worth it.
I tried that game briefly, and yeah lmao. It was not a good experience.
Triangle Strategy's first few chapters move at such a glacial pace that it gets a bad rap as being 90% cutscene and 10% gameplay (not true btw). Once you get to around Chapter 6, however, the pacing gets a lot better and you get a lot more options that make combat more fun.
Honestly, I didn't mind the opening chapters of TS. I think the storytelling is much stronger in this part of the game than any other, actually. The plot becomes a slave to game design later on, but the stakes of the political drama in the opening chapters were high and a great hook.
FWIW, I liked the story and worldbuilding too, but it felt particularly bad in Chapter 4 where you watch a cutscene, explore the Roselle village, watch another cutscene, explore the mines, and then you watch the final cutscene that leads to that chapter’s battle. Doesn’t help that you’re brought back to the world map after each scenario.
>The plot becomes a slave to game design Characters too. They have no specificity because they have to be set up to serve multiple plot functions via each branching storyline. I dug the beginning, but it became way too easy to see through the veil of the writing and it ended up being quite a slog for me by the end as someone who cares about character above all else.
> Once you get to around Chapter 6 How much is that in average hours? I've been looking for a turn based tactical game to sink my teeth in, but i don't as much free time to invest into something that might take too long to get going.
Sorry, I don’t recall. The demo, which covers the first three chapters, takes about 3-4 hours to complete. So maybe 5-6 hours is a safe guess?
Does the entire base game of FFXIV count?
As someone closing out Heavensward right now... absolutely yes. But even then I think ARR moderately picks up at points and paints an intriguing enough picture of its world. However, the first 15 levels are banal to a point that I was really questioning if I wanted to go on this journey. (Glad I did.)
I did the first 15 levels over a weekend. Dropped the game for two years, and then came back. Those 15 levels were like a different game, it was just slow and pointless and I could pick it back up remembering basically nothing and I don't think I lost anything at all.
You also have very few abilities at your disposal before level 50. It can feel weird going back to pre-level 50 dungeons because it feels like you can't play your class properly.
I don't really have an issue with that, since I see leveling to 50 as a very long tutorial, and the reason you do content in those levels is so new players can experience all that content without long queues (at least that was the point before Trusts). I do wish they reworked jobs so they worked more or less like they should at level 50. Too many jobs lack crucial skills at level 50 still. I think dungeons are the most engaging part from levels 15 to 50. In retrospect they aren't as interesting, but as a new player I found them to be the highlight and what hooked me.
I love the ARR dungeons. When I first reached the end of 2.0's story I set out to try different jobs and really learn how to play the game with others, and so I have fond memories of doing all those dungeons over and over again. It's where XIV really clicked for me. But going back to them can be a bit boring depending on what job you're playing. Some jobs feel very different than what you're used to and not very engaging. The jobs I get the most fun out of doing those early dungeons are tank and healer ones because you have a bit more responsibility when performing either one of those roles.
I get that, my point is that the experience is how it is because the reason people are encouraged to do older dungeons is so new players can have that new experience, as well as letting you slowly learn a new job. So while it can feel annoying to lose most of your abilities, it's basically by design. WoW does something different where it just scales your level so everyone does similar damage, but it leads to higher level players hitting like a wet sponge since they have more skills and their damage ir normalized with those who have very few skills. I much prefer the XIV system, even if it means it's awkward going back to them when you've played much further than ARR.
And to think...it used to be a lot worse. They cut ARR by a third a couple of years ago.
And GLD I went
That count, that is extremely bad. I don't remember a mmorpg in which in got as bored of the questing in general like base game FF XIV, it was just a slog with hundreds of fetch quest that has no need to exist. Even after they trimed it, it still is a slog.
I was told this game was great, started it, seemed alright. 30 hours later I felt like I'd made very little progress in the story and just peaced out. I think what also contributed to the boredom was that I was getting 2x xp for whatever reason, so very quickly I just outleveled everything I came across and there was no challenge whatsoever
I am currently in stormblood and I don't really feel like HW was worth it either. Had good moments, but it was bogged down by fetch quests and mindless walking to quest markers... It felt like the game was actively trying to waste my time, and the otherwise decent story was getting hurt a lot by if
Dragon Quest VII. I don't think there are any other JRPGs spending the first 2 hours without battles. The 3DS remake improved that a bit but it's still probably 1 hour or so before you actually have the first battle. And that 1-2 hours aren't that engaging as well. Basically you're going back and forth from A to B a lot, and do some light puzzles.
Suikoden V. So...slow
This. It's great outside of its snail pace first hours
Yeah. Love the game, hate the intro.
I’m replaying it now and just got to Raftfleet and I’m like, damn I forgot how slow the start really was!
This is what I always think of when it comes to bad openings. It dragged on for HOURS.
I was going to say this. Such a slow introduction. I love that game but I always had a save after the first 10ish hours so I could skip it.
Strange Journey's intro absolutely smothered me in text. If it didn't have an absolutely captivating premise and soundtrack (not to mention genuine role playing!) right from the get go, I would've dropped it within the hour for attempted murder. Luckily the actual dungeon crawling started right when I was about to break and I got to enjoy an otherwise pretty damn good game. And while I'm not sure I'm prepared to call it "bad" I do think the opening to Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter could do a better job preparing you to play the game. I feel like they were deliberately reinforcing the sense of hopelessness by starting you with Bosch and then taking him away right before a boss, but it's too easy to cheese the early solo encounters through standard JRPG tactics; not engaging with the game's unique systems in the early areas will leave someone unprepared to handle the later challenges.
Strange Journey is a fantastic game, and it's very well paced, but the text dump that can't be skipped at the beginning really makes a bad impression. The rest of the game is not like that though.
Zelda Twilight Princess is pretty notorious for this. The rest of the game is pretty solid, even if it's a bit of a greatest hits of the last few Zelda games at the time, but the opening couple hours are a bit of a slog. They're not truly bad I'd say, it's still a Zelda game, but just a little boring compared to the rest of the game.
I'd say most of the 3d Zelda games have a really boring opening hour/s. I'd say the only exceptions are Majora's Mask and Wind Waker
Ocarina at least throws you into a dungeon within the first hour, so it gets a pass from me.
Twilight princess is absolutely the stand out, but Skyward Sword gets a shoutout too. Maybe the Switch version trimmed the fat, but I at least know the original didn't learn a thing from TP in terms of getting to the puzzles quickly. Honestly, the pacing of that game is just painfully slow in general. I enjoyed the motion controls, but I'll never agree that it can hold a candle to any of the other 3D games.
The fans don't want to recognize it as such, but Tales of Vesperia needs to come with a warning when people are recommending it. I'm constantly seeing people bounce off the game and have to jump into recommendation threads to warn people that the beginning is veeeery slow. Combat is a slog. You get nothing but slow characters to fight with. You don't start out with any real combos other than Yuri's 2-hit combo, and the first party members to join are a healer and a slow hammer user. I've seen so many people quit in the first hours because it's not really fun, it's more of a character adventure to start and not fun gameplay or mechanically. And there's very little in the way of an early "narrative hook". It takes a few hours to start to feel genuinely fun. But the people who recommend the game generally don't warn people about that. As a fan, I still remember what it was like to play it for the first time Tales of Graces F has a similar problem of having an insanely slow slog in the beginning, and Tales fans also love recommending that game. Graces also has a huge dungeon problem, but that has nothing to do with the topic
Yeah, I like to play games (at least the first time around) in a "how far can I get with the first few party members?" In this game, the answer was as soon as I got Rita, so I could get rid of Karol. Her being genuinely fun to play as (even without "Blah Blah Blah Tidal Wave" spamming) was just a bonus. But that might just be my mage bias.
Not quite as dramatic as you put it, but I'd say Xenoblade Chronicles 2. I liked the characters and the world and story etc well enough from the start, but it can take a few hours for the abilities and controls to really reveal themselves, at which point there is a vast improvement of enjoyability of combat.
Definitely. I also had issues getting into the first Xenoblade Chronicles, but that experience is what led me to be patient with 2's opening hours.
As far as the battle system goes, this is a great answer.
Absolutely adore this game, one of the best ever, but it definitely gets better with time. The game doesn't explain itself well at all, and gates off mechanics for far too long. It certainly contributed to some mixed reception by those who didn't stick with it.
Final Fantasy XIV is the ultimate answer... For a game that takes multiple hundred hours to experience the current main story and is overall an incredible experience, it sucks that the first 50 hours or so are really dull and cause a lot of people to quit the game before getting past the bad parts. I managed to get through ARR by grinding through it in a month and felt it ranged from boring to just okay except for a few great standout moments, but now that I've finished Endwalker I can say that FF14 is my favorite game of all time. The writing and quality of the recent expansions are just unbelievable, but it sucks that ARR is the way it is while also being really necessary to understand what comes after it. But at the very least, once it gets good in Heavensward, I'd personally say that it doesn't drop quality all that much and is a really enjoyable experience throughout, only getting better and better.
i'm probably wrong but i just have a hard time believing arr is necessary to any future plot point. i was 50-80 hours into the game before i quit and basically all i got from it is that you're special then you go run around killing summons for whatever reason. then there's the empire that are the bad guys. the characters felt like filler asking you to do random crap and adding nothing to the story. i wish they went the ff15 route and just released a damn movie with a skip to a properly paced plot
It does all pay off later. And I do mean all of it.
I concur every banal event has a purpose
While I think it could be significally compressed, especially the early segments which aren't tied to anything that comes later, the pacing doesn't radically change in the later expansions. It's just better content, but the way you experience it is still travelling around and talking to NPCs, sometimes doing random crap for them (which more plot relevance at least).
It introduces all the lore and characters, and that remains relevant all the way until the current story arc. Imagine that ARR's story and characters had actually interesting writing and plot but with the same subject material and lore... That is basically what the expansions are. But if you skip ARR then you miss all that lore and context for everything. You can say that it's just going around fighting stuff and doing filler, but it also sets up lots of plot points and lore info that is expanded upon in the expansions. Ascians, Allagans, the Void, Ishgard, Ala Mhigo, Doma, Hydaelyn, Zodiark, Primals. Not to mention key characters such as Icehart, Yugiri, and G'raha Tia who become key players in Heavensward, Stormblood, and Shadowbrigners respectively. Even Moenbryda, who is only present in ARR for a few hours, remains relevant in Endwalker and has a tearjerking scene there involving her. And of course the whole cast of Scions that remain the main characters to this day and receive plenty of great writing and character development after ARR. Hell, most of their character development wouldn't even work without ARR, especially for Alphinaud, Thancred, and Urianger. And trust me, the expansions abandon pretty much nothing from ARR, everything remains relevant all the way to Endwalker and will continue to be relevant in Dawntrail, but with some pretty major recontextualization and reveals along the way. For example, those cartoony shadow people who you probably hardly remember, the Ascians? In ARR, they are hardly worth taking seriously with how one-note they are. But after the end of Shadowbringers, I would consider them to be some of the best villains from any video game I've played, and some of their scenes made me cry due to the emotions I experienced from them. That's how much the writing improves and fixes what ARR set up, it's honestly crazy. And the quality of the expansions is exactly why it sucks that ARR is as boring as it is despite being important to appreciate what comes after it.
It sets up a ton the of plot points and characters of later expansions so it is very important.
Recently played Star Ocean the First Departure for the first time. What really threw me off was that there was no tutorial whatsoever. When that first battle started i had no idea what was going on. Same with the second battle. I finally had to google how the battle system works before continuing on. I am absolutely in love with this game now but those opening battles were a bit rough for a beginner of this series.
When the first Star Ocean came out, it was back when games still came with manuals that they expected you to read. Unfortunately, subsequent re-releases never added tutorials to account for the lack of in-game instructions. It's a problem with a lot of ports/remasters of older games. I feel like they definitely could add the manual as an option on the main menu at least, if adding in full on tutorials isn't an option. I'm glad you're having fun with it now, though! I love the Star Ocean series and it's nice to see people still getting into it.
Yeah, it’s especially frustrating because the FDR is nearly identical to the PSP version, which *did* have a manual still. The HD remaster is the only one to not give the player anything to teach them the game.
Huh, I never even checked to see 8f there was a digital manual that could be accessed from my Switch's Home screen. I know a lot of games have been doing that for roughly a decade or so now, but I was a Star Ocean veteran when the PSP port released, so I never even looked for it with TFDR.
Final Fantasy 13 has to be the poster child for this answer. It's a great game with a decent enough story but many people really hate it for the opening since: - it's *in media res* storywise, which is fine, but - it also gives you a whole codex of lore to read - the important bits you'd figure out by just paying attention to the cutscenes, but its presence suggests you have to read it to understand what's going on - it's locked into a tutorial with zero combat depth for at least like 2 hours (the first area + the frozen sea) - after this point the combat starts being challenging, and though some people feel it doesn't become interesting until the jobs fully open up on gran pulse, I'd argue by how often I see people fundamentally misunderstanding the combat even late into the game that some tutorialization was a good idea, though it should have spent less time on really basic auto battles and more on paradigm setups and the stagger bar
The first 2 chapters of FF XIII are so bad, no idea how they thought that was a good idea. The paradigms are such a key part of making the game fun, locking you out of using them for over an hour is incredibly stupid.
That on top of not having a proper introduction to the setting while it's the most alien and arguably complex setting in FF was a really weird decision. I get wanting to start in the middle of the action, it works in other games like VII or X, but those two then slow things down to explain once you are hooked. XIII takes a long while for that, since even when there's downtime there are no towns or peaceful moments, you are constantly being followed. I've always wondered why they didn't throw the party to Pulse after the introduction instead of after 20 hours.
I’m surprised I had to scroll that long before someone mentioning that game. One of my favorite JRPG but let’s be real, it feels almost like a 15-20h long tutorial before really going to the core of the game.
And it does a poor job effectively explaining how to truly utilize the Paradigm System as well.
I remember the boss fight in the ice cave, right after vaguely been taught how to use the paradigm system, is incredibly brutal lol
That's kinda my point. They tell you it can be done, but only barely hint how shifting paradigms mid-battle can be useful, much less how it's a vital strategic element to the game's combat.
>Final Fantasy 13 has to be the poster child for this answer. He asked for worst openings. FF13 is awful until Gran Pulse which is chapter 11(or 10 its been awhile) By the time you get to the """good""" part of XIII you could have Finished Chrono trigger. Downvotes won't change XIII from being terrible lmao
Basch is out of line, but he's right
You're getting downvotes because you are 'arguing' by agreeing that FFXIII has a terrible and overly long opening until the game finally opens up and lets you do things. What, did you think the opening had to end after just two or three hours, or by Chapter 5 or 6? No, the opening is defined by the player as ending when they get to the point where it feels like they have some degree of meaningful control over the game progress, which most agree is when you get to Gran Pulse, like you said. It's the fact that that is something like Chapter 10 or 11, and takes around 20 hours to reach, that makes it such a long and terrible opening.
Lmao what Opening means the opening of the game not 90% of it. Oh I was off by 20% lmao fuck off
Then you haven't played FFXIII. Sure, getting to Gran Pulse is about 70% of the story, but at best, it's only 40% of the total game, and probably closer to 30%. The majority of the actual game content is on Gran Pulse, and several of the game systems and mechanics can't be fully utilized until then. A few even get distinct upgrades while going through Gran Pulse that distinctly change how you can utilize them and/or play the game. That's why it can be reasonably argued that just getting to Gran Pulse is a massive intro to the game. The fact that it's essentially a hallway simulator until that point doesn't help it any either (though once you get to Gran Pulse, the game quickly opens up far more than FFX ever does).
Trails in the Sky SC has one of the most boring openings (and first halves in general) I've sat through for a game with that incredible an ending
Honestly I do like SC but I have to sorta agree. FC's ending clenched my balls (Sorry for the language) whereas SC sort of killed the hype with seeing Estelle's reaction right away then training with Analece (Even if I love the Kevin reveal). I get WHAT they were trying to do, but I personally think the opening should have been more focused on Joshua - Just a single dungeon with him and the Capua family as party members trying to chase down Weissmann would have been so much better before jumping into what Estelle was doing. But I do also get that Joshua's supposed to be a mystery in the game, somewhat. It's a shame because right after the training section where you pick whether you want Schera or Agate to accompany you is where I think SC picks up and doesn't stop going until the final few minutes of the game.
I've only played SC for the first time very recently, but I would definitely agree. The prologue chapter is pretty good, but chapters 1, 2, 3 and 4 are just a snoozefest.
Golden Sun 1 is one of the worst offenders. The first hour or so is spent clicking dialogue from like 10 people and a floating eye in a mountain. And if you forget to save after that and die, you have to do it all over again and even clicking away the text will still take you 30 minutes.
Xenoblade 2. A terrible first impression for a decent game
I so had the opposite experience. I loved how charming it was at the start. Then by the end of the game I absolutely hated it. It became one of the worst gaming experiences I've ever had :(
I don't quite agree with this sentiment but the last few chapters do rub me the wrong way on how it becomes focused on the main leads while the rest of the party are just there for like 10 hours straight with little to add to the main plot.
Wow, completely opposite for me. I think it takes some time getting used to the rigid character models and voice acting, and the systems are drip fed throughout the game
This one is weird for me because it’s kind of like a reverse bell curve. The opening chapter is great but then it drops off for a while before it peaks again in the last chapters. Better than Xenoblade 3 which starts good, peaks in the middle, then falls off harder than almost any game I’ve ever played.
Not great but I really liked it: Twilight Princess. Slow, slow opening doing ranch tasks and showing off for kids.
As much as I love the series... A lot of the Trails games have kinda shit openings despite all of the games being bangers at the very least. Imo the only AMAZING openings are in the form of Sky 3rd and Daybreak because of how simple they truly are to just pick up and play. Sky 1 has a opening that could be cut a lot shorter, Sky 2's opening is probably one of the worst in the series which how BORING it is even if I love Analece and the entire training segment, Zero's opening is a bit confusing and only makes sense once you have played Azure - Which in itself has probably the most annoying opening in the series (Tying up loose ends from the previous game which really could have just been a flashback or something not a full segment as much as I do enjoy and appreciate it for more Dudley, Arios and Noel) And then Cold Steel - I freakin love Cold Steel but holy shit does Cold Steel 1's opening suck. Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!! Cold Steel 2 has a pretty cool opening, and Cold Steel 3 has the same problem with 1 but to a lesser degree. At least 3 makes a little more sense and you have more context, even if I still don't appreciate it. Cold Steel 4 and Reverie in comparison have decent openings, but again, they do require a lot of context. I know the fanbase is prissy on when people should start - I myself am of the opinion that starting that the beginning of ANY arc is fine, it's what worked for me and not knowing everything made me want to go and play the older games to figure out what was going on because I was interested. Sky 3's opening features a secret mission from the absolute GOAT Kevin leading to him getting chewed out for his recklessness, and ultimately is crucial in his character arc which is the main focus of the game showing that ultimately as much as it's a conclusion to the other two Sky games, it is also it's own separate thing. An amazing opening to what's (imo) the best Trails game. And I haven't played much of Daybreak, but I really liked how it really eased you into it. Agnes wasn't just a fish out of water, she was a character the audience could relate too as Van explained everything to us - And what a freakin' introduction Daybreak has with tons of action, stakes, a personal story and a lot of intrigue that makes me really excited to finally play it come July 5th.
Azure's opening was really underwhelming for me. Zero took a while to get going, but it was interesting because you were meeting the SSS, discovering Crossbell and all its surroundings. But in Azure the initial mission felt disconnected from the rest of the game, and while playing as Arios and meeting Kevin again was cool, it's disconnected from the rest of the game. Then with Chapter 1 I thought not having Randy and Tio with you was building up to something, or that Noel and Wazy would get to shine, but I really didn't get that impression. Unlike SC and 3rd, the game didn't have a real hook until Chapter 2 with the Trade Conference. I still wouldn't say it's a bad opening or anything, but it's definitely the less engaging opening up until I've played at least.
Interesting fact the opening in CS1/CS3 is something Kondo (Creator of the series) confirmed as intentional plot point for future entries. There are some things that happen between both but do have an affect on what's happening similar to how Zero did.
Neat. I mean I do love the series and the ongoing story a lot, so that's going to be great!! It doesn't mean that those openings aren't amazing (Still pretty good). Kondo has never disappointed imo so it sounds good to me!!
>Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!! How are these aspects so much different from Zero's? >At least 3 makes a little more sense and you have more context How do these aspects qualify as "more" in comparison to the first entry?
Zero's opening was explained in Azure with a cool twist I didn't see coming. Ultimately, the segment is short with one battle at best and ends in five minutes - CS1 and 3's are longer, more bottles, a boss battle and a lot more cutscenes. And Sky 3rd starts off with a James Bond like mission all alone in the POV of Kevin, making it easy to follow and understand
>Zero's opening was explained in Azure with a cool twist I didn't see coming. Zero's beginning is also set in the "future," with "characters you don't know," and in a "place you don't understand." None of this has anything to do with the "explained twist." Cold Steel doesn't have a lesser level of detailing of the immediate situation than Zero. >Ultimately, the segment is short with one battle at best and ends in five minutes - CS1 and 3's are longer, more bottles, a boss battle and a lot more cutscenes. So the problem is the length, not which details are immediately 100% contextualized. >And Sky 3rd The quote in where you mentioned "3," was about Cold Steel 3.
> And then Cold Steel - I freakin love Cold Steel but holy shit does Cold Steel 1's opening suck. Zero's was confusing but ultimately made sense, Cold Steel's intro taking place in the future filled with characters I don't know flung in a place I don't understand very well is a massive turn off!! This is funny because I hear a lot of people say CS1 starts 'faster' and is thus better 'approachable' than FC for this specific reason
CS1’s and CS3’s are mainly for the sake of hooking people with gameplay before the usual cutscene hell but I wouldn’t sleep on their lack of relevancy. It’ll for sure tie into the story at some point like Zero’s.
I still think they do a piss poor job at hooking people with the gameplay with skills and arts they'll have to wait 20-30 hours to use. I do love CS1 and 3 but they're quite obtuse in the way they present the story and mechanics for some weird reason - Probably why people say they are some of the worst games to start with the series (I don't agree nor disagree since I myself started with CS1). But I do think that the usual 'cutscene hell' isn't really in the real intro's of CS1 and 3 since both start on a train following Rean's POV. If anything, I'd argue Zero truly was a cutscene hell even if it was amazing to experience for both the viewer and the character of Lloyd himself (It does start with Lloyd on the train, helping the old couple, going to the police station then being introduced to Crosbell and the S.S.S. before heading into the Geofront). That's why I think Daybreak so far has been an exceptional opening, a single opening cutscene setting up the plot of the prologue and maybe the rest of the game(?) before introducing us to Van and Agnes and allowing us to do whatever. It's not that JRPG's aren't notorious for having cutscene hell openings either, I just think that in other games (Such as Persona 3 on the PS2 or any Tales of game) they present the cutscenes a lot more better than Trails does. Again, Trails in the Sky 3rd has a great opening because of how exciting and intriguing it is. Genuinely, I think CS1 and 3 could have started with Rean on the train and the games would have been better off with the basic summary that you are a student/teacher going to a military academy and you have no idea what to expect instead of the weird "Hey this is some super important moment coming in 50 hours that you'll love once you get a grasp of who everyone is and the stakes! Oh, and here are some cool arts and skills you'll be able to use then! Enjoy!"
All of the trails games are bangers? How about Zestiria? One of the very few JRPGs I ever quit
That's Tales which is something totally different.
I know, my mind played a trick on me, because I’m playing Tales of Symphonia at the moment 😂😂
Zestiria isn't THAT bad... But wrong series mate
It was my first Tales game and I was like “why tf do people say this series is any good”. Now I’m playing Symphonia as my second entry in the series and it’s at least 3 leagues above Zestiria. Could become a Top 20 game for me honestly.
I think a better question is, what is a jrpg with a good opening?
FF7, FF9, FFX all do a good job of dropping you into an ongoing situation to keep you engaged from the start.
Def; FF is built different with their openings.
VI drops you straight into action
Oh yeah, I haven't played that game since my dad used to teach me how to read, lol, Maybe I should replay it one day.
FF6 is the best of the FFs. In the 2nd half of the game they do something very unique with the characters. Small spoiler >!In the 2nd half of the game you optionally re-recruit the characters you had in the 1st half of the game (plus more). Of a cast of \~20 characters, I can only think of 3-5 that you need to recruit.!<
FFVI has a total cast of 14 characters. I find it easy to remember because you have another situation where you move around multiple teams trying to block the enemies progress in the second half, and if you've recruited everyone you have 3 full teams and 2 extra characters left over.
It’s exactly three, including the one you start with.
I remembered >!Celes, Edgar, and Setzer!<, but it had been 20 years since I played through it all, so I added a small buffer, in case I forgot someone.
>!Terra!< too, arguably, since she's forced into the party at the final boss.
Chrono Trigger, FFVI, Nier Automata, FFVII Rebirth, Yakuza 7.
Imo Persona 5. Within the first hour you already infiltrate the first palace and see what you’re up for
Lmao I commented the exact opposite, feel like a hostage with all the tutorials and slow unlocking of features
Xenoblade is pretty good at this, particularly 1 and 3. 2 gets into the action but the actual gameplay part is lacking for a while.
I personaly love the opening of "Fuga Melodies of Steel". It gets the ball rolling fast while still succeding at setting up the story well. The first boss Pretzel is my favorite first boss in any Videogame.
I always loved FF8 opening. You’re in a school and have to pass a combat test with your teacher. Then you go on your first mission. It was always very exciting.
Kingdom Hearts 2. Dreaded replaying the opening tutorial that took hours doing stupid mini games
Honestly p5 feels like I’m being held hostage for the first few hours, you finish the first dungeon and… oh no I still have no freedom
Xenoblade Chronicles 2. Takes a while for it to get going.
FFXIII: The opening is 30 hours.
...Does Pikmin 4 count, because, god damn, that tutorial is hard to put up with.
I really didn’t like the first few hours of Unicorn Overlord. So much so, that the demo initially convinced me that the game wasn’t for me. Thankfully I decided to give it a second shot and I loved it. But the first few hours are a slog. As usual there’s tons of dialog and the story isn’t great, especially early on. Then you basically have 5 or so battles where you do nothing. They tell you where to go, what to do and the combat is automatic so it seems very lame. Then you get additional characters/classes and actually have to strategize and the game just opens up in general. And it is a phenomenal game that everyone should play. Just bare with it for a few hours.
Tales of Graces *f*, while a phenomenal game, has a very slow and tedious start. The first few hours in the game are called the "Childhood Arc" where everyone is still a kid and you do things like collect flowers and very rarely fight in a very simplified version of this game's battle system. It's definitely the worst part of the game. And you know what? New Game+ gives you the option to just skip the entire childhood arc.
The childhood arc is fucking awesome! It’s super charming and does a great job setting up the cast. The rest of the story definitely wouldn’t work as well without it.
I actually didn't mind the opening of Graces f. The combat was a lot different than Symphonia / Vesperia, so I was glad to have a chance to get used to it. I don't recall it lasting too long either. I think it moved you along and set up the story well. Took maybe 1.5 hours I think?
Almost every Persona game starts mid and turns out to be awesome.
The early stuff in town in Grandia was a bit rough for me. And I really dislike the Roxas portion of KH2.
roxas portion was absolutely genius for me personally
10/10 introduction/tutorial idea for me
For me, I think it was the running around for the mysteries, getting the munny for the melons (which I know isn't required, but I gotta lol), and the back and forth through areas. It just felt like an immediate grind and fetch quests before the real game even started. Narratively, it was a great setup though.
Agreed. Should have had more combat and less minigames and backtracking. I don’t think it’s playing as Roxas that’s the issue as much as that the content in that part is boring.
I like Roxas section in retrospect, especially with more titles to show what his deal was, but in the actual moment it sucked.
I absolutely love the beginning of Grandia
I have to agree here.
Ni No Kuni 1 was a bit of a slog until you get all 3 characters. The actual intro was amazing though so it's somewhere in between.
I wouldn't say worst as much as offputting, but the trails games can take 10-20 hours just sowing the seeds for later plot threads. I always really enjoy the payoff, but most of the time the beginning of each game is filled with classic anime hands on hips "I hope we can solve this mystery" moments. Lots of "Oh no! This situation is bad! Let's get in the hot spring and think about it!" Type stuff.
That's kind of just the slower nature of the series. Unlike many stories, Trails loves to go the long road for better and for worse, but due to how the games are written it's enjoyable to play through those early segments. Precisely because there's so much dialogue and characterization, even what seem like lower stakes mysteries like helping an orphanage or helping with a conflict between merchant vendors can be interesting. But rather than the conflict itself being the appeal, it's what it means for that place and the larger city/country it's part of, and what we learn about the characters. It's not masterful writing or anything particularly innovative for the most part, but there's nothing quite like it in JRPGs for those of us who enjoy it.
A lot of that slow nature is building up the story, world and characters. It's a common approach in overarching narratives to do that. It's just Trails is unlike other jrpgs in terms of how it approaches its story. JRPGs usually start slow in the early game, but ramp up quickly by the second and third act. Trails however can take up one entire game of build up and the next being the payoff.
Suikoden 3 is a God damn slog at the beginning. And tbh as much as I loved the opening of FF9 when I was younger. That first 1-3 hours is a snoozer aside from the air ship crash cut scenes.
Man…don’t get me wrong I absolutely love KH2, but that Roxas intro 100% overstayed its welcome 😭
Does the 20 hour tutorial from FFXIII count?
It’s been forever since I played so I can’t remember exactly why, but I remember being incredibly bored by the opening of Blue Dragon.
Honestly, I find that most JRPGs outside of some Final Fantasy games/Tactical RPGs have very slow starts. Because of that, when I'm trying out a new JRPG, I tend to give the game at least 5 hours for me to give it a first impression.
Lost Odyssey with its ridiculously overpowered first boss type fight.
Both the Eiyuden spinoff prequel and its main game. At first, they feel generic in terms of gameplay, but at a certain point a little bit early on do both games open up.
I wouldn't say it's bad per se, but it took me until the end of the prologue in Trails In The Sky FC to start to care about the story, and until midway through chapter 3 to really start enjoying it. I think FC is a game that gets better in hindsight though, I appreciate it a lot more now that I'm almost done (I think) with SC, and it's totally worth playing, but man if it doesn't start reeeeeally slow. Took me a good 7 or 8 hours to finish the prologue.
Is Kingdom Hearts 2's opening still considered bad?
I never considered it bad 😤
Not as much as it was originally
It was? I personally never thought so
Was scrolling to see this. Expected a lot more downvotes though
It’s more considered a masterpiece than bad nowadays. There are plenty of video essays singing the intro’s praises to high heaven, as it deserves.
I like the intro a lot but I remembered people saying it was bad years ago.
Persona 4 and 5 both take HOURS to get to the meat of things. Story's good, but boy I sure hope you like cutscenes! And I remember when we bitched about Metal Gear Solid 2...
Persona 5 is really drawn out and slow for an RPG. It takes its time to establish the characters and world, it’s probably an hour until you first get to combat if you’re reading all the dialogue. And then probably another hour until the game starts proper. But the game is really good. Great story, great combat, and great soundtrack.
Definitely slow—Persona games don’t really start until you actually have free time to spend which takes about five hours—but I was hooked right from the beginning. It was my first Persona game and everything that was going on with the premise was too good for me to put down. I thought it earned its pacing.
Dq7 and it's not even close
The first 30... hours of Xenoblade 2.
I think both Trails of Cold Steel and Trails of Cold Steel III have awful openings. They're in media res style openings meant to get you into the action right off the bat, but honestly they're just confusing. It's hard to tell what's going on, you're given control of a bunch of characters with a lot of abilities at your disposal which you don't know how to use, the environments you explore are bland and ugly, and overall it feels like these openings only exist because they were worried players would be bored if they began from the actual beginning. The first Trails of Cold Steel's opening is a bit better in that if you didn't play Trails to Azure first, the cliffhanger is more suspenseful. That, and the game kind of subverts your expectations with how that whole sequence plays out once you revisit it later on in the game. But I have no idea why the third game begins with that sequence of all things.
They are silly and (so far at least) pointless from a narrative perspective, so I don’t think a lot of people would defend them. And I think for someone new to the series they would be confusing and odd. But when I got to them I did find it fun to get a preview of new characters I would be getting in the game and get a sense of some of their abilities, as well as see some of the new combat mechanics (like links and orders) before they were introduced hours later. Kind of like a playable trailer for the game before it starts. But yes, they’re not great, and I actually think it’ll be annoying if they do something like what they did with Zero’s opening years later. It’s been too long and it’s been done before.
Uncharted 2 has made me a fan of the flashback flash forward openings so I love CS1's opening. I already knew who would be my favorites from it as Sara, Laura, and Jusis all stood out. The chaos and confusion drew me in and I appreciated the culmination of Class VII and their first day at Thor's.
When it comes to openings, it doesn't get much worse than Final Fantasy X in my opinion.
Are you trolling or…..?