The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
The best short RPGs?
TSR
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
After playing a few RPGs that were way too large, with overextended plots and huge dungeons that dragged on for hours, I've started looking into shorter, smaller games that are great, but not massive time sinks.
My personal favorite in this "genre" is probably Mario RPG: LOTSS for the SNES. The game took maybe twenty hours to play through to 100% completion, but it was a wonderful ride the whole way.
What others would you recommend?
My personal favorite in this "genre" is probably Mario RPG: LOTSS for the SNES. The game took maybe twenty hours to play through to 100% completion, but it was a wonderful ride the whole way.
What others would you recommend?
TSR on
0
Posts
Beyond Good and Evil is more of an adventure game, but it's also pretty short. Or so I've been told. Haven't beaten that yet, either.
Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
Also, I really echo your sentiment about overblown dungeons. I'm playing through Digital Devil Saga at the moment and some of these dungeons just feel like massive time-sinks.
Say what you want about it, but I enjoyed it for multiple hours. The final, *final* boss did feel rather kludged on, though.
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is probably a little too long for you, but it should appeal to your tastes.
If you don't mind that the story is meaningless, I had a good time with Lord of the Rings: The Third Age. FFX-esque battle system + elves and dwarves? Yes, please.
Well worth playing, and you could probably crank through the main story in ~20 hours if you wanted to (30ish to do the side quests and soak up the atmosphere).
I don't remember Lunar: SSSC taking longer than 20 hours.
Vandal Hearts was 10.
games longer than this tend to lose my attention right after the 20 hour point.
Both won't have you dicking around doing sidequests and grinding for levels to beat boss X. The console ones tend to have a bit more extra stuff to do once you finish, but the series as a whole are short RPGs without fluff and great storylines. And they are of a satisfactory length, so by the time you finish you'll feel like you invested your time well and didn't get ripped off by an overly short game. I think well-paced is the word I'm looking for.
The problem with Jade Empire is that it feels like it is going to be long and epic and then when you think you're at the halfway point, the game just stops.
In retrospect it was a good game, and I liked the story, but at the time all I could think was "Shit, I'm done already?"
I have a decent PC that I could play Fable on, so perhaps I'll try that next (along with Threads of Fate, if I can find it. I've been jonesing for a good PS1 RPG in particular.)
Yes
It just felt long at some points due to the grinding . . .
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
I prefer short RPGs to long ones, actually. I can't stand games that drag on and on.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Lufia I and II, perhaps? I don't recall them being too terribly long. But it's been a way long time since I played either.
Suikoden (the first one) really deserves mention here as well, clocking in at just over 20 hours for most people. Chrono Cross also skirts the line at about 30 hours, but is still considerably shorter than your average Squeenix epic, even if you fully explore both worlds.
Or what the hell do you people think is so much longer? I can only think of DQ VII, Xeno, and some pc RPGs as being any longer
Too bad it's freaking impossible to get your hands on . . .
It had like 5000 copies printed in the US in the last days of the Saturn. I consider myself fortunate that I snagged a copy shortly after its release. Still one of my favorite games of all time. In fact, my purchase of an X-Box was greatly influenced by the announcement of PD: Orta and the hopes that another PD RPG would be made soon after.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
Fallout 2 can be beaten quickly if you take a ridiculous and almost certainly fatal shortcut, but then you miss out on getting gay married, pimping your spouse, and having a Dirk Diggler-style drug-fueled psychotic breakdown while making porn.
You'd be really really lucky to find one cheap though.
Which is such a damned good RPG that I started playing it again recently - already on the third disk.
It did go Greatest Hits, typically if you can actually find the Greatest Hits version it will not cost you much at all.
Panzer Dragoon Saga is probably the best short RPG, but it's awfully expensive unless you buy the Japanese version plus most people don't have a Saturn in the first place. Of course, you could always take a chance and buy it and then sell it after you finish it (great game, but I think it has awful replay value), but if that plan backfired (the game gets damaged, Sega announces a remake on a modern system, etc), you could be out a lot of money.
Final Fantasy IV (2 on the SNES) is a rather short game as far as Final Fantasies go with an average playthrough of the SNES version taking around 10-15 hours. I imagine Final Fantasy Advance IV for the GBA would take a little longer if you wanted to do all the bonus stuff (plus the SNES version is Easy-Mode), but I still can't imagine it being especially long.
Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is really short and easy. Saying it's not the deepest RPG is an understatement, but I still had fun with it.
Suikoden 1 is really easy and fun and unless you're trying to get every character to join your team, it can be finished rather quickly. It's pretty expensive these days, but not nearly as bad as Suikoden 2.
Parasite Eve 1 & 2 are both fun games that are rather short. Parasite Eve plays sort of like an early version of Vagrant Story whereas Parasite Eve 2 is more like old school Resident Evil crossed with an RPG.
Most older Action/RPGs are short. The aforementioned SNES Shadowrun comes highly recommended by me.
I remember the Final Fantasy games for the original Game Boy to be on the short side (Final Fantasy Legend 1-3 & Final Fantasy Adventure). Technically, none of them are really Final Fantasies (Square just gave them those names in the US to try to make them sell better), but that's besides the point.
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire,
Parasite Eve is a good choice, although I'm not sure how truly 'RPG' some people consider it.
You might also try Legend of Legaia for the PS1. It's not a great RPG in terms of story or characters, but the combat is kind of cool, it's not very long, and (big plus in my book) the bosses aren't afraid to hand you your ass the first time you fight them.
If you really want short, play the original Lunar on the Sega CD since it's much shorter than the remake. Although really, I can't really recommend that since the remake on the PS1 adds a lot of cool stuff and is overall much better.
I just thought of a few more.
The original Arc the Lad is a very short Strategy/RPG. Of course, since it comes with 2 other games in the Arc the Lad collection, anyone who plays it is likely to spend quite some time total (Arc the Lad 2 is pretty long), but if for some odd reason you just wanted to play the first game, you could beat it in around 10 hours (more if you do the big extra dungeon).
Growlanser 2 is another short Strategy/RPG that can be finished in around 10 hours, although once again, it comes in a collection (this time with just the 3rd game in the series) so the total time one would need to finish the entire collection is noticeably longer.
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire,
http://steamcommunity.com/id/BlindProphet
I thought it was pretty short. I don't know if it counts as an RPG, but Uncharted Waters: New Horizons is short, depending on who you play as.
Gamecube:
Lost Kingdoms I & II - Relatively short games overall, and tons of fun, both of them. They're rarely mentioned but they really deserve alot of credit for being awesome.
Paper Mario 2 - Already mentioned and discussed.
Xbox:
Fable - A game that actually took a lot of flak for being as short as it was. Still an amazing game in its own right, if dreadfully easy
Jade Empire - Another game that doesn't get enough credit.
Dreamcast:
Timestalkers - A game that doesn't take very long to complete, but can be played for as long as you want given the style of the game.
PSX:
Azure Dreams - Similar to Timestalkers, in that you can play through the main story fairly quickly, but if you want to accomplish everything you're in for a long haul.
PS2:
Kingdom Hearts I & II - I blazed through these two with astounding speed, but your mileage may vary.
.hack series - A bunch of short games, in my opinion, that range from okay to pretty good.
twitch.tv/Taramoor
@TaramoorPlays
Taramoor on Youtube