Steam, the new home for the JRPG fan

Kingdom hearts PC

Steam has been slowly been taking over the gaming ecosystem with its year round sales on great Video Game titles. The rate at which these sales happen are so alarmingly high that it has had an effect on the entire digital gaming industry, and I’m not just talking about other digital stores on PC, no this is much larger now, it’s affecting almost every digital store. PSN, XBLA and the Nintendo E-shop have all tried to somehow combat this by having sales of their own throughout the year, but I’m not sure they’re having as much of an impact as steam, and It seems that developers are starting to notice too.


Steam Sales

For many year it was common knowledge that if one wanted to regularly experience the goodness of JRPGs you would have to get yourself a Japanese developed video game console, or handheld. Waaaaaait….. Stop right there all you know it alls that are just itching to jump in the comments with stuff like;


But Q, what about Final Fantasy VII? It was released on PC, it’s a JRPG


Yes, yes you’re right, but remember the word I used “regularly”, ahhh… that’s it, let it all soak in, English. 😉

You see even though there were JRPGs on PC, they were few and most of the times they were just horrible ports that required you to Macgyver around your PC just to get them to run. So for most of us what that meant was that we “had” to get a PlayStation, or a Nintendo device if we ever hoped to play the newest, biggest, most awesome fantasy worlds out there. Now with that little back story behind us we can focus on the future. The future of JRPGs on the PC for us, the fans. These games that were mostly console/handheld exclusive are now being released on the PC and at a very pleasing rate.


JRPGs on Steam

The first batch to make the trip over consisted of ports of fairly recent games from last the last generation of consoles like; Hyperdimension neptunia re:birth 1, and Valkyria Chronicles, both were previously PlayStation Exclusive titles, now they are finding a new home on the PC for new and old fans alike. These games are being ported over for fans of jrpgs, but they also serve as an opening door for more and more like them to follow. For the last two year we had the Naruto Storm series of fighting games join the PC fold and this year we’re getting Dragon ball Z Xenoverse (on release day). These are titles that were also previously console exclusive, but are now making their release alongside their console counterparts, and more and more games are to follow.


Kingdom hearts 3 Gif

As more and more developers start to notice the possibilities that PC has to offer, the more great games we will get on our desktops, and with Windows 10 around the corner with Xbox and Direct X 12 support there is just too much that can go right. Who knows maybe Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy 15 will get announced for PC in the next few months, or maybe they won’t. What is certain though is that the PC is currently the strongest digital contended in the Video Game market and any developer would be wise to get their games on it.


if you’d like to hear more about my thoughts about this topic, then I suggest you listen to the Buttonsmashers podcast.

Qudduws Campbell

That messy hair bloke: Romantic, Food lover, Gamer, Sports Fan, Manga Reader, Tech Head, Podcaster... Pretty much do a bit of everything.

2 Comments

  1. Not to mention all the RPG Maker titles that have been popping up on Steam, too! Currently playing through The Last Remnant on Steam, btw ;p

    Thanks for the article!