One thing about Japanese RPGs that players need to love is their combat systems. Otherwise, gameplay would be a tedious slog in between the story scenes.
Early JRPGs tended to feature simplistic turn-based battle systems, but with greater game console tech came greater flexibility as to how developers could play things.
Action-based mechanics would quickly squeeze their way into RPGs, with later games in the genre sometimes sporting hybrids of action and turn-based elements. This article aims to explore modern JRPGs that are among the paragons of the genre in terms of combat.
15. FINAL FANTASY XVI
PlayStation 5 | Windows
The sweet sixteenth entry of the long-running Final Fantasy franchise, the first to be rated Mature, is set in the world of Valilsthea, with Mothercrystals on the continents of Ash and Storm providing energy for their respective populations. Humans who can use magic without crystals are called Bearers and are subject to slavery and persecution, with too much use of their magical abilities turning them to stone. The protagonist is Clive Rosfield, member of a royal family that can utilize the power of multiple Eikons, which are equivalent to summon spells, espers, eidolons, or whatnot, from previous Final Fantasy games.
Clive can switch between different Eikon powers in the middle of battle to string them into combination attacks, and is the only character players control themselves, with his allies controlled solely by AI. Clive’s canine companion Torgal can respond to his master’s commands to use special attacks or heal, with Clive himself able to attack normally and dodge. The ability to “stagger” enemies returns from Final Fantasy XIII after dealing them enough damage, and a Story mode allows more casual players to breeze through battle, making the sixteenth mainline Final Fantasy accommodating to most gamers of different skill levels.
Final Fantasy XVI gameplay
14. Granblue Fantasy: Relink
PlayStation 4,5 | Windows
The Granblue Fantasy series relinked players with the world established by the first game with its sequel, appropriately subtitled Relink, albeit in a different location. The crew of the airship Grandcypher is attacked by monsters after its arrival at the Zegagrande Skydom, with the vessel’s Captain helping afterwards to evacuate villagers from the island of Tempeal. A few twists abound later on regarding the lineage and backstories of a few of the characters, with some betrayals leading to a stunning conclusion and epilogue rounding out a great narrative.
Players engage in real-time combat with a four-character party, with each combatant having their own distinct weapons, skills, and battle styles, where teamwork is the name of the game. Party-based mechanics like Link Attacks and Chain Bursts can help the player crush their adversaries with impunity, with every foe and party formation having their own strengths and weaknesses. Those who just want to experience the story, however, can just easily turn on autobattle to let the game work its own magic, sure to appeal to players of all skill levels, accounting for an accommodating JRPG.
Granblue Fantasy Relink gameplay
13. CrossCode
Linux | macOS | Windows | Nintendo Switch | PlayStation 4,5 | Xbox One | Xbox Series X/S
Developer Radical Fish Games developed the radical action RPG CrossCode, focused on Lea, a player in the fictitious MMORPG CrossWorlds, where she wakes up mute and amnesic. She is assaulted by a man called the Blue Avatar who spirits her away to a forbidden area called the Vermillion Wasteland, where a woman named Shizuka Sakai reveals Lea is an AI known as an Evotar, based on Shizuka’s memories. Lea learns about the creation of CrossWorlds and aims to stop the conspiracy of Benedict Sidwell, a black-market financier who financed the Evotar Project.
Players control Lea from a top-down perspective in action-based combat, exploring a traditional JRPG overworld and earning her "elements" that grant her different puzzle-solving and offensive capabilities. The difficulty of both combat and puzzles is mercifully customizable, always accommodating to players of different skill levels. Lea can perform melee or ranged attacks to obliterate her adversaries, earning her experience to level up and circuit points she can put into her circuit board to enhance her abilities. In the end, any self-respecting JRPG fan owes it to himself or herself to cross paths with CrossCode.
CrossCode gameplay
12. Monster Hunter: World
PlayStation 4 | Xbox One | Windows
Prepare to enter a new world of hunting monsters with Capcom’s Monster Hunter: World, where humans and other races have their eyes fixed on the New World, separate from the Old World. Ferocious, untamed beasts wander the New World, with researchers yearning to uncover new mysteries, led by the Research Commission. The player controls a hunter that they create and name, with an assistant handler helping them along the way, part of the Fifth Fleet to provide support, particularly emphasizing the study of Elder Dragons.
World features a whole new world of monster-hunting gameplay, with the hunter the player creates tasked with hunting down monsters to kill or capture them. The hunter can gain skill with whatever weapon they have equipped from one of the franchise's fourteen archetypes like a longsword, bow, or hammer. When players locate monsters, they have a ton of approaches to slay or capture them, and need to watch their health, with three strikes in losing their HP knocking them out of a quest's rewards. Overall, Monster Hunter: World is sure to provide series fans a world of fun with its gameplay.
Monster Hunter: World gameplay
11. MONSTER HUNTER RISE
Nintendo Switch | Windows | PlayStation 4,5 | Xbox One | Xbox Series X/S
Capcom’s Monster Hunter series rises with Monster Hunter Rise, opening in Kamura Village, where the player’s custom character is promoted to the eponymous rank of Hunter. As the Hunter is escorted to the village chief, they see an unknown flying monster in the distance, which may suggest an impending event known as The Rampage. The Hunter is tasked with various quests to prevent another Rampage, which involves frenzied monsters attacking, by supplying the village with various supplies while beefing up their hunting capabilities.
Rise's gameplay is similar to that of its precursors, with the Hunter tasked with slaughtering or capturing giant beasts utilizing various weapons, tools, and environmental elements to hurt and weaken them while surviving their onslaughts. Finishing quests nets players loot, usually as monster parts, that they can use to create new armor and weapons so that they can take on more powerful beasts to form a neverending cycle of entertainment. The fourteen weapon types present in previous Monster Hunter games like World return as well, accounting for good monster-hunting fun.
Monster Hunter Rise gameplay
10. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth
PlayStation 4,5 | Windows | Xbox One | Xbox Series X/S
Sega’s long-running Like a Dragon franchise gives players Infinite Wealth, following former Tojo Clan yakuza members Ichiban Kasuga and Kazuma Kiryu as they go on a new adventure to various locales in Japan and Honolulu, Hawaii. Kasuga seeks his biological mother who he thought died years ago, while Kiryu seeks her as well to find and protect her from various criminal organizations. Throughout their journey, the two encounter various Japanese and Hawaiian criminal groups and characters, including one who looks strikingly similar to Danny Trejo, and is, incidentally, voiced by Trejo himself.
Similar to its predecessor, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, Infinite Wealth sports turn-based combat for all playable characters, now dubbed the Live Command RPG Battle System. Each character can move freely about the battlefield, with their positioning critical to the flow of combat, allowing initiatives like being able to deal extra damage to enemies from behind. The Hype Meter allows all characters except Kasuga to perform special team-up attacks, with Kasuga himself able to use an Ultimate Tag Team skill to really dish out the pain. In the end, Infinite Wealth is sure to provide infinite fun for those who play it.
Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth gameplay
9. SCARLET NEXUS
PlayStation 4 ,5 | Windows | Xbox One | Xbox Series X/S
Bandai Namco’s Scarlet Nexus will definitely make players see red in a near-future alternate reality where humans have developed technology and formed a society based on human brain substances that give extrasensory superpowers. The Other Suppression Force (OSF) recruits those with special abilities to protect the human race from the Others, which are mindless mutants hailing from the Extinction Belt that feast on human brains. The game is played from the perspectives of two OSF members: Yuito Sumeragi and Kasane Randall, who accidentally create a Kunad Gate, sort of a black hole, which they need to close.
On their quest to close the gate they idiotically opened, Yuito and Kasane can battle with short-range weapons such as swords, in addition to their psychokinetic abilities to hurl objects and other things at their adversaries. Players can upgrade each protagonist's ability to use the game's equivalent of the Force through brain maps, equivalent to skill trees prevalent in many other RPGs. Different party members will assist the duo as they advance through the game to open up new ways through which to kick enemy tail, accounting overall for satisfying combat.
Scarlet Nexus gameplay
8. Tales of Arise
PlayStation 4,5 | Windows | Xbox One | Xbox Series X/S
Bandai Namco’s long-running Tales series arose with Tales of Arise, set in a world divided between the medieval land of Dahna and the more-advanced one of Rena. Arise stars its own Man in the Iron Mask (Alexandre Dumas, eat your heart out), an amnesic slave named Alphen, who gradually remembers his memories as his guise cracks and crumbles. He encounters a Renan girl named Shionne Vymer Imeris Daymore, with whom he forms a pact to take down five Lords and seize the Master Cores they have.
Arise builds upon the Linear Motion Battle System of its predecessors, with a great emphasis upon evading and countering enemy attacks, the previous entry Graces one of its primary inspirations. Although this entry doesn't feature multiplayer mode akin to most of its predecessors, the development focused on the various interactions between characters in battle. One major addition is the Boost Strike feature, which allows multiple members of the player's active combat party to execute destruction attacks together when certain conditions are fulfilled. In the end, Arise is another Tale told well with regards to its combat.
Tales of Arise gameplay
7. Yakuza 0
PlayStation 3,4 | Windows | Xbox One
In 1988 during the bubble era of Japan, Kazuma Kiryu and Goro Majima went from zeroes to heroes in Yakuza 0. Both protagonists are drawn to a vacant field known as the Empty Lot, which the Tojo Clan wants to acquire to redevelop it, although a blind woman named Makoto Makimura is its rightful heir. A lot of twists and turns abound in the Godfather-like narrative, with the player's perspective alternating repeatedly between Kiryu and Majima, amounting to a fiery conclusion that ties into the first mainline game in the Yakuza series.
Yakuza 0 is set in an open-world environment, with the player alternating between controlling Kiryu and Majima to kick their adversaries' tails. Each can play minigames like classic Sega arcade games or eat dishes at restaurants to earn Completion Points the player can spend on special items or character upgrades. The protagonists can spend money obtained from fights or side activities to purchase skills from their respective skill trees to obtain new methods with which to beat the crap out of their enemies, accounting for satisfying, stress-relieving combat overall.
Yakuza 0 gameplay
6. Honkai Star Rail
Windows | iOS | Android | PlayStation 5
Chinese developer miHoYo gave players worldwide a Honkai Honkai burning love with their gacha RPG Honkai: Star Rail, set in a science-fantasy future where humans and nonhumans follow Paths of godlike beings called Aeons. The protagonist is the amnesiac Trailblazer, who holds a Stellaron and follows the Path of Trailblaze, created by the deceased Akivili. Pathstriders aim to explore, establish, and connect among different worlds, with the main adversary being Nanook, who controls the Path of Destruction, with other Paths including the Path of Abundance.
Star Rail follows the trend of classic Japanese RPGs, with players building a party of up to four characters in turn-based combat, with each having stats and combat types that affect damage dealt to foes and characters classes known as Paths. Each character has unique abilities called Traces, also being able to equip weapons known as Light Cones with different effects if it matches with a character's Path. The game also features gacha mechanics, where players can spend in-game or real-life currency to get new characters and weapons, sure to have vast appeal to gamers of different social standings.
Honkai: Star Rail gameplay
Honkai: Star Rail Combat Gameplay
5. FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE
PlayStation 4,5 | Windows
In 2020, Square Enix finally gave fans of the seventh Final Fantasy their long-awaited dream of a full-remake (actually, the first of three parts) with Final Fantasy VII Remake. Cloud Strife is a former member of SOLDIER, the Shinra Corporation's elite guard, who joins the ecoterrorist group Avalanche to stop the electric company from draining the world's lifeforce, mako, through its plants. He is assisted by a variety of characters like the gun-armed Barret Wallace, the martial artist Tifa Lockhart, and the flower saleswoman Aerith Gainsborough, as they traverse the megacity Midgar to stop Shinra's ambitions.
The remake features an altered version of the Active Time Battle system from the original and most series entries, where an ATB gauge fills slowly or faster with standard attacks. Once it's full, players can stop the action and use skills like magic, items, and special moves, assignable to shortcut buttons so they can play out in real-time without needing to pause. Summon spells and Limit Breaks from the original Final Fantasy VII return, allowing players to especially smack down enemies, accounting for a great evolution of the standard Final Fantasy battle system.
Final Fantasy VII Remake gameplay
4. A.O.T. Wings of Freedom
PlayStation 3,4 | PlayStation Vita | Windows | Xbox One
Developer Omega Force allowed players to fly on Wings of Freedom with their video game adaptation of Hajime Isayama’s animanga Attack on Titan. The player creates a customized character of their own to experience the events of the first fifty chapters of the manga, equivalent to the first two seasons of the anime adaptation. As with series protagonist Eren Yeager, the protagonist's parents are killed by the eponymous Titans who breach Wall Maria and thus, they seek vengeance, interacting with the various luminaries of the animanga during their journey.
Wings of Freedom features players battling the titans in large, open areas, with a story mode playable entirely in co-op mode, not to mention a character creator. When not fighting beyond the walls, the player's character can become friends with and bond with endless characters from the animanga including Eren Yeager in the Daily Life mode. As in the first game, players can embark on countless missions and eventually be able to capture titans and review them in the research room. Overall, the second Attack on Titan game is sure to provide a good time for fans of the animanga and newcomers who don't want to bother spending their time watching the anime or reading the manga.
A.O.T. Wings of Freedom gameplay
3. DRAGON BALL Z: KAKAROT
PlayStation 4 | Xbox One | Windows | Nintendo Switch | Stadia | PlayStation 5 | Xbox Series X/S
CyberConnect2 pitched the (dragon) ball with Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, an adaptation of the Dragon Ball Z anime, based on the late mangaka Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball manga. The game is broken up into four storylines: the Saiyan Saga, the Frieza Saga, the Cell Saga, and the Buu Saga, echoing the different arcs of the Dragon Ball Z anime. Protagonist Goku learns about his Saiyan heritage (with Kakarot being his birth name) and undergoes a great deal of training to battle the increasingly-more-powerful opponents he faces throughout his adventures.
Kakarot is chiefly an action RPG with tons of fighting game elements, with players able to battle adversaries and do things like fish, collect Z orbs, eat, drive a hover car, train, and put characters into soul emblems. Players can explore the world of the animanga and complete sidequests galore, with many of the main characters of the Dragon Ball cast playable like Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Piccolo, and so forth. They can also have two supporting characters to assist them in combat, accounting for an experience on par with watching the anime or reading the long-running manga.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot gameplay
2. NieR:Automata™
PlayStation 4 | Windows | Xbox One | Nintendo Switch
PlatinumGames and Square Enix’s NieR: Automata will automatically captivate your heart with its futuristic science-fiction setting where humans, mercifully, are nonexistent. The main characters are the female YoRHa android 2B and her male reconnaissance droid 9S, who help fend off invading alien Machines with help from pre-YoRHa Earth androids organized into the Resistance. The game requires at least three playthroughs to get the most out of its narrative, through 2B and 9S' different perspectives in the first and second, and then 9S and a rogue YoRHa android, A2.
Automata is an action RPG where players explore an open world that also features flying mech battles and wild animals to ride, in addition to standard exploration on foot. Combat itself sports real-time action-based hacking and slashing with light and heavy attacks stringable into various combination onslaughts. The playable characters can also evade and counterattack their enemies, with the player also assisted by a flying Pod robot that can assault foes with various customizable ranged attacks. Those just in the game for its storyline can at any time set it to play itself, sure to accommodate players of any skill level and rounding out a great JRPG battle system.
NieR: Automata gameplay
1. Nioh 2
PlayStation 4,5 | Windows
Never say “Nioh” to the first sequel in Team Ninja’s Nioh series, set in the late sixteenth century of Japan, where players control a customizable character named Hidechiyo. He or she is a half-yokai known as a Shiftling, and they befriend characters such as the ambitious merchant Tōkichirō and others who play a role in the rise and fall of the warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi. The main villain is a mysterious entity named Kashin Koji, linked to a powerful yokai called the Otakemaru, who hinders Hidechiyo and manipulates most of the events that occur throughout the game.
Like the first game, Nioh 2 is an action RPG where players, as mentioned, create a custom character, who can equip a number of different traditional Japanese weapons and gain new skills and abilities as they progress throughout the game. When players slaughter hostile yokai, they may drop Soul Cores that allow them to use new yokai abilities once they're purified through special shrines. At Benevolent Graves, moreover, players can summon AI-controlled players to aid them, with three-player cooperative multiplayer available as well, accounting for great Japanese feudal-era fun.
Nioh 2 gameplay
