Best PS1 JRPGs That Are Not Part Of A Franchise

Best PS1 JRPGs That Are Not Part Of A Franchise



Summary

  • PS1 had great RPGs like FF7 & Suikoden, but some one-off games didn’t become franchises.
  • Xenogears led to Xenosaga/Xenoblade, Legend of Dragoon didn’t get a sequel.
  • Vagrant Story & Guardian’s Crusade were unique, Thousand Arms focused on relationships & crafting weapons.



The PS1 had a slow start but eventually, it got a lot of great RPGs on the system and from different companies too. Squaresoft had Final Fantasy 7 along with other sequels and more experimental games like Parasite Eve. Konami came out with Suikoden which looked dated graphically but it had one of the most enthralling party systems in RPGs.

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The list can go on but then some RPGs weren’t as lucky to go on and become a successful franchise. Many of these haven’t even left the console let alone get a sequel. Here’s a look at what they did for the PS1 and whether they deserve a second chance or not.

Special Mention: Xenogears — A Religious Mech-Based Oddity

Systems

Released
October 20, 1998

Developer(s)
Square

Xenogears was one of the many one-off games that Square Enix, then Squaresoft, designed for the PS1. Players were split between two types of turn-based battles in this futuristic RPG. On the ground, characters could input button combos to perform moves similar to Sabin’s specials in Final Fantasy 6.


Eventually, the party gets mechs for similar turn-based battles. While this never got a sequel, a few of the key members, like Tetsuya Takahashi who was the game’s director, went on to form Monolith Soft which led to the creation of two spiritual successors: Xenosaga and Xenoblade Chronicles. Except for the “Xeno” prefix, none of these three franchises are officially connected.


6 Beyond The Beyond

Should Be Named Golden Sun Origins

  • Developer: Camelot Software Planning
  • Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
  • Platform: PS1
  • Released: September 11, 1996 (NA)

Beyond the Beyond was one of the first turn-based RPGs to hit the PS1. It was a tough market to crack until Final Fantasy 7 blew up the PS1 and the genre. It was developed by Camelot and Nintendo fans may know them from the Golden Sun series and various Mario sports titles. The sprites in towns and dungeons are very basic and chibi-like but in battle, characters are rendered in wonderfully drawn sprites as are the animations.


Plus combat used Super Mario RPG-like active commands, so it was ahead of other turn-based RPGs of the era. There are many reasons why this game never took off as a series, discounting Nintendo usurping Camelot, but the high difficulty and large amount of random battles could have contributed to some gripes.

5 Guardian’s Crusade

How To Train Your Dragon

  • Developer: Tamsoft
  • Publisher: Activision (WW)
  • Released: March 3, 1999 (NA)
  • Platform: PS1

Guardian’s Crusade was the North American name for the title but the original Japanese title is cuter and more descriptive: Knight & Baby. As a young knight, players will be given a pink hippo-like dragon that they need to return to their mother.


Through the course of the adventure, players will engage in turn-based battles with enemies that they can see in the field before beginning. Players can feed and show their creature affection to help it evolve. It’s sort of like a more medieval Digimon game as trainers in that universe get one monster to develop instead of Pokemon wherein players can catch hundreds.

4 The Legend Of Dragoon

Sony’s House Of Dragons

Systems

Released
June 14, 2000

Publisher(s)
Sony Computer Entertainment

The Legend of Dragoon was made internally at Sony as sort of a last-ditch effort for the PS1. While beloved by many, Sony never green-lit a sequel although it did get a nice enhanced port to the PS5 featuring upgrades like save states. The game itself stars Dart on a quest to retaliate against an invading empire.

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In combat, players can time their attacks like in Mario’s RPG games and the aforementioned Beyond the Beyond which was forward thinking of The Legend of Dragoon. What wasn’t revolutionary was the random and quite frequent enemy encounters but even the best PS1 RPGs, like Final Fantasy 7, had those.


3 London Seirei Tanteidan

If Professor Layton Was An RPG

  • Developer: Unit
  • Publisher: Bandai
  • Platform: PS1
  • Released: May 20, 1999

London Seirei Tanteidan is a game that’s hard to track information down online because it was only released in Japan. Also, there hasn’t been a widely released English fan patch for it, so fewer RPG fans have checked it out via emulation.

It does come from a high pedigree though within Bandai before they merged with Namco. It’s a typical turn-based RPG set in a not-so-typical RPG era: Victorian London. It looks like a Professor Layton game if it were mixed with Oliver Twist thematically and that’s a pretty cool idea for an RPG on any system.

2 Thousand Arms

Dating A Blacksmith


Thousand Arms
Systems

Released
October 14, 1999

Developer(s)
Red Company , Tose

Thousand Arms is probably a PS1 RPG that not many have checked out. This was during the era when Atlus was a relatively small publisher and developer who helped bring niche games to the West. Thousand Arms stars a blacksmith named Meis and the secret to their family strength is relationships.

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Forming bonds with female party members will help Meis grow as a blacksmith thus allowing players to upgrade and craft better gear. Battles were traditional turn-based affairs but they looked stunning thanks to the 2D presentation and big sprite models.

1 Vagrant Story

A Medieval Metroid-like


Systems

Released
May 15, 2000

Developer(s)
Square

Vagrant Story began as a single game from Squaresoft that was later sort of retconned into Final Fantasy by stating it takes place in Ivalice which is the same location as Final Fantasy Tactics and Final Fantasy 12. Beyond that, there are no real connections so let’s count as it was originally intended, a strong one-off, because even that notion is flimsy at best. The game stars Ashley, a young knight trying to pursue a heretic into some castle ruins.

The presentation style and gameplay are like Parasite Eve and Dungeons & Dragons had a baby. Players will traverse a sprawling castle map akin to a Metroidvania and fight turn-based combat in real-time with players able to move out of range using a spherical grid. The gameplay is challenging but well thought-out but fans came away from this experience high on the political intrigue of the story the most.

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