Which rpg is the most outlandish about what they say young people can do.

[KoShiatar]

I think it's Yoshi's Island. Who thinks a newborn baby could ride a dragon like that for all that time while shaughtering monsters, avoiding traps and running from an evil wizard?

[(CECIL120X]

palom and porom are young and still can do the best spells and more efficentlly than anyone in the game on ff4. i go with the other dude about the little baby mario brothers. this doesn't just happen in games it also happens in comic books too but yet again there comic books.

[Zeromus_X]

I'm pretty sure it was Yoshi that was in control...

[Gnostic Yevon]

Relm.

Killing people by drawing pictures of them is pretty good for a little girl.

[darkchrono]

Xenosaga is a game where I think they did a good job of not making the characters too young. The only character in Xenosaga who seems just a bit too young to do what she is doing would probably be Shion.

The rest of the characters ages were done pretty well I would say in that game

[Vermachtnis]

Pokémon, you have this, what is he/she like 12, 13, 14, over throwing entire crime syndacites and doing tasks adults can not accomplish. I remember reading the statue back in the Red/Blue days and only seeing the rival and my name.
On a less serious note, you have these freakin animals that just popped outta there eggs two days ago taking on the elitest fighters in the land, I mean WTF.

Or the Baby Brothers, they took down the 1337 H3mm3r Br0z all by them selves.

[Elhaym]

In most cases I never found it odd that RPG heroes could do the things that they do. Generally you don't play some completely run of the mill kid in RPGs, you play an exceptionally talented, exceedingly determined individual who probably has some sort of power that is strange even by their own world's standards =P Maria from Xenogears, for example, isn't a normal child at all. I don't want to spoil anything, but if you've played the game you'll know why.

Talent is talent, and I never found it strange that somebody with that sort of talent could save the world in RPGs just as I don't find it strange that, in real life, there's probably plenty of child prodigies out there that are well beyond the aptitude of many adults at certain things. I guess there are some exceptions, such as Justin from Grandia who is...basically just a normal kid, but generally RPG heroes aren't exactly run of the mill children.

What I find stranger than kids being able to save the world in RPGs, though, is them being able to take the mental strain of such a burden. I mean basically if the kids fail, then the world is completely doomed. At that sort of age I couldn't even fathom that sort of burden, it'd simply be too big. I'd be terrified. There's no way that as a kid, even if I had RPG hero-esque powers, I'd be able to handle that sort of pressure. Heck I doubt I could handle it now ^_~ Yet most RPG heroes swallow it without so much as a second thought. I always found them having that much courage to be stranger than them having any amount of strength, personally ^_^

[darkchrono]

Yeah since the biggest age range who usually plays rpg's is usually between the ages of 10-21 (meaning that the majority are probably going to be about 15 or 16) they want to create characters that will make people who are playing the game feel good about themselves.

And creating characters who are young but have the maturity and the physical prowess of probably somebody twice their age would adhere to the people playing the game much more than to actually have teenage characters in the game act how teenage characters act in real life.

I think this also might have something to do with why people who are in their late teens or early twenties tend to lose interest in rpg's because they instead start viewing the young characters in the games as being silly and unrealistic instead of thought provoking.

Yes people of that age tend to get busy with other things and do not play video games as much in general. But I think people tend to lose interest in rpg's a little quicker than they do other genres.

[Azure Chrysanthemum]

If you play Dungeons and Dragons, you'll note that most people like to start their characters at the minimum adventuring age (16 for humans) because it doesn't make sense for an older character to not be a higher level, unless you employ the artificial level drain technique which is kind of cheesy but can work in a pinch.

Basically, a level 1 character doesn't have a whole lot of experience in combat or spells, and that's how most of your characters start out. It'd make far more sense for an older character to have more advanced magic and better weapon abilities, which is why you tend to get them later on in the game and they DO come with such things.

[darkchrono]

Really? I never played Dungeons and Dragons and am not familiar with how it's character set-up system works. Does Dungeons and Dragons allow you to pick how old your character is as well. And people in their teens in general were the most popular age to start out with.

Since present day rpg's kind of derived from Dungeons and Dragons I guess it would make sense for them to kind of have the same basis for their characters as D&D did.

But for people not familar with the Dungeons and Dragons system it makes the present day system seem a bit awkward.

[Azure Chrysanthemum]

In Dungeons and Dragons you can pick an age, although you do get stat bonuses and penalties for picking a really high age and making an old character start at level 1 really doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Although with the D20 Modern system they've made it so that PCs, in order to have a reasonable starting occupation, need to be somewhat older. But typically a high fantasy adventuring party will have a bunch of sixteen year olds.

And yes, as the modern RPG is based off the D&D system, I think it stands to reason that the characters are usually younger.

[Vivi123]

All Characters under 10 in Final Fantasy.

FF6: Relm
FF9: Vivi, Eiko

[Vyk]

People lose interest in those RPGs as they grow up, becuase the RPGs themselves don't grow up with them. I'm in my 20's and I don't really care for the next RPG I play to be yet another "coming of age" story. Probably one (of many) of the reasons I liked FF7, your character is older and more mature. I won't say its more realistic, but it's certainly more reasonable, considering the task at hand. Xenogears had older characters. The Baldur's Gate games had older characters. KOTOR games had older characters. All stellar games. I'm tired of playing as little kids, or rather, unrealistic little kids. If I play another game with some punk teenager, he needs to still be wet behind the ears and I'll train the brat into some gritty old man (a la Fable). Or something...

As for the topic... Isn't FF3j the pennicle of this? You have four todlers chosen by fate to save the world

[Zeromus_X]

I think that they're teenagers. Well, they most definitely are in Amano's artwork.

[darkchrono]

The characters in ff7 are still pretty darn young as well to be doing what their doing. Just not as young as what most rpg's have.

If the games were having their ages be realistic the very youngest people in your group would probably be in their mid to late twenties.

Any younger then that and they wouldn't have the maturity (and in alot of cases the physical strength) to pull off the task at hand.

And the wise advice givers would be in their 40's and 50's instead of their late twenties or early 30's like many rpg's have them.