Suikoden is decidedly old school in terms of telling a story, and its more like DQ and early FF than the PS1 RPG genre. It uses a ton of cliches: rebels vs. empire; elves, dwarfs and kobolds; forbidden magic, "chosen hero of destiny", and some of the most narm inducing drama to ever grace an RPG outside of Revelations: Persona. That's not to say the plot doesn't have its strong moments or surprising twists, but if you're an RPG veteran, there is very little in Suikoden's plot that is going to surprise you (the final battle/ending might) let alone escape that sense of "been there, done that". It's a fairly typical fantasy story with some political overtones. The later entries tend to downplay the fantasy elements in favor of focusing on stronger and more dramatic political story telling, which was the better route if you ask me. Still, McDohl's story concerning the True Rune is still one of the better ones in the franchise since the True Runes are usually treated as simple plot devices to start conflicts in the later games and the focus is more political than dealing with magic artifacts that grant demi-god status.

It's big strength is the massive cast and the games clever use of Chrono Trigger's Dual/triple techs so the game gives you major incentive to play around with your party and discover combo attacks. Runes use an FF1/D&D style with different tiers of power and limited casting of each tier of spell so there is some strong item/resource management going on. Deeper customization systems come later in the series but Suikoden 1 is pretty straight about it. Basically think of Suikoden as a really snazzy looking 16-bit RPG. There are some clever gameplay elements, the duels were a novel idea and play a large role in some of the more dramatic moments of the game, war battles are simple, and somewhat based more on luck than I would care for, but I still prefer them over Suikoden 2's system(my least favorite), though I feel Suikoden V has hands down the best army battles in the series. Also, the sheer challenge of getting all 108 stars is more than most of the franchise has tried (though Suikoden V is a close second) as it's very easy to lose story characters through events in the game, and it's very easy to have story characters killed in the war battles (Maximilian is the best example) so trying to get the true ending is a nice challenge. The castle building system itself is a very novel idea though Suikoden 2's castle is still the best in the series imho.

The big thing about Suikoden 1 is that the rest of the series refers back to it and a lot of the emotion in Suikoden II is lost on people who didn't play S1, so its kind of important to play it to understand what is going on when people mention the Toran Republic, or the Harmonia Empire's dealings with the Scarlet Moon Kingdom. A near third of the cast returns in Suikoden 2 and S2 doesn't bother in the slightest to recap their backstories. Seriously, the excitement of seeing Victor and Flik is lost on people who didn't play the first game, not to mention Futch's story. Hell the entire sidequest involving Clyde only unlocks in S2 if you did a minor thing in S1. You really miss out on some of Suikoden 2's most heart wrenching scenes if you don't recruit McDohl. No one who has played both cannot tell me you're heart didn't sink a little when McDohl reunites with Sakura and they discuss the effects of the True Rune's curse and her feelings for him. S1 and S2 are so ingrained with each other for me, it's difficult to talk about one without bringing up the other. The later entries are a bit better about this but one of the most amusing thing about the series is paying attention to name dropping as Suikoden 1 actually mentions the conflict with the nation that is the focal point in the next game, just as Suikoden 2 brings brings up the first taste of the Grasslands where Suikoden III takes place. Really, after playing the new entry, you almost want to play the old entry to discover if they referenced events. The entire plot of Suikoden V is based on the biography info you pick up on Georg Prime in Suikoden II. Suikoden IV brings up references o conflicts mentioned in passing books from Suikoden 1 about the Scarlet Moon Empires history.

It's the cohesive world that the numbered Suikoden games have built that makes the series so freaking awesome. Suikoden I has not aged well compared to the glorious Suikoden II or the underrated and groundbreaking Suikoden III but it's still a decent RPG romp that sets up one of the best and overlooked RPG franchises in gaming history.