5 JRPGs Worth Buying in 2022 & 5 That Are NOT!

five jrpgs worth playing and buying at full price and five that are not that's what we're talking about in this video I'm not gonna waste your time with a long drawn out intro because you're probably gonna skip it anyway so let's just jump into the first game that's worth your time and money the Xenoblade Chronicles 3. now why is it worth it well if you're like me and you're on a tight budget and you need a game that's long and it's Gonna Last you a while well Xenoblade 3's got you covered with it being over 60 hours just for the main game and much more if you want to do everything it has to offer and it's not just long but it's a quality game with an 88 open critic score and for whatever this is worth it was nominated for Game of the Year at the game awards and like I said it's just a good game I feel like with this one monoliths off took everything they've learned from past Xenoblade games and put it together in a nice tight package here it's got a compelling story a great cast of characters including the Hero characters you're going to want to recruit along the way and I think this is the best version of this combat system that they've done yet now the UI could use some work but as you play the game comes less of a big deal and you won't even pay attention to it if you love jrpg Xenoblade 3 is an absolute must play game in 2022 now for the first game that's not worth it it pains me to say this but it's Digimon survive now I say it pains me because I came in wanting to love this game I love the concept of going to this other world and you're trying to survive it had cool character designs and I didn't mind that it was more visual novel than anything else however after playing it it's just boring yet you do have long stretches of visual novel segments that are broken up with strategy RPG gameplay but that gameplay segment is just too simple and it's just not very fun there's very little strategy that goes into it and it's a real shame like I said because this art style is really beautiful and overall it's just not a super compelling story I tried playing for several hours and I got bored and I just kind of stopped playing because I couldn't get through it no matter how big of a sale you'll see this for I say it's not worth it from your time alone I would say it's better spent elsewhere one of 2022's surprise gems for me was stranger of paradise now it's debatable if it is a jrpg but whatever I just want to talk about it again now for its structure it's a level based RPG and a total reimagining of the original Final Fantasy yeah it's pretty hammy it's got a cringe story but it's weirdly entertaining it's like watching a really good Bee Movie but I think the real star of the show is its amazing combat it's super challenging and fun it's all about learning enemy movements and patterns so you can Dodge or block or period just the right time a lot of people compare this to Dark Souls or just Souls like games in general and from a challenge perspective it's definitely in that same category as you go through the game you'll be unlocking a huge variety of classes that are all really fun to try and you'll want to try them all out just to see which one matches your gameplay style the best and there's also tons of content including a lot of post-game content that will unlock and will allow you to do just so much more and if you can't get enough they've released tons of DLC for this game post launch so you'll have tons to go through now if the cringy chaos turned you away don't let it this is a fantastic game that you can probably get pretty cheap now but even if you did have to pay a little bit less than full price it's absolutely worth every penny now the game that gets my award for the most disappointing jrpg of 2022 has to be Soul hackers too it had all the potential in the world I had an incredible art style Great Character designs and it essentially has persona's combat system that everybody loves however it just doesn't do anything with that to me the biggest problem was the boring design overall the city is kind of small and limited you can't really explore too much and the dungeons oh my God they are just painfully boring especially the character ones where you have to walk around in that really boring environment and the story dungeons aren't that much more interesting either and while the story starts with a bang it's not that compelling and probably won't be able to pull you through the rest of the game also I just feel like overall the game is just slow and I feel like that's the case because the developers patched in a dash so you could run faster in the Dungeons and also the ability to speed up the combat now when you have to speed through your game I feel like it's just boring and you didn't do a good job designing it because if that's the case you wouldn't need to add in the speed up mechanics overall Soul hackers 2 is the epitome of unrealized potential in a post Persona 5 world we just expect more especially from Atlas the people that made Persona now I know a lot of people disagree with this but I feel like we shouldn't be settling for mediocrity and there's only so much time to play games and I feel like they should be spent playing the best games possible and again even if you find this for a steep discount to me it's just boring and not worth your time now to piggyback off that in a game that's clearly inspired by shin Megami tensei let's talk about Monarch now this was another game that looked cool on the surface it was set in a Japanese High School it had a darker tone and had a kind of unique art style and to be fair it does do a few cool things it's got unique combat these mystery solving segments that can be kind of cool and an overall interesting story however there's one thing that absolutely kills it and that is the performance the game just has these awful frame rate dips and overall just doesn't look very good it has some pretty low quality textures and in 2022 that's just unacceptable in my opinion now to me the game isn't very visually demanding so it really speaks to the teams technical shortcomings now if you're looking back on the year and wanting to play some jrpgs that you might have missed earlier in the year don't bother with Monarch now to move on to one of my favorite jrpgs of the year the deal field Chronicle now here's something really weird it's from the same developer as Monarch they must have gotten some really good direction from Square Enix that helped them because this game is leagues better now it's a real-time strategy RPG with a really unique art style in the gameplay itself you'll have a squad of four characters that play out in relatively short strategy battles somewhere between five to seven minutes and to me was really compelling is that it's basically a series of micro strategy decisions the battles aren't going to be that long but you get into a little scenario and you go okay which abilities do I want to use how do I want to position my characters and you get through it relatively quick now admittedly the game does get a little repetitive however it always is throwing something different at you once you finish up a battle you'll want to go back to your base and level up your characters maybe to partake in a side mission to get some new loot see what's going on with the story or interact with one of your characters whatever you're doing there's always something new that's going on and it's never lasting too long so you can kind of just move from one thing to the next now to me what really makes the game is the character walta Quinn she's easily my favorite character of any game this year I will say at the beginning the story is relatively boring but once she comes in she totally shakes things up I like to really heard of the Joker in a lot of ways she just likes to create chaos for fun and it makes for some really compelling story moments and I guess the development team had their ear to the ground because they're going to be adding new story content for Walter Quinn early next year in a free update overall a default Chronicle is just a great game you can probably get pretty cheap now and it's going to be having new content coming next year that'll be totally worth playing another game that pains me to put it on this list as not worth it is Valkyrie Elysium now I say it pains me because I actually kind of liked it when I played it but in hindsight it's just not worth it it completely changes gameplay styles to an action RPG that's much more level based and linear the story itself is also relatively boring and now it does have a Twist if if you want to call it that but you'll see it coming a mile away to me it feels like they just had another game they were working on and slap the valkyrie name onto it and the reason I say that is because it doesn't feel very cohesive there's this kind of bland art style that they added a black still shooting border to they have combat while it's not bad overall just feels uninspired and you'll also be seeing the same enemies a lot especially in the final stretch of the game where it's just this Gauntlet of every enemy in the game with seemingly no Rhyme or Reason to it and maybe the most surprising thing is that it's only about 12 hours long now I don't mind shorter games but it's got to be super jam-packed with quality and production value and valkyr Elysium just doesn't have that now since the release they have added free story content which is appreciated but again I just feel like it's not worth your time and money maybe for curiosity's sake on a deep deep sale but in the end I feel like you're just not gonna be satisfied now one of the most satisfying games of the year for me and probably will be for you is trails from zero we've been waiting a long time for this game it has been been totally worth it it's the missing middle chapter in the greater Trail Saga and arguably the best one has a much tighter story with a much smaller scope now that sounds like a bad thing but I think it's a good thing because you'll get to know your team from the very beginning as you're all together from the start and you'll get to know each other in deeper ways not to mention you'll get to know the region of cross Bell much better as well because you're constantly going to the same areas over and over again and again I know that sounds like a bad thing but by the end you're gonna feel like you know this place so well and it just makes for a better tighter game experience now despite it being a much older game it does have a few new features that make it shockingly playable they've added turbo mode to Speed the game up they've added voice acting newer character portraits not to mention a total facelift for the visuals and in terms of just pure dollar to hour value it's over 40 hours for the main story alone with much much more if you want to do everything the game has to offer and here's the cool thing it's Sequel and the closing chapter to this duology is coming in March 2023 right around the corner so if you didn't get a chance to play it definitely play it right now it's gonna be the perfect time especially if it's on sale and you'll get ready for the new game coming out next year you know we eventually had to talk about Pokemon scarlet and violet right now if you somehow haven't heard this game is a technical mess terrible frame rates crashes glitches and overall it just doesn't look very good visually now despite people having a lot of fun and enjoying the game I just feel like this is totally unacceptable for Pokemon it's the biggest media brand in the world yes more than Star Wars Marvel and uh Winnie the Pooh huh that no one made that much money but for Pokemon when you're making this much money you can't have your Premier product in such a poor State now if you're enjoying the game despite all the issues I'm happy for you however I just think we should be expecting better from our games and the only way that companies hear us is through our money sadly that probably won't matter for this one because scarlet and violet has already broken tons of records for my time and money especially at full price since it just came out I feel like Pokemon scarlet and violet just isn't worth it and to respect your time and money I feel like it wouldn't be either and you should just wait until this game either goes on a deep sale or they finally patch it now one of the best jrpgs of 2022 and a game that's worth every single penny is triangle strategy this is a strategy RPG from the good people who brought us octopath traveler and Braley default has a gorgeous art style incredible music fantastic gameplay and level design which I think is lacking in most strategy RPGs in my opinion I think something that triangle strategy does really well is it marries mechanics to level design in really fantastic ways and the story is really unique in that you have to make these decisions that drastically change the outcome of the game you'll run into different levels have different characters on your team and there's even multiple endings now a single playthrough would take you about 35 hours but it's totally worth replaying for different levels different story and just seeing how the game ends if you enjoy jrpg's particularly strategy RPGs triangle strategy is a must play game and absolutely worth every cent you spend on it now we talked about a lot of games in this video and I actually reviewed most of them so if you want to hear my full thoughts on them click into this playlist right here to watch all my reviews from this year including even more great games that I didn't have the time to talk about in this video if you enjoy jrpgs and want more content just like this make sure you subscribe so you don't miss anything thank you so much for watching and we'll see you next time

Channel: The Gaming Shelf

Views: 160,520

Keywords: 2022 jrpgs, playstation 5, nintendo switch, best jrpgs 2022, xenoblade chronicles 3, best switch rpgs, soul hackers 2, the gaming shelf, switch jrpg, best jrpgs, pokemon scarlet violet, triangle strategy, diofield chronicle, monark, games to avoid, games worth it, worst games 2022, worst rpgs 2022, ps5 jrpgs, switch jrpgs

Id: U6R1F5m6GYM

Length: 11min 28sec (688 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 27 2022