What are some non-mainstream RPGs that deserve more love?

[VampireFreak]

Everyone always talks about Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy 6, but I rarely see people mention truly amazing RPGs that go under the radar. I'm not talking about rare and super forgotten games (although those are welcome too) but rather games that could've been popular at their time but now are mostly forgotten because they're not part of the celebrity team of RPGs.

One obvious example for me of this is the 1st Shadow Hearts.

Amazing visuals, gritty atmosphere, fun characters and plenty of options and places to travel. I really don't understand why this game is not as popular as the likes of FF or Fire Emblem. In my opinion, it has all the elements that make an RPG great and maybe in a few aspects blows out of the water the darlings everybody knows. Does anyone else knows similar cases of amazing games that should get more recognition? Either new or old is fine.

 

[sneakyguts]

wild arms needs all the love i want it to come back but ik sony would never bother

 

[TheSoulWalker TheSoulWalker]

Enchanted Arms had a great battle system but was marred by terrible writing and music. From Software CAN make a traditional RPG and I wish they would take a second crack at it but everyone wants another Souls-like from them and that's it.

 

[χKai]

Sugoro Quest - Dice no Senshitachi.

 

[Glimbo]

Metal Max has tanks you can customize/upgrade, a post-apocalypse setting, and very weird monsters. I also love how open it is. You can do things in different order or go places much earlier than you should. It all makes for a unique experience. Shame only two of them made it out of Japan.
Metal Max Returns, Metal Max 2: Reloaded, and Metal Max 3 are great and have fan translations.

 

[χKai]

I've heard really good things about Metal Slader Glory, but I've never played enough of it myself to have an opinion. It kept crashing on the emulator I was running it on, and I haven't had the time to get into something new lately; mainly because my phone screen has all these dark spots all over it so I can barely see shit, and it makes it hard to use. I'll get by, but for now I'm mainly collecting games and nkt so much playing them.

Apart from the stuff about my phone, I've got pretty much the same to say about a ton (and I mean a  lot) of games on the NES and SNES, mostly. It's either:
- I heard it was really good and the story makes it worth checking out
- A game stood out to me, looked like a really good, well-put-together RPG that I never got around to playing

So I have a bunch of games for those systems in specific that I never got the time to check out, if you want a list of various RPGs of varying types and genres but I have little experience playing them, so I don't know what you'll end up coming across if you play any of them. They're mostly translations or really obscure USA titles.