Don't Know an Adamantoise from Zenny? Start Your JRPG Journey with Our Guide

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1903340/Clair_Obscur_Expedition_33/

What happens when you filter JRPG tropes through a French studio's Belle Époque artistic inspirations? Multiple game-of-the-year awards, apparently. The concept is very traditionally JRPG - a rogue creator god is slowly deleting all people from the world, one age-bracket at a time. Everyone 34 or older has now vanished, and it's up to the 33-year-olds (plus a few younger recruits) to embark of a seemingly suicidal expedition to put things right before it's their turn. So far, none have returned, but those who went before may have left clues to improve your odds.

This one's self-evidently beautiful, great at tugging on the heartstrings, and has a mesmerizingly great soundtrack. Intriguingly, the combat riffs off the Mario RPG series - turn-based, but with enemy attacks able to be dodged or parried with precise press, and attacks that you can boost with a similarly synched hit. Also, consider playing it with the original French audio. While the English dub is no slouch, everything about this one is so French (right down to mimes wielding baguettes as weird enemy encounters) it feels wrong to use any other language.

DRAGON QUEST XI S: Echoes of an Elusive Age - Definitive Edition PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1295510/DRAGON_QUEST_XI_S_Echoes_of_an_Elusive_Age__Definitive_Edition/

The first big Dragon Quest to land on PC, and while we've had a great bundle of remakes and reimaginings since, this one remains a fantastic introduction to the series, requiring no prior knowledge. A massive but easily understood fantasy adventure in a world illustrated by Dragon Ball artist Akira Toriyama, and buoyed by a fantastically rousing orchestral soundtrack. It's packed with weird oddball characters, oodles of soul-achingly painful puns. It's just a bright, summery, relaxing way to spend your time.

Under the hood, Dragon Quest 11 has barely changed from the early SNES era, and that becomes all the more apparent in this version's most special twist - the 16-bit mode. At the start of any chapter, you can throw the game back through the eras, experiencing the same story and world in retro 2D form with adorably chunky little sprites. Even the combat plays out in a window echoing the NES original.

FINAL FANTASY IX PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/377840/FINAL_FANTASY_IX/

The only name as synonymous with JRPGs as Dragon Quest is Final Fantasy, but where to start? The answer is the most Final Fantasy of all the series, and the one that you can only experience in its greatest form on PC. Great as FF7 is, Final Fantasy IX is a wonderful, fast-paced fairytale adventure, following a rebellious princess, a band of thieves disguised as a theatre troupe and a doughty knight on a grand quest. The only mark against this game is its age, being limited by the original PlayStation's hardware.

Enter the Moguri Mod, a truly colossal community endeavor to fully remaster the game. 60fps combat animations, smoother cutscenes, expanded and upscaled widescreen backdrops - they've done everything. And installing it is a cakewalk too, via the community mod launcher, Memoria. For returning players, I also highly recommend the Alternate Fantasy mod (also in Memoria and compatible with Moguri), which fine-tunes the game's balance, restores some choice cut content, adds some optional endgame bosses and makes a certain someone into a recruitable party member.

Persona 5 Royal PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1687950/Persona_5_Royal/

The Persona games were once a splinter series from Atlus' classic Shin Megami Tensei franchise. While the SMT games were mostly dungeon crawlers and creature collectors set in mythic apocalypses, the Persona series rolled back the clock to before everything went to (literal) hell.

Sure, by night you're still delving into magical dungeons to battle stuff with the aid of summoned gods and mythic beasts in snappy turn-based combat, but by day you're hanging out with your schoolmates, acing exams and going on some questionable dates in a breezy life sim layer. It's a hit formula, and Persona 5 is the most popular by far, with its squad of high-school oddballs being students by day, Phantom Thieves by night, delving into the dream-dungeons of the rich, powerful and unpleasant in order to literally steal their hearts. All elevated by some amazingly stylish UI work, sharp character designs and an amazing, jazzy, vocal-heavy soundtrack.

Persona 5 has somehow become a whole dang series by itself. Not only is the Royal edition here a re-release with some major expansion content (on top of the already 100+ hour long original game), but there's been several spinoffs that continue the story. Persona 5 Strikers is a Dynasty Warriors-like action hack n' slasher and Persona 5 Tactica is a squad strategy spinoff with a cute art style. Most recently, Persona 5: The Phantom X rolled out, a free-to-play gacha entry, which hits a lot of the same notes as the original game. There's even a rhythm game with VR support, though sadly that one's a PlayStation exclusive.

Metaphor: ReFantazio PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2679460/Metaphor_ReFantazio/

A close cousin to Persona 5 (from many of the same developers), but Metaphor deserves a place of its own. Set in a surreal fantasy world menaced by twisted, Hieronymus Bosch-inspired monsters named 'humans', the biggest concern on the minds of the people is an upcoming election. Similar to Persona, you've got a ticking clock and a final deadline, but instead of counting down to the end of school, it's how long you've got until election day.

And so you're off on the magical campaign trail, juggling traditional dungeon crawling and monster-slaying with getting out in the streets to unite with the people, levelling up your character's public speaking skills and confidence as well as your ability to throw fireballs or transform into cool Archetype forms inspired by classic Wizardry-era dungeon crawlers. Metaphor is a significantly less daunting game and setting to dive into than Persona 5, delivering its self-contained story over perhaps 70-80 hours with no sequels or spinoffs to worry about.

OCTOPATH TRAVELER II PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1971650/OCTOPATH_TRAVELER_II/

The sequel to the game that defined the 'HD-2D' style, with chunky SNES-era sprites overlaid like cardboard standees on a lush, well-lit 3D world. The Octopath Traveler games are pure old-school JRPG goodness with an interesting structure. Each of the eight protagonists has their own path through the world, their own main quest, and their own unique abilities. The Hunter character can capture and deploy monsters in combat, or butcher them for their parts to craft items with. The Thief can steal from characters in the overworld, and the samurai Warrior can challenge characters to duels.

Those eight stories do eventually intersect and the story gradually converges, but each of those eight characters feels like they've got their own miniature RPG story arc to play through, making this one feel a lot less dense than it actually is. All together, it'll take you a good 80 hours to get through, but hopping between story threads gives this one a more whimsical feel, and each character really does lend their distinct personality to the blend. Compelling turn-based combat here too, plus a really good soundtrack.

Yakuza: Like a Dragon PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1235140/Yakuza_Like_a_Dragon/

A grand reboot for the long-running Yakuza/Ryu Ga Gotoku/Like A Dragon series (the naming is complex and messy, don't worry about it), and a fantastic place to start for newcomers. While earlier games in the series were Shenmue-esque urban life adventures with real-time brawler combat and gritty crime-drama stories, this one is a bit more whimsical, with turn-based, party-scale fights that are (mostly) more slapstick than serious. Playing as Ichiban Kasuga, a middle-aged, low-level street punk with a heart of gold, he ends up drawn into a grand criminal conspiracy that threatens the city of Yokohama.

Unlike taciturn mainstay protagonist Kazuma Kiryu, Ichiban is a people person with a head full of childhood nostalgia for the Dragon Quest games - real, actual canon. As such, he views his crew of modern-day dirtbags as an adventuring party, and everyone they tussle with as RPG monsters full of XP and gold. As an example of the silliness to expect, one of your party has the 'Homeless Guy' class, able to breathe fire with a bottle of cheap booze or summon bothersome pigeons to attack his foes. There's plenty of other silliness, including a whole minigame side-story where Ichiban ends up running a local candy store. GTA this ain't.

INAZUMA ELEVEN: Victory Road PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2799860/INAZUMA_ELEVEN_Victory_Road/

The JRPG formula can be applied to any genre. High fantasy? Sci-fi? How about a high-school football league. It's every bit as dramatic, and makes for surprisingly engaging tactical RPG combat. Movement plays out in real-time, but every shot, tackle, slide or esoteric special kick (and there are SO many of those) slows the action to let you plan your attack. This game is also absurdly massive. The main story is easily 30+ hours by itself, followed by an oddball sandbox campaign with town management elements, as your customizable dream-team fights to save Earth by battling football teams from across time and space. And beyond that, a bevy of online PvP modes.

The only real down-side to Victory Road is Level5's insistence on using generative AI, even though there's no disclosure on the store page. Seemingly the biggest use-cases they could find for it were brainstorming concepts and generating background crowd graphics, and while I don't consider its limited use a dealbreaker, it's disappointing for sure.

Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3375780/Trails_in_the_Sky_1st_Chapter/

I waited so long to start playing Atlus' absolutely colossal Legend Of Heroes series (quickly approaching its final planned chapter in the series) that they started remaking them. Good for me, then, that this remake of the PSP classic Trails In The Sky is excellent, bringing all the graphics, latest features and quality-of-life improvements from the newest games back to where it all began. Set in a steampunk fantasy world, the saga begins with a pair of siblings - Estelle & Joshua Bright - starting work for the local adventurer's guild.

Before long, they get dragged into an international, surprisingly political saga that spans an entire world, around 15 games (each 50+ hours long), several sets of protagonists and currently concludes with the beginning of the setting's space explorational program. Combat-wise, this one's interesting, with the option to open fights in real-time action style, comboing enemies to soften them up until either they land a hit, or you choose to transition to turn-based tactics where positioning matters for targetting area attacks.

STAR OCEAN THE SECOND STORY R PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2238900/STAR_OCEAN_THE_SECOND_STORY_R

The Star Ocean series had had some highs and lows, but few would argue that Star Ocean 2 - remade here in lush HD-2D style - is the best of them all. A Star Trek inspired series of RPGs, usually focused on spacefaring adventurers solving problems on more fantastical, magical worlds. With frequently spectacular real-time action combat (keep those juggle combos going!) and a high-energy soundtrack, most Star Ocean games move at a brisk pace, throwing you from one big encounter to the next. Most will wrap this one up in around thirty hours, but it's well worth a second playthrough, as there's two playable main characters (one more sci-fi, one more mystical), each with their own perspective on the plot.

Most Star Ocean games, while sharing a setting and timeline, tend to be self-contained stories, so you can really play them in any order. Unfortunately if you want another game that hits the same highs as Star Ocean 2, most other games in the series have some kind of glaring flaw or two, usually in their character writing. Not so in the case of Star Ocean: The Divine Force, which I still reckon is the most underrated in the series by far. I recommend it as your next - just make sure to use the Recompile Shaders option at the bottom of the options menu or it'll run terribly on PC.

Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2455640/Romancing_SaGa_2_Revenge_of_the_Seven/

It's time for your first introduction to Square-Enix's most cult RPG series. Originally released on the SNES in Japan only, Revenge of the Seven is a comprehensive modern reimagining of one of the most systems-heavy RPGs of its era. Romancing Saga 2 has you running an entire fantasy empire over the course of multiple generations, with a procession of fresh protagonists (of your choosing) taking the throne at key points. Your character and your party are entirely of your choosing here, and while the core story is largely linear, there's a lot more freedom here than in your average JRPG.

Being emperor means more than just going into dungeons and fighting monsters (though there's plenty of that, with an unusual turn-based combat engine where new skills are learnt at semi-random by performing similar actions in combat) - there's big decisions to be made that will affect both your country and what plot thread you're following, giving this one a lot of replay value compared to your average JRPG, although the story is understandably less dense than others. We're hoping for a similar 3D remake of Romancing Saga 3 (which even had army-scale kingdom battles), but there's a solid remaster already available.

Atelier Sophie: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Book DX PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1502970/Atelier_Sophie_The_Alchemist_of_the_Mysterious_Book_DX/

Final Fantasy aside, Koei Tecmo's long-running Atelier series might be the most voluminous on all of Steam, with around 18 titles available, and plenty more exclusive to consoles. The Atelier series are lighter, softer adventures, with less world-threatening crises and more girls going on whimsical magical adventures, usually arranged in loose trilogies. Atelier Sophie DX (an enhanced remake with all the DLC bundled in) is part of the 'Mysterious' trilogy, each with a different protagonist, but also has a direct sequel here.

While there's plenty of wandering around woods and caves fighting monsters in turn-based combat, the heart of the Atelier games is in their intricate crafting systems. Most Atelier protagonists are alchemists, selling potions, bombs, lamp oil or just delicious cakes to the townsfolk. Every expedition into the wild is an opportunity to collect more ingredients, which you can then mix and match on a complex alchemy grid to further optimize your recipes, aiming for more power, efficiency, quality or elemental perks in what you make. The more effort you put into the crafting, the more powerful your items are in the field.

Fuga: Melodies of Steel PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1357860/Fuga_Melodies_of_Steel/

On the border of indie and mainstream lies CyberConect2. The studio that gave us the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm series. They made Asura's Wrath for Capcom. And whenever they've got money in the war-chest... they self-publish quirky furry RPGs with gorgeous hand-drawn 2D art. Set in a fantasy reinterpretation of World War 2, The Fuga: Melodies of Steel trilogy follows a band of orphan children that stumble upon a gigantic techno-magical tank and decide to go to war against the invading Berman army. Yes, I did spell that right.

Almost the entire trilogy (each game being ~20 hours long) is set within the multi-floor iron belly of that colossal tank, as you wander around, talking with your fellow children and seeing to their needs in-between battles. When you do run into trouble, battles play out across a branching web of turn-based fights, each of the tank's many guns manned by a different child, their stats altering your attacks. Keep some resources in reserve, because boss fights can be tough. Although... you CAN sacrifice one of the kids to power the tank's Soul Cannon, letting you one-shot even the toughest fight. If you can stomach the loss, that is.

WitchSpring R PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1958220/WitchSpring_R/

We've got to tip our metaphorical hats to Korean studio Kiwiwalks, for being one of the few mobile studios that just make good, old-fashioned, self-contained retail games with no sketchy monetization or gacha mechanics. WitchSpring R is a heavily expanded remake of the original Witchspring, first released in 2015, designed for PC and consoles, and it's a charmer.

A comparatively bright and breezy game (not too dissimilar to the Atelier series), Witchspring R follows a young, oddly monikered witch named Pieberry on a quest to... mostly just exist. Her kind aren't much liked by the zealous knights of the land, and as such, she lives by herself, training and studying half the time (and crafting customized spells), questing out in the world for the remainder, accompanied (initially) by various creatures and familiars she summons and befriends.

Were it not for some chunky UI elements you'd never think this one started out on mobile, with a charming soft-focus, relatively low-poly aesthetic and snappy turn-based battles. It even got a free expansion back in 2025. While the majority of the Witchspring series are mobile exclusives, one other title saw a remaster on Steam, albeit not quite as dramatically reworked as Witchspring R.

Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1082710/Bug_Fables_The_Everlasting_Sapling/

We might not have the Paper Mario series on PC, but there's a few great alternatives. Bug Fables looks like the brighter, sunnier cousin to Hollow Knight and plays just like Paper Mario, complete with its customizable low-numbers combat (hitting for 10hp is always a big deal) with timed defensive hits and combo attacks. The writing is cute and whimsical, the main quest is well-paced, and the music is toe-tapping stuff. It's just a big warm fuzzy moth-hug of a game.

Bug Fables is further improved on PC by the Bug Fables Plus community expansion. It tunes up the balance (making Hard mode a little more spicy, but Normal is very reasonable) and adds a bit more of everything. More dungeons, more bosses, more side-quests, all fitting seamlessly in. You'd be hard-pressed to tell original from new content, and I'd honestly say this mod's fine for a first playthrough.

DELTARUNE PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1671210/DELTARUNE/

It just wouldn't be right to skip on this indie mega-hit in a JRPG roundup. Still incomplete, with 5 out of a planned 7 chapters available, and the remainder coming as free updates. Even without an ending, Deltarune is a mesmerizing, emotional trip set in a single modern-day magical town that's growing increasingly warped by the power of memories and dreams.

Low-fi graphics aside (we love them, but your mileage may vary), everything about Deltarune hits the high-notes. The music is stupendous, the writing is equal parts hilarious and pathos-laden, the combat is a clever mix of turn-based RPG standard fare and real-time arcade bullet dodging, and there are so many mechanical twists and minigames woven into the action. Plus, it's full of surprising reactivity, with even the smallest actions coming back to cheekily bite you.

While we'd highly recommend playing its predecessor, Undertale, first (it's a brisk game, doable in an afternoon), Deltarune is a standalone story seemingly set in an alternate, thematically mirrored world to the first. Feel free to start here if you're strapped for time. Also, the first two chapters of Deltarune (easily 8+ hours of game) are free, as a demo, with saves transferrable to the full game.

OMORI PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1150690/OMORI/

Continuing the thread of indie hits, it speaks to Omori's quality that it launched on Christmas Day in 2025 with no early reviews, and still sold like hotcakes. Inspired equally by Earthbound/Mother and Yume Nikki, this is the story of Omori, a shut-in teenager (see what they did there?) stumbling between the real world that they really don't want to deal with, the intermediary White Space and the whimsical dream-world of Headspace. There, Omori gets to just Be A Kid, hang out with their friends (half-imagined or otherwise) and go on big, goofy, low-stakes adventures with only the bare minimum of traumatizing nightmare twists.

Needless to say, this one can get heavy, with multiple plot routes unfurling based on how you handle your protagonist's relationship with reality. At least the combat is really fun, smart and original. While never overly complicated, many attacks and combat effects in the turn-based battles change the mood of your four party members. Each mood has its own rock-paper-scissors like quirks, but is able to also interact with other party members based on their emotional state.

Omori's multiple plot routes and interpretive dream-worlds really lit a fire under its fans, as it now boasts an active modding community creating new side-stories, overhauls, enhancements and expansions. They've even got a big shared repository of all their projects for you to browse. While spoilers abound in the story mods, for newcomers I'd gladly recommend either the Community Enhancement Pack (mostly bug-fixes and quality-of-life stuff) or NEMURI, which is a small expansion adding a few console-exclusive battles to the PC version, a few all-new encounters and a yet another alternate (well-hidden) story route. It also tunes up the difficulty a bit, so maybe best for a second playthrough.

Kingdoms of the Dump PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2159270/Kingdoms_of_the_Dump/

They say 'write what you know'. Given that prior to the release of Kingdoms of the Dump, the two-man development team were janitors by trade, that explains why it's set in a whimsical world of garbage - the mythical Lands of Fill. Looking and sounding like a long-lost SNES JRPG, Kingdoms of the Dump is a genuinely great example of the genre. A well paced adventure full of twists that takes itself JUST seriously enough, smart turn-based combat where your party can move (or be pushed) around a 3x3 grid to evade or aim attacks, and a rousing but authentically SNES-styled soundtrack, this one nails it.

You'd think that being set in a trash-heap, the game's aesthetics and tone would be limited, but they get SO much out of the idea. From the big world-ending threat being a bubbling sea of toxic slime, to a far-off magical kingdom being laundry-themed, with its cloth-based inhabitants mastering bubblemancy, to there being rat and bug people coexisting alongside ambulatory trashcans (the protagonist is named Sir Dustin Binsley), they clearly had fun with this.

As an aside, many of the bigger boss and cutscene sprites here come from Francis Coulombe, developer of the fantastic 2025 horror RPG Look Outside, a game which also contains a Kingdoms Of The Dump-themed side-quest. Check it out.

Sea of Stars: Sunset Edition PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1244090/Sea_of_Stars_Sunset_Edition/

Coming to us from Quebec-based indie studio Sabotage, Sea of Stars is clearly the work of people who grew up playing Square's classic Chrono Trigger and thinking about it a lot. A fast-paced fantasy adventure about a trio of young friends (Sun and Moon-themed warriors, plus their chef friend who acts as a combined tank and healer) going on a globe-trotting quest, recruiting new friends, stumbling upon ancient evils and resolving most problems through snappy, relatively low-stats turn-based battles. Interestingly, Sea of Stars is set in the same universe as the studio's ninja platformer, The Messenger, albeit in an ancient mythic era.

While perfectly playable solo, Sea of Stars also lets you play it in co-op with up to three players, each of your active party members are free to move independently on overworld (so long as you don't run too far from each other), and given separate actions in the turn-based combat. Similar to the Mario RPG series (and Clair Obscur), there's timed hits and defenses here, with the game's Hard mode really requiring you to master those, as it locks out item use mid-combat. While some have bounced off the game's playful tone (this is not a deep and serious game), we found it hard not to like the breezy Saturday morning cartoon tone.

LISA: The Painful PC

https://store.steampowered.com/app/335670/LISA_The_Painful/

And finally, a true bizarro indie phenomenon. LISA: The Painful is a low-budget, post-apocalyptic adventure through a twisted America where one day all women blinked out of existence. Now, an ageing population of increasingly unhinged men carve out an existence that's part Children of Men, part Mad Max, part Fist Of The North Star, and part Jackass. Until rumors spread of a girl being sighted, and this already unstable society tears itself apart.

That sounds really grim, and it is, but this game is also shockingly funny, full of laugh-out-loud moments, memorable characters and smart combat, where almost every encounter is a hand-crafted mini-boss with unique attacks. It's like a dark mirror to Earthbound's whimsical '80s Americana, without losing sight of those wacky roots. This version of the game includes the original release, plus the even darker expansion, LISA: The Joyful. Surprisingly, the game has also spawned a vast number of fan-games and mods, but if you're wanting something that hits the same notes as the original, we recommend LISA: The Hopeful.