What do you consider to be the five best written RPGs?

[Laddy]

Planescape: Torment
A masterpiece of literature and, in my opinion, the greatest example of "high art" in video games.

Baldur's Gate II
Equally funny, epic, disturbing, and heartbreaking, this game is both massive and nuanced in tone, style, and approach.

Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions
The best dialogue in a JRPG that is reminiscent of a Shakespearean drama.

Anachronox
A hilarious fourth-wall breaking sci-fi epic with a disarmingly large amount of heart.

Fallout: New Vegas
A complicated and home-hitting morality system in a realized and living world where every detail, random, and plot point is impeccably written.

[Del Murder]

5. Super Mario World. It is a game I still play to this day and enjoy the trout out of it! It has held up as one of the great Mario titles.

Yes, the Yoshis' struggle being trapped in those eggs and Mario's internal dialogue when he grabbed that feather and took to the skies were especially well done. I also thought Chargin Chuck was an underrated character.

[Galuf]

5. Super Mario World. It is a game I still play to this day and enjoy the trout out of it! It has held up as one of the great Mario titles.

Yes, the Yoshis' struggle being trapped in those eggs and Mario's internal dialogue when he grabbed that feather and took to the skies were especially well done. I also thought Chargin Chuck was an underrated character.

i think maybe he meant mario RPG lol

[Raistlin]

1. Suikoden II -- brilliant story, emotional characters, well-developed plot and world. This game just has it all, story-wise.

2. Final Fantasy Tactics -- There's an argument that this should be #1. A well-developed story of betrayal and tragedy, I could see this story being an actual book.

3. Lunar SSSC -- a more cliche plot than the top ones, but amazingly well-done with great characters and outstanding and often comedic dialogue.

4. Suikoden III -- there are some legitimate complaints with this game, but it can't be disputed that it told an epic story, and the three perspectives were done really well.

I can't think of what game I'd put #5 and I'm tired of thinking about it, so here's some honorable mentions: Final Fantasy VI, Suikoden I, Breath of Fire III

[Del Murder]

I love a well written RPG and not surprisingly I've played most of the ones listed. But I may have to check out Xenosaga, Suikoden III, and Grandia. Are any of them on PSN?

1. Final Fantasy VI - Great characters, great villain, great themes of depression and hope.

2. Final Fantasy Tactics - An excellent take on the 'great man' theory of history and the influence of religion.

3. Chrono Trigger - I love how all the time periods flow from each other, the characters are great too and there are some good twists.

4. The World Ends With You - A surprisingly great story about dealing with death and friendship.

5. Final Fantasy XI - The standard storyline is pretty vanilla, but each of the expansions got better and better and helped build this vast world and cement your character's place in it.

[Wolf Kanno]

This is proving to be pretty difficult for me. While I've got four down, I'm having issues with number 5, as I feel there are some great contenders but not one that I'm as content with as the other four. I'll keep dwelling on this for a moment.

[Wolf Kanno]

W~Post!

It was hard to come up with five entries, four of them were pretty easy but number five became a bit more difficult because the field was pretty big with several strong contenders. I will probably do a few honorary mentions.

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Chrono Trigger - While CT is not exactly some great literature and more of a simple adventure tale, it accomplishes something that is pretty difficult to do in writing in general, let alone game writing: Write a story that is equally appealing to children and adults. The game is simple and colorful enough to keep kids glued to the screen but offers enough mature subtext and deeper story elements to make adults give it a second glance. It does for games what Pixar has done with family movies, make a game whose story can be appreciated by the whole audience. Barring the grandfather paradox plothole, CT's world has a level of consistency that many games to lack, with each time period being it's own self contained story while all of them feeding into the game's overall narrative and battle with Lavos. Lavos itself is an interesting villain not often done so well in the medium. Lavos truly defines "alien" being presented as something beyond our comprehension as opposed to typical aliens of the genre who have too many human characteristics that they become relatable. The cast is also very strong with all of the characters getting good time spent developing them and even NPCs are so colorful that they remain memorable. Overall it's just fun.

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Final Fantasy Tactics - While my love for the genre of Turn-Based Tactical RPG has waned in the last few years, it hasn't stopped me from popping this game back into the console and doing a new playthrough. Largely because I find Ramza and Delita's story to be so damn compelling. Watching their trials and tribulations as one falls from grace to maintain his ideals while the other "sells his soul" to the political machine in order to build his ideal world. The political machinations are fun and the story creates an interesting moral drama set to an interesting political story of seizing power. Despite the game eventually having you fight real demons, I always loved the contrast of how monstrous the humans themselves are, being no different from the Lucavi. The fact the story doesn't necessarily hold back punches on the unfair nature of life was a real breath of fresh air in 97. The game has strong and mature characters and deals with idealism and heritage in a more "realistic" setting than the usual idealistic mold of the genre. If I was to hold the whole franchise together, Ramza is easily the best written protagonist to grace the series.

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Suikoden V - Bold choice for me considering how much love Suikoden II gets but after replaying the whole series recently, I honestly feel Suikoden V has one of the best stories in the franchise. Partly because the game does a better job of really setting up the conflict and making you emotionally invested in the characters and plight of Falena as opposed to learning as you go like the other entries. The political conflict is also done in a way not often seen in the JRPG world with the monarchy torn apart by political movements within and the monarchy being held hostage to doing what is right but also not egging the conflict on more. While the True Runes play a strong role in the story, it takes it's cues from SII by being more of a plot device to spur on the court intrigue as opposed to being the driving force of the entire story like other Suikoden games. The title may suffer from being hit with the anime clich stick a bit too hard, resulting in garish costumes, stripperific females, and eccentric being the norm, but the characters are all strong and the conflict is often treated maturely with only a hanful of character being purely good or evil. Basically it's a really well thought out political drama that would feel like something read in history if it didn't involve talking Beavers, using ancient ruins to obtain magical doomsday weapons, and a strategist who is the very definition of Mary Tzu.

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Persona 3 - I was conflicted with choosing this game over the Persona 2 Duology. I decided that P2 might be a bit too campy at times and that P3 did a better job really connecting all of its themes together. P3's main theme is Memento Mori, which roughly translates to "remember you are mortal" and serves as a basis about making the most of every day because you never know when you're going to die. Isn't that a happy thought? This translates into the gameplay as the day to day scenario where you actually live each day, sometimes doing the same monotonous things which is incredibly meta as I'm sure most human beings can relate. This also translates to how you can't really go back on the choices you make, meaning you'll miss that stat upgrade by not studying or miss out on completing a side quest because you chose to hang out with Mitsuru instead of Kenji and now you don't have the time to complete his quest. This theme in the gameplay really hits home in the last few months when you realize your choices may have helped or hindered your progress. This pacing also works really well to experience the cast in a way not seen too often in gaming or even other storytelling medium. You get to see them as everyday people who go one with their boring lives just like you instead of jumping from one high point to another as though every moment in a person's life is exciting. This ends up making the exciting moments of the game have more bite and energy to them as you drop from mundane day-to-day nonsense to the deeper plot. Even just minor events become highlights as they break up the monotony of living this virtual life.

The human cast also receive really strong character growth throughout the piece as you watch Yukari and Mitsuru go from a cold and non-trusting relationship built on jealousy and guilt to a closer almost sisterly bond that literally takes close to 40 hours to get to with lots of soul searching in-between. Junpei goes from liking his place in the story, to questioning his purpose in life, to finding love, losing it and and in doing so grows enough to find a purpose for himself that isn't weighed down by childish idealism. Ken and Shinji have a fairly dark story of revenge and guilt that ends more poignantly and with a better message than Hope and Snow from XIII could hope for, and again it plays into the theme of how our choices can't ever be unmade. The theme of irreversible choice is felt in the game's Social Links which help to ground the player into the world beyond the story and see the world as more than a crazy place where creepy things happen but again, reinforce the idea of living day-to-day in a normal world. The contrast between the daily life of a student to dealing with the party drama, to facing death against the Eldritch horror that is encroaching on the story is a stark contrast that helps you to appreciate the world and characters in more of a big picture sort of way as opposed to just doing it for the people you like. The theme of death and irreversible fate is powerful and ultimately tells us to simply make the best choices we can in life and to surround ourselves with people we care about because in the end, it's all that we really have to say about our life. What I guess I'm trying to say in this rambling run-off sentence is that you should go play Persona 3.

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Xenogears - I can't think of a game that has had more personal impact on my life and views than this game. It's what I get for playing it during my impressionable years but I wish there were more games that were as ambitious and tackled as many mature themes as this game does. Also the world needs more giant kung-fu robots because smurf Yeah. Gears works well because you don't realize how crazy it all is until it's too late, you're invested and then it sometimes gently and other times violently takes you down the rabbit hole of deeper themes of religion, man's relation with God, identity, guilt and how to deal with it, losing your faith, genetic engineering, reincarnation and the deeper implications of our actions over the course of history. Fei is easily one of my favorite protagonists of all time, not just because his story is so fascinating but also because I've never had a character make me go through the full gambit of emotion like he does. You'll feel for him, hate him, love him, and root for him over the course of the entire game. The other cast members are also well rounded and interesting without being too corny or cliche most of the time barring a Chu-Chu from time to time. While the story remains incomplete and certain character arcs are cut painfully short due to the game's troubled production, the main themes and overarching story is beautifully told as you experience the life of Fei and all his incarnations over 10,000 years of history to fulfill a deal he made with God. What is also interesting about Gears is that it deals with the subject of God and religion in a more mature, and frankly less antagonistic way than most JRPGs. Using Gnosticism, Christianity, and Buddhism to tell a story that is both personal for its main character but has repercussions that go beyond the simple characters. Gears may not be perfect, but it reached for the stars and tried to push the genre into a more mature and respectable field in terms of writing than most games of it's time. This is the reason why people still talk about this game, because sometimes a game's impact is more than just sales.

Honorary Mentions:

Lunar Silver Star Story
Vagrant Story
FFTactics Advance
Chrono Cross
Persona 2 Duology
Suikoden II
Wild ARMS 2nd Ignition
Suikoden III
Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter
Xenosaga Episode I and III, and Pied Piper
Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne

[blackmage_nuke]

Off the top of my head list:

Final Fantasy VI - for all the reasons already stated above
Undertale - I laughed, I cried, I want to play again but don't want to erase my save
Chrono Trigger - Great way to do multiple endings only need 2 playthroughs to see everything
Seiken Densetsu III - love how the other characters are just doing their own thing if you don't pick them and pop up every now and then.
Legend of Legaia - I dunno probably nostalgia tinted glasses with this one.