How Do We Choose What JRPG to Play NEXT? | GEMS 4 

For me, I try to play a demo because that's the best thing to understand the game before fully committing my money to it. If a demo isn't available, then I try to look at gameplay and review videos. Gaming is an expensive hobby, and I don't want to think I wasted my money on something I didn't like.

I just finished the first Trails of Cold Steel so this is a very timely video. Thinking I might hold off to start the second one and play a palate cleanser first…

I’m really enjoying Reynatis Im just finishing up on it. I just get games which I like the look of which is most rpgs haha so I just get all of them 😅

I follow a pretty standard process: 1. Gain awareness of a game from somewhere. 2. Look into that game more. Previews and reviews, maybe looking up rumor content. 3. Decide if I'm outright purchasing the game. This is usually reserved for those games I want to see more of. I throw a lot of support behind new SRPG games unless they really look iffy. 4. If I won't outright buy the game, play the demo or wait for gameplay from an independent source I trust to show what I'm getting into. 5. Buy the game and add it to my stack of shame. 6. Revise my list of games to play this year for the (insert excessive number of instances) time. 7. Play the next game on the list.

for me when is not a franchise that I know or the trailer blow me away is that amazon give me a recommendation base on what I had bought and other people also buy these and 70 to 80 percent of the time is a hit (but there is miss like monark from furyu who make exp points the in game currency and its share by the whole party I had to grind for hours to level up my team)

Great video!!

My copy of Reynatis came in yesterday and im enjoying it sofar. It's msrp is my only concern, think most people wont give it a shot untill it gets a discount. Didn't mind paying $59.99 for the physical with a digital soundtrack download but thinking digitally, it should've been $49.99 or less to get people to give it a chance

Yes Brandon! Keep rolling out the content my friend 👌 Just started trails in the sky the third after playing FC and SC back to back! Feel like I need a break (even though I’m looking forward to the crossbell arc) so I’m going to be in this predicament. Dragon Quest 11, Octopath Traveler 2 are leading the way in my backlog! Heard DQ11 is very long but heard the story is good so that’s all good!

Thank you for taking the statement from your reynatis review and doing a deeper dive on the RPG genre spectrum. Very insightful and balanced.

This is a great video - and I really respect the way you're so measured and honest about what you said. I held my breath when you started talking about the political stuff, because I was afraid it would make people mad, but I think you said it all really well. There are a few reviewers I follow - moreso in music than in games - that I use more to just make me aware of new things. I think, if this reviewer took the time to make a video about it, that probably means it's worth discussion in some way. Sometimes I don't even watch the video, I just use it as a way to encourage me to check something out if it's in a genre I like. The games reviewers I follow I do tend to actually watch the video, though! Focusing mostly on retro stuff on my channel has helped in making the decisions about what games I'll eventually play, but I'm also glad that we've been going through things at least mostly in chronological order - helps me decide what game I'll play next out of the far too many on my list.

If the thumbnail is anything to go by then i guess i choose indie no contest maybe look at reynatis, but yea.

Thank you for taking one of your statements from the reynatis review and doing a deeper dive on the RPG genre spectrum. Great job!

When the video started I thought, “this feels like a GEMS episode.” 😂

Chained Echoes is so good 😁

I mostly just go by gameplay footage and interviews once I’ve spotted a game that seems appealing. But I’ll watch reviews out of curiosity over what people think. I like to know who made a game and what they have to say about it. A one-on-one with the director is 100000x more valuable than a journalist’s review. I know what appeals to me, and if I think the game seems interesting and I like the creator’s philosophy behind their work, then I’m interested. Also worth noting that reviewers and the general gaming public get things wrong. Using Furyu as an example, people tend to have weird impressions of what their games even are. Like how Monark was billed by many as a game by “ex SMT devs.” Which is very misleading. It’s got some ex-SMT staff, but it was really just the next project by the producer and director of Crystar, Fuyuki Hayashi. And it shares more similarities to that game narratively than it does SMT. If you read interviews you quickly get the impression that he’s the main creative force here. You can see that same creative style in Crymachina too. Now like you touched on earlier, political stuff can be a factor. For me it’s more tied to my personal principles than a team, and I am less likely to play something I object to. But only less likely. There are cases where I might miss something good because of this, and I’m willing to hear people out when they say it’s worth it despite whatever it is I don’t like. I’m ultimately just trying to find an enjoyable game after all. I draw the line at stuff that’s so full of stuff I object to that I clearly wouldn’t like it. Or outright censorship, which I choose not to support financially. But if it’s minor I may go with a used copy.

Hey Brandon good video but I have to disagree on the political point (of course) Although I agree with your general sentiment, I think that the idea that disliking Woke is just due to Team Politics is reductive. For me (and I think most others as well), although Political Ideology obviously does play a role, the main factor is quality and immersion. I believe we (rightfully so) identify "woke" works (or products with particular "consulting groups" hired) as being of overwhelmingly lower quality and having a negative impact on the work of art as a whole. For example, I recently played through (and put in 100H) to Horizon Forbidden West which is undoubtedly "woke." The graphics are great, the gameplay is pretty okay albeit repetitive (Ubisoft formula) but the story/setting/writing is HORRIBLE! It has such great potential, but the NPCs and dialogue is insufferable. I am not going to get into specifics, but it is so boring and immersion breaking that it ruins the experience. This should be an 8-9/10 experience but just because of the poor writing and dialogue I seriously feel like it is about a 5/10 experience for me now and by the end I just was completing it for the achievements and completion sake. In the past almost all Movies or TV Shows were still written by those with a Left Slant and there was undoubtedly political messaging encoded into some of the greatest films, but it didn't matter because the Art was good. I am someone who is very capable of separating the Art from the Artist. So for me it is not Team Politics - but the overall quality associated with these shoe-horned in and overtly blatant political messaging which waters down what should be amazing experiences into essentially a Degrassi Episode. It's the destruction of quality in our favorite medium that is what upsets us far more than something as insignificant as team politics. Well at least that's my 2 cents.

My economy decides it a lot, big ones are often saved up for when they have a sale. It also depends A LOT on mood, when i want it grindy, or hopeful, or more fluffy. It decides a lot when i buy a thing and the thing often needs to be played very quickly so i dont loose the mood and interest.

Hey Brandon here's a video idea: how do you choose which next JRPG to play from your own Backlog?? I swear I have been paralyzed by that decision for over a day before, just scrolling through the back log trying to choose which one I want to install next. For me I eventually just have to force myself to choose one install and start it. once I start I usually get into it but those in-between moments when you have like 20 to choose from can be rough!