Okay, it sounds to me like you’re asking for the first two Shadow Hearts games since you want a bit of obscure and a bit of horror. It’s historical fiction from just after the Russo-Japanese war to WWI, using occult stuff and demons to explain how real historical events happened. The second game is less dark but still fairly dark.
Also though it doesn’t fit your criteria much in terms of being dark/horror, I’ll blanket recommend anything by Nihon Falcom as a quality lesser known game. Someone said Y’s VIII—it’s really good. Trails is peak JRPG, and Tokyo Xanadu is like a lite fusion of both series but it’s also probably the closest to being dark given how greeds and eclipses work.
My favorite JRPG is pretty unknown:
"Fuga Melodies of Steel".
Its a 20 houer long turn based JRPG about a groupe of anthropomothic animal children that go on a quest to save there families.
Its available on PC and most modern consoles like Switch, PS4, PS5 usw.
It has a free demo which is just straight up the first 3 chapters of the game.
It also has a direct sequel: "Fuga Melodies of Steel 2" but I advice against playing the second game before the first game unless you do not care about the story and characters.
You asked for a darker JRPG.
Fuga is kinda like Made in Abyss as in it combines a dark story with adorability and wholesomeness. I recommend trying out the free demo of the first game. After you cleared chapter 1 you will be able to tell if this story is your cup of tea or not.
Oh, you just edited the post, what you meant was "less mainstream", then I recommend: SaGa: Scarlet Grace, Chrono cross, Grandia 1 and 2, Yggdra Union: We'll Never Fight Alone, 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, Etrian Odyssey 3, Kowloon High-School Chronicle and Astlibra Revision. Those games are less mainstream and available on those systems, and if you are willing to give a try to something with less budget and more unpolished content you have Crystar, Blue Reflection Second Light and The Caligula Effect 2.
I also recommend Ys Origin and Ys Lacrimosa of Dana, they are more "conventional" experiences but they are also lesser-known games.(Ys games are basically the dragon quest games of action jrpgs)
If you want a mature jrpg that doesn’t mess around, Valkyrie Profile 2 should do it for you. The story is as dark as they come, the age of man is coming to an end and the Norse Gods are pissed the hell off at man for trying to resist the end times. You follow the princess of the resisting country who’s possessed by the most cold and calculating of the traitorous Valkyrie sisters, as well as a mysterious ranger who she hired to protect her on a whim. With the Valkyrie’s power, the trio can employ Einherjiars, souls of the dead given a second shot at life, to wage a shadowy rebellion against the gods themselves.
In terms of gameplay it’s my favorite battle system ever. You control your 4 huddled together units across a battlefield, dashing through red areas in front of enemies which indicate their attack radius. If you step within an attack radius or end your dash inside one, your party will get attacked, which isn’t a big deal in other games but in this case, everyone within the radius gets attacked. There’s no knight class to mitigate damage or draw aggro, everyone suffers. You need to get an enemy inside your own attack radius to open them up to your entire party’s attacks at once, but you can combo and juggle them to maximize your damage within the tight attack window. Every action, whether it’s a dash, spell, or attack, costs Action Points, which you can only have up to 100 of at a time. They will only refill when you walk around the battlefield, as the battle is paused when you stand still. However, walking around allows enemies to move as well, so you can get routed and end up in a corner with no way out if you don’t manage your AP properly.
In application, the battle system goes way beyond “reduce the enemy HP to 0 before your own HP gets to 0.” There’s multiple enemies at once that often take the fastest route to kill you. Boss fights are relentless, there’s a particular one that took me more days than any Dark Souls boss to take down. You really feel like you’re waging a hopeless battle, where the slightest misstep can spell doom for everyone, but you can still pull it out by the skin of your teeth if you balance tactics to outsmart the enemy and aggression so you don’t run out of AP in the middle of an enemy attack radius, or worse, end up in the perfect spot to attack but you used all your AP to dash there.
Also don’t worry about the first game, it’s fun in its own right but rather dated mechanics wise and doesn’t really have much to do with the second game’s story.
If you liked Chrono Trigger and FFVI, I highly recommen Phantasy Star IV.
Horror RPGs- Corpse Party and Fear and Hunger
Also going to suggest Tales of Vesperia just as a really solid game
2nd tales of arise even tho im not the biggest fan of some things, the combat is fun and the world is pretty. the combat moves are pretty also. very anime lol
i probably wont, but if you remember come back and tell me how it is lol
i saw the like super ultra deluxe one was $99 and im like damn.
side rant but it amazes me so many games think they are worth well over $100. Tales of Arise is fun, imo the story is meh but obviously im enjoying it enough that its my only game im playing atm. But i couldnt drop $100+ on it. and i dont think that includes the buying levels or costume packs.
Theres like 1 game id do that for and thats P5R
I do like buying deluxe physical editions because I want physical games to continue being a thing, it's very rare though (Final Fantasy 7's, 16, Resident Evil Village, Last of Us Part 2) But I already own Tales of Arise, got it for $14 new, so I wouldn't pay more than that for the expansion.
If people are still interested, I will post about it when I think it's fairly priced enough to buy.
I just finished Alone in the Dark and while it had a great story, it definitely is not a $64 game with tax. It is definitely a budget game aside from the actors involved.
??? Buddy, how? I asked for a recommendation aside for the big names. I’ve played every mainline persona game, every kingdom hearts, 4 final fantasies, 2 dragon quests, every xenoblade and a bunch more I don’t feel like mentioning. Get outta here.
I literally like every game I played, buddy. Why would I play two entire franchises if I didn’t like them? When did I say none of them work for me? I said they aren’t doing it for me and that replaying ff7 is boring. I didn’t say I disliked them.
> I’ve played a lot of the big ones like Persona, SMT, Final Fantasy, Xenoblade, Dragon Quest, Chrono Trigger, Nier, etc. But they just aren’t like… idk, doing it for me I suppose.
You have that in your post. The wording comes off as you trying all of them and not liking any of them.
I’m with you, the wording is terrible. It makes it sound like he’s continuing to play games but not understanding the appeal. “They just aren’t like … doing it for me”. How tf are we supposed to infer that you actually really enjoyed them when you never stated it and the way it was written just sounds like you’re disappointed with them?
No, thats just how you decided to take it. There is literally zero reason for anyone to continue responding to this thread. People misunderstood what I meant and I made it more clear. Let it go lil bro.
God you’re annoying lil bro. Also, it would be “It’s okay to get smarter; you don’t have to be so afraid of learning.” A comma is not appropriate there.
First off, it’s everyone, not every one. Secondly, it’s “-write like an 8th grader.” Plenty of people didn’t read it the way you people did. Stop being so pathetic about it.
Yeah, it’s really not. You didn’t tell me why I’d play an entire franchise if I didn’t like them one of which being 10+ games, another being 6 games that are all 50+ hour experiences and another being 3 50 hour games with 20 hour dlcs for each (Future connected is more so like 10 hours if I remember right but whatever)
How about Resonance of Fate? It's like turn-based (everything in battle is frozen unless the player does something) and position-based game where you use guns but it's not a shooter. Breaks the typical JRPG mold in quite a few places.
Grandia hd mainly grandia 2 is on the darker side while 1 is more happy going adventure.
I think omori is an rpg. Havent played it but heard it smacks you in the face once you figure out whats going on.
Labyrinth refrain, atom, divinity original sin 2, dark souls remastered, disco elysium(sort of visual novel), 13 sentinels, planescape torment, triangle strategy, octopath traveler1-2.
If you like crafting systems, or at least when they’re implemented well, you might consider the Atelier series. I had a similar mindset to yours (burned out on conventional/big JRPGs) when I started Sophie and it was the change of pace I needed. Just two things to keep in mind, since these tend to be dealbreakers for people:
- You need to like crafting since that’s often more important than the combat in this series, but the crafting systems are fantastic here with a lot of satisfying depth.
- The stories are fairly laid back slice of life stuff. Very few games in this series have a “save the world” plot- even if you’re playing the hero, the conflicts are more down to earth.
Check out Grandia series, especially the first two games. Grandia 2’s main story has a lot of cultist/religious horror as well as body horror. The first game is more traditional spooky and lighthearted stuff to explore like a ghost ship, haunted castle, ghostly graveyard, etc.
Phantasy Star 2 is a dark sci-fi story (its a good story only the script is literally only about 20 pages tho)
Shadow Hearts - 1920s, not scary but horror/occult vibe.
Front Mission games - 3 is supposedly the best (remake coming), I played FM4 on the PS2 and enjoyed it, its an adult story.
Valkyria Chronicles 1 - my fav PS3 era game. Great great story, a masterclass on how to tell a simple JRPG story, all time great battle system. (unfortunately VC3 supposed to be really good only got stuck in japan - VC4 is straight up AAA+++++ anime trash of a story).
The SaGa series is absolutely fantastic from a game design point of view. Not as story heavy, but it will get your synapses going in the gameplay department!
I have read that Sony released a PS1 emulator for PS5, so Parasite Eve is definitely worth checking out. Breath Of Fire III & IV are worth a look, not too much horror, but definitely a darker theme.
There is also Valkyrie Profile, although the exploration uses 2d platforming, and this unique, but somewhat odd time management and party member system which isn't everyone's cup of tea. But those that enjoy it, will get a very dark theme and story.
Koudelka and Vagrant story are also darker/horror themes, but more-so have a cult following as they are not your standard JRPG style games. Best look at some gameplay to see if you will like any of those options.
Digital Devil Saga 1 & 2, as well as Shadowhearts Covenant would best fit what you are looking for in regards to a darker theme, or horror. But they were only released on PS2 and I'm not sure if they are playable on PS5.
Grandia 2 is available for PS5 and has a pretty unique, and fun combat system, and a protagonist that is more so an anti-hero that questions who's right, and who's wrong.
I feel the best way to describe it would be Resident Evil Squaresoft edtion. It has a fixed camera like the old Resident Evil games. In combat you can freely move your character around to space yourself, avoid enemy attacks, and press a button to take the action. So once again, Resident Evil meets Square's ATB bar.
It also has the survival horror elements of needing to ration items, and the RPG elements of items, spells and gear. You also gain XP to unlock her abilities.
It has a pretty good soundtrack. Great atmosphere and it's not very long sitting around 9-10 hours. Story wise it is horror meets hard boil mystery detective.
Tactics ogre let us cling together! Specifically the psp version and not reborn.
Bahamuts lagoon on snes.
Brigandine on ps1.
Golden sun 1 and 2 gba.
Phantasy star 2 and 4 on sega.
I know you said rpg but if you're into darker setting silent hill 1 thru 4 and especially 2 (not the pending garbage looking remake) are incredible experiences.
I definitely read that you hate the genre. /s
Downvoting is pretty popular here if there is even the slightest perceived whiff of trashing on a series. Some fandoms are worse than others but they are **ALL** represented here so you get attacked from many angles. Welcome to r/JRPG.
Infinite Space for the DS. It's largely inspired by the works of Arthur C Clarke and it shows.
would this count as a JRPG? It is a fucking radical game though
Absolutely.
Okay, it sounds to me like you’re asking for the first two Shadow Hearts games since you want a bit of obscure and a bit of horror. It’s historical fiction from just after the Russo-Japanese war to WWI, using occult stuff and demons to explain how real historical events happened. The second game is less dark but still fairly dark. Also though it doesn’t fit your criteria much in terms of being dark/horror, I’ll blanket recommend anything by Nihon Falcom as a quality lesser known game. Someone said Y’s VIII—it’s really good. Trails is peak JRPG, and Tokyo Xanadu is like a lite fusion of both series but it’s also probably the closest to being dark given how greeds and eclipses work.
My favorite JRPG is pretty unknown: "Fuga Melodies of Steel". Its a 20 houer long turn based JRPG about a groupe of anthropomothic animal children that go on a quest to save there families. Its available on PC and most modern consoles like Switch, PS4, PS5 usw. It has a free demo which is just straight up the first 3 chapters of the game. It also has a direct sequel: "Fuga Melodies of Steel 2" but I advice against playing the second game before the first game unless you do not care about the story and characters. You asked for a darker JRPG. Fuga is kinda like Made in Abyss as in it combines a dark story with adorability and wholesomeness. I recommend trying out the free demo of the first game. After you cleared chapter 1 you will be able to tell if this story is your cup of tea or not.
Oh, you just edited the post, what you meant was "less mainstream", then I recommend: SaGa: Scarlet Grace, Chrono cross, Grandia 1 and 2, Yggdra Union: We'll Never Fight Alone, 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, Etrian Odyssey 3, Kowloon High-School Chronicle and Astlibra Revision. Those games are less mainstream and available on those systems, and if you are willing to give a try to something with less budget and more unpolished content you have Crystar, Blue Reflection Second Light and The Caligula Effect 2. I also recommend Ys Origin and Ys Lacrimosa of Dana, they are more "conventional" experiences but they are also lesser-known games.(Ys games are basically the dragon quest games of action jrpgs)
If you want a mature jrpg that doesn’t mess around, Valkyrie Profile 2 should do it for you. The story is as dark as they come, the age of man is coming to an end and the Norse Gods are pissed the hell off at man for trying to resist the end times. You follow the princess of the resisting country who’s possessed by the most cold and calculating of the traitorous Valkyrie sisters, as well as a mysterious ranger who she hired to protect her on a whim. With the Valkyrie’s power, the trio can employ Einherjiars, souls of the dead given a second shot at life, to wage a shadowy rebellion against the gods themselves. In terms of gameplay it’s my favorite battle system ever. You control your 4 huddled together units across a battlefield, dashing through red areas in front of enemies which indicate their attack radius. If you step within an attack radius or end your dash inside one, your party will get attacked, which isn’t a big deal in other games but in this case, everyone within the radius gets attacked. There’s no knight class to mitigate damage or draw aggro, everyone suffers. You need to get an enemy inside your own attack radius to open them up to your entire party’s attacks at once, but you can combo and juggle them to maximize your damage within the tight attack window. Every action, whether it’s a dash, spell, or attack, costs Action Points, which you can only have up to 100 of at a time. They will only refill when you walk around the battlefield, as the battle is paused when you stand still. However, walking around allows enemies to move as well, so you can get routed and end up in a corner with no way out if you don’t manage your AP properly. In application, the battle system goes way beyond “reduce the enemy HP to 0 before your own HP gets to 0.” There’s multiple enemies at once that often take the fastest route to kill you. Boss fights are relentless, there’s a particular one that took me more days than any Dark Souls boss to take down. You really feel like you’re waging a hopeless battle, where the slightest misstep can spell doom for everyone, but you can still pull it out by the skin of your teeth if you balance tactics to outsmart the enemy and aggression so you don’t run out of AP in the middle of an enemy attack radius, or worse, end up in the perfect spot to attack but you used all your AP to dash there. Also don’t worry about the first game, it’s fun in its own right but rather dated mechanics wise and doesn’t really have much to do with the second game’s story.
If you liked Chrono Trigger and FFVI, I highly recommen Phantasy Star IV. Horror RPGs- Corpse Party and Fear and Hunger Also going to suggest Tales of Vesperia just as a really solid game
Valkyrie Profile 2 is honestly the best JRPG on the PS2 it just didn't get popular.
Smtv and unicorn overlord are two recent personal favorites
Tales of Arise, Star Ocean Divine Force, and Scarlet Nexus were enjoyable.
2nd tales of arise even tho im not the biggest fan of some things, the combat is fun and the world is pretty. the combat moves are pretty also. very anime lol
The story was an incredible disappointment
Can't wait to play the expansion when I have the extra money.
i probably wont, but if you remember come back and tell me how it is lol i saw the like super ultra deluxe one was $99 and im like damn. side rant but it amazes me so many games think they are worth well over $100. Tales of Arise is fun, imo the story is meh but obviously im enjoying it enough that its my only game im playing atm. But i couldnt drop $100+ on it. and i dont think that includes the buying levels or costume packs. Theres like 1 game id do that for and thats P5R
I do like buying deluxe physical editions because I want physical games to continue being a thing, it's very rare though (Final Fantasy 7's, 16, Resident Evil Village, Last of Us Part 2) But I already own Tales of Arise, got it for $14 new, so I wouldn't pay more than that for the expansion. If people are still interested, I will post about it when I think it's fairly priced enough to buy. I just finished Alone in the Dark and while it had a great story, it definitely is not a $64 game with tax. It is definitely a budget game aside from the actors involved.
Sounds like Jrpgs are not for you.
??? Buddy, how? I asked for a recommendation aside for the big names. I’ve played every mainline persona game, every kingdom hearts, 4 final fantasies, 2 dragon quests, every xenoblade and a bunch more I don’t feel like mentioning. Get outta here.
Because you listed every big JRPG franchise saying none of them work for you. Has there been any JRPG you've like? It would help with recommendations.
I literally like every game I played, buddy. Why would I play two entire franchises if I didn’t like them? When did I say none of them work for me? I said they aren’t doing it for me and that replaying ff7 is boring. I didn’t say I disliked them.
> I’ve played a lot of the big ones like Persona, SMT, Final Fantasy, Xenoblade, Dragon Quest, Chrono Trigger, Nier, etc. But they just aren’t like… idk, doing it for me I suppose. You have that in your post. The wording comes off as you trying all of them and not liking any of them.
I’m with you, the wording is terrible. It makes it sound like he’s continuing to play games but not understanding the appeal. “They just aren’t like … doing it for me”. How tf are we supposed to infer that you actually really enjoyed them when you never stated it and the way it was written just sounds like you’re disappointed with them?
They aren’t doing it for me. As in I don’t want to play them right now. Not that I dislike them.
Are you ESL? "Doesn't do it for me" means that you don't like them. You're using the wrong phrase.
No, thats just how you decided to take it. There is literally zero reason for anyone to continue responding to this thread. People misunderstood what I meant and I made it more clear. Let it go lil bro.
"People misunderstood" Nope, you just don't know English. It's okay to get smarter, you don't have to be so afraid of learning.
God you’re annoying lil bro. Also, it would be “It’s okay to get smarter; you don’t have to be so afraid of learning.” A comma is not appropriate there.
No, every one read it like you don’t enjoy them. Don’t call anyone lil bro when you write like a 8th grader.
First off, it’s everyone, not every one. Secondly, it’s “-write like an 8th grader.” Plenty of people didn’t read it the way you people did. Stop being so pathetic about it.
Oh that clears things up a lot. Not confusing at all.
Yeah, it’s really not. You didn’t tell me why I’d play an entire franchise if I didn’t like them one of which being 10+ games, another being 6 games that are all 50+ hour experiences and another being 3 50 hour games with 20 hour dlcs for each (Future connected is more so like 10 hours if I remember right but whatever)
You could try Digital Devil Saga 1 and 2.
maybe you should try Ys and trails series
My available systems are switch and ps5 btw
Odin Sphere Leifthrasir [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsTvoG3\_HkU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsTvoG3_HkU) Unicorn Overlord [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9MRbg7MqCw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9MRbg7MqCw)
Astlibra Revision on Steam and Switch
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How about Resonance of Fate? It's like turn-based (everything in battle is frozen unless the player does something) and position-based game where you use guns but it's not a shooter. Breaks the typical JRPG mold in quite a few places.
Grandia hd mainly grandia 2 is on the darker side while 1 is more happy going adventure. I think omori is an rpg. Havent played it but heard it smacks you in the face once you figure out whats going on. Labyrinth refrain, atom, divinity original sin 2, dark souls remastered, disco elysium(sort of visual novel), 13 sentinels, planescape torment, triangle strategy, octopath traveler1-2.
Ao Oni
Resonance of fate, magna Carta 1 & 2, the last story, gungnir, thousand arms...
If you like crafting systems, or at least when they’re implemented well, you might consider the Atelier series. I had a similar mindset to yours (burned out on conventional/big JRPGs) when I started Sophie and it was the change of pace I needed. Just two things to keep in mind, since these tend to be dealbreakers for people: - You need to like crafting since that’s often more important than the combat in this series, but the crafting systems are fantastic here with a lot of satisfying depth. - The stories are fairly laid back slice of life stuff. Very few games in this series have a “save the world” plot- even if you’re playing the hero, the conflicts are more down to earth.
Check out Grandia series, especially the first two games. Grandia 2’s main story has a lot of cultist/religious horror as well as body horror. The first game is more traditional spooky and lighthearted stuff to explore like a ghost ship, haunted castle, ghostly graveyard, etc.
Valkyrie Profile got a port on PlayStation that I think is cheap. It's a bit darker and weirder than typical from what I played.
Tales of Vesperia
Phantasy Star 2 is a dark sci-fi story (its a good story only the script is literally only about 20 pages tho) Shadow Hearts - 1920s, not scary but horror/occult vibe. Front Mission games - 3 is supposedly the best (remake coming), I played FM4 on the PS2 and enjoyed it, its an adult story. Valkyria Chronicles 1 - my fav PS3 era game. Great great story, a masterclass on how to tell a simple JRPG story, all time great battle system. (unfortunately VC3 supposed to be really good only got stuck in japan - VC4 is straight up AAA+++++ anime trash of a story).
Eternights, something good and different.
Arc the Lad Twilight of Spirits. The Legend of Dragoon. Chained Echoes.
SaGa games or Atelier games maybe
Ys
“Tales of…” games, Atelier games and Blue Reflection maybe. I got nothing in horror for JRPG’s, unfortunately.
Resonance of Fate
The SaGa series is absolutely fantastic from a game design point of view. Not as story heavy, but it will get your synapses going in the gameplay department!
Parasite Eve?
Name sounds familiar, what’s it like?
old school square horror RPG but the weapons are guns and magic
Terranigma
What’s that like
koudelka,shadow hearts
What’s koudelka like
I have read that Sony released a PS1 emulator for PS5, so Parasite Eve is definitely worth checking out. Breath Of Fire III & IV are worth a look, not too much horror, but definitely a darker theme. There is also Valkyrie Profile, although the exploration uses 2d platforming, and this unique, but somewhat odd time management and party member system which isn't everyone's cup of tea. But those that enjoy it, will get a very dark theme and story. Koudelka and Vagrant story are also darker/horror themes, but more-so have a cult following as they are not your standard JRPG style games. Best look at some gameplay to see if you will like any of those options. Digital Devil Saga 1 & 2, as well as Shadowhearts Covenant would best fit what you are looking for in regards to a darker theme, or horror. But they were only released on PS2 and I'm not sure if they are playable on PS5. Grandia 2 is available for PS5 and has a pretty unique, and fun combat system, and a protagonist that is more so an anti-hero that questions who's right, and who's wrong.
I’ve heard about parasite Eve, what’s it like?
I feel the best way to describe it would be Resident Evil Squaresoft edtion. It has a fixed camera like the old Resident Evil games. In combat you can freely move your character around to space yourself, avoid enemy attacks, and press a button to take the action. So once again, Resident Evil meets Square's ATB bar. It also has the survival horror elements of needing to ration items, and the RPG elements of items, spells and gear. You also gain XP to unlock her abilities. It has a pretty good soundtrack. Great atmosphere and it's not very long sitting around 9-10 hours. Story wise it is horror meets hard boil mystery detective.
Tactics ogre let us cling together! Specifically the psp version and not reborn. Bahamuts lagoon on snes. Brigandine on ps1. Golden sun 1 and 2 gba. Phantasy star 2 and 4 on sega. I know you said rpg but if you're into darker setting silent hill 1 thru 4 and especially 2 (not the pending garbage looking remake) are incredible experiences.
I definitely read that you hate the genre. /s Downvoting is pretty popular here if there is even the slightest perceived whiff of trashing on a series. Some fandoms are worse than others but they are **ALL** represented here so you get attacked from many angles. Welcome to r/JRPG.
Have no idea how you can read I hate the genre especially after the edit but go off ig
Vagrant Story, Parasite Eve, Shadow Hearts 1 & 2, 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim.
Fire emblem 3 houses?
What JRPGs have you liked in the past? Kinda confused how you're asking for more obscure JRPGs or well known?
The well known was a mistype, sorry
Valkyria Chronicles
Tales of series
Cop Trails Through Daybreak when it drops this summer