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.

 

[Graw]

I think the SaGa series is underrated. They can be a little weird but they're mostly high quality games created by the director of the original Final Fantasy 2 who basically took the weird levelling system from that game and refined it into a weird jrpg series that combines sci-fi and fantasy with non-linear story telling. My favourites in the series are Romancing SaGa 3 and Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song. Every game in the series is different from the last though. They've all received high quality remasters and Romancing SaGa 2 recently received a full on 3d remake.

Lufia 2 on the snes is one of my favourites on the system for gameplay. I wish more jrpgs had those Zelda style dungeon puzzles. Too many jrpg dungeons are just tunnels with monster encounters. The ancient cave roguelike dungeon is also super cool and could be a whole game all on its own.

For western rpgs, I know it's Bioware which is pretty mainstream, but I feel like Neverwinter Nights never really got the attention it deserved compared to games like Baldur's Gate or the later Bioware RPGs like Kotor, Mass Effect and Dragon Age and stuff like that. The campaign that came with the game is a bit mid but the engine and the toolkit that came with it and the level of creative freedom it allowed still hasn't really been topped to this day. It's about as close as you can come to a full on digital D&D experience. Especially if you play online with DM. You can basically make full on games with the toolkit and hundreds of high quality custom modules exist, everything from full on worlds with tons of quests and areas to explore to smaller self contained story driven adventures and everything in between. It got an enhanced release relatively recently by Beamdog that runs on windows, mac, Linux, android and even ios I think. It seems like most of the custom modules still work and there's a small but active community of online players and servers.

 

[TheGreenJackass]

Jade Empire, from Bioware. It's a sin it never got a sequel.

 

[throughdarkness]

For a truly underdog RPG, I recommend Okage: Shadow King. It was a pretty early PS2 release and has a very specific comically gothic charm with a good sense of humor. The art direction is really good and I think it holds up well today compared to many others.

Okage: Shadow King (USA) PS2 ISO – CDRomance

Okage: Shadow King (USA) PS2 ISO Game ID: SCUS-97129. Languages: English. For Sony PlayStation 2.

cdromance.org

 

[medisinn]

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

Not quite the same thing, but Armed Fantasia is a spiritual successor in development. Penny Blood is the same thing for Shadow Hearts.

Lufia II first came to mind, but that was already said. Maybe Paladin's Quest? It was janky, abrasive, but also surreal and interesting. I'll also maintain until my dying breath that Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is awesome and underrated. A lot of PS1 RPGs have gotten love and ports to modern platforms, but Breath of Fire III somehow hasn't. The beginning drags a bit but it gets great after that.

 

[iamthemilkman]

Everything Mistwalker. Lost Odyssey has been getting more love lately because of the Expedition 33 dev talking about it. Also Blue Dragon, The Last Story, and Fantasian.

I agree with Shadow Hearts (I think Lost Odyssey devs previously worked on this), Enchanted Arms, and Jade Empire.

I have a soft spot for Enchanted Arms since it was the first "next gen" JRPG that I played for the 7th generation:

I actually liked some of the music. It wasn't as bad as Evergrace in this department (another non-mainstream From RPG that I love alongside its sequel Forever Kingdom).

Another cool one that's forgotten to time is Sudeki on the original Xbox.

 

[Nickakyoin]

Definitely Golden Sun (rip Camelot, forever stuck in the Mario Tennis/Golf development jail) and Breath of Fire.