RPGMaker is my lowest tier when it comes to JRPGs. I don’t hate that the engine exists – far from it. If you’re new to game development, it’s probably one of the best that exist simply because the barrier to entry is so low.
Anyone – even kids – can make a decent JRPG with RPGMaker.
But that’s a double-edged sword. Because anyone can use RPGMaker, a whole lot of low effort crap gets made that litters Steam. Many people do the bare minimum with RPGMaker and then try to sell it.
However, it’s also worth mentioning that this wasn’t always the case. At one time, if you were a PC gaming JRPG fan, RPGMaker was like mana from heaven. There weren’t a whole lot of JRPGs on PC – never mind cheap ones – so suddenly being able to try out so many fan-made productions was amazing.
When I returned to PC gaming, one of the first RPGMaker titles I tried was Destiny Warriors. In terms of story, it wasn’t much to write home about. It’s pretty much just Naruto, if you’re familiar with that anime.
Yet it had good artwork and was decently challenging. At the time, I had an itch for 16 bit-style JRPGs, this one was on sale for less than a dollar – it gave me 12+ hours of gameplay. Not going to lie, I got a lot of value out of Destiny Warriors.
Even though this game has mixed reviews on Steam, I’m glad this was my intro RPGMaker because I had legitimate fun. Sure, I’ve played much better RPGMaker games, but most of them have been worse.
All this is to say that sometimes D tier has its good points.
