Where are the Japanese Tactical RPGs we grew up with?

There was a time when the majestic Tactical Role-Playing Game (TRPG) roamed the landscape and were abundant in numbers. Battle were fought and positions were held, even if it meant your forces falling in desperate battles.

That time was the 90s and while some may try to forget the decade of grunge bands, soul patches, and phrases like “da bomb,” we remember it fondly for its games.

These games haven’t vanished, but their numbers have been thinned — culled even — if only in the West to make way for shooters and AAA games with budgets larger than a small country.

TRPGs primarily focussed on turn-based combat taking place on grids. Each player or enemy side would have an option to move their units, attack, or perform special actions. Once the turn was complete, the opposing side would take their own turns. Due to the often complex and deep gameplay mechanics, battles in TRPGs can take anywhere up to a hour or more to complete.

During these years of RPG saturation, Square Soft (Square Enix), SEGA, and Konami others were titans of the industry. In recent times, they’ve either over-saturated their own franchises or shelved them completely. These are the tactical RPGs companies should look at bringing back into the market; they are the ones we miss:

Final Fantasy Tactics (Square Enix)

Starting off as a spin-off dealing with a more mature storyline and themes, Final Fantasy Tactics (FFT) debuted on the original PlayStation in 1997. The game was later remade in 2007 for Sony’s PSP and given the moniker Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions. The received two additional entries, though not sequels, in the form of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance for the GameBoy Advance and Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift for the Nintendo DS.

The games take place in the fictional world of Ivalice. These lands are inhabited by all manner of races and creatures, which are usually involved in some sort of war. The gameplay within FFT is standard for the genre, but where it truly shines is the unit and character customization. Each member in your army can be assigned a specific class, such as Black Mage or Warrior, and equipped with spells, weapons, and armor. Their ability to use more powerful spells and forces depends on their level so you’ll want to grind them as much as possible.

With all of the Final Fantasy titles and spin-offs around you’d think Square would delve back into the series, though the best we can hope for in a Japanese cellphone game.

Shining Force (SEGA)

Another fantasy-styled JRPG, Shining Force was SEGA’s own stab at the tactical genre. While also following the standard genre mechanics, there were two key things that set it apart from the rest. Firstly, during battle the game would switch to a mini cutscene where characters would duke it out. The second major difference is that your team was comprised of main characters and none of them were general canon fodder. That meant players needed to be very careful during battle. On the plus side, you’d be able to rank up your character classes after a while.

The game received several sequels in the form of Shining Force II, Shining Force CD, and Shining Force III. The latter was split into three games with only the first seeing a release in the West. The last true release of the core series was a remake of the first one in 2010 entitled, Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon, which was released on the GameBoy Advance and iOS. It has since been removed from the Apple App store.

There hasn’t been another core entry into the series since then.

Front Mission (Square Enix)

The Front Mission series from Square Enix combined huge mech battles with roleplaying. Players were able to customise their walking behemoths with a variety of parts, weapons, skills, and more. It’s also possible to kill the pilots of these mechs (Wanzers) and capture the mech for yourself in battle. Abilities are learned by equipping certain items and then meeting certain battle conditions in the game.

Front Mission received very few English translations of its titles and the last one released was a Mech Warrior-type game in 2010. Much like many other titles in the Square Enix library, the Front Mission series has fallen dormant.

Vandal Hearts (Konami)

Strategy, blood, and violent. That’s what the Vandal Hearts titles were about. They lived and died with the first and second games — I don’t count the third title at all. This series always felt like chess, which has a nice change from traditional TRPGs. This feeling came from the Rock, Paper, Scissors type mechanics the series utilised. For example, swordsmen were strong against archers, who were, in turn, more effective against flying foes.

Vandal Hearts is a Konami title and given their recent actions we shouldn’t expect to see this series reborn anytime soon. It’s a pity, because it really could have been a contender in the TRPG genre.