Laziness in JRPGS

I like Japanese RPGs, also known as JRPGs/J-RPGS, a lot. In fact, I prefer Japanese games in general over Western-developed games. Over the years, having played since the NES era, I have noticed that Japanese developers tend to maximize their resources, making even small-budget games look polished. Basically, even in the case of a low color count and other similar shortcomings of a game’s graphics prowess, the presentation still remains top-notch. E.g., Punch-out has very good coloring and looks very clean. However, I have noticed laziness in jrpgs, such as only one armor design per character for the entire game, and the lack of visual changes when equipping new gear, as well as a single battle theme. Even modern remakes, like the HD-2D versions of older games such as Dragon Quest, continue this trend; battles lack a third-person perspective and visual variety for equipment, which makes the presentation feel lackluster. In contrast, Dragon Quest 9 on the Nintendo DS offered clear visual changes for different weapons and armors long before these remakes.

The other issue I have noticed in some Japanese role-playing games is a lack of difficulty balance. Especially, the bosses in most JRPGs are just too unbalanced. Even if the player plays in normal difficulty, difficulty spikes do happen very often in some J-RPGs. I have played games where the final bosses were too hard. While in most games, the final boss is expected to be very challenging, I also believe that if the player has reached the end point of a game, she/he should be able to finish the fight without much frustration. If it's a secret or side-boss fight, then extreme difficulty is understandable.

My favorite JRPG series is Suikoden. Suikoden games have at least 50 playable characters, something hardly seen in other JRPGs. It also offers a base where all your characters reside, and the turn-based gameplay in these games is extremely good as well.