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The best JRPGs on PS5

Luis Abrines Updated 14 min read Prices checked 1 h ago
The best JRPGs on PS5

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"Which JRPG should I get on PS5?" is almost never a question about quality. Every one of the seventeen games below is good, and you will still bounce off half of them, because what decides whether you finish a hundred-hour Japanese role-playing game is rarely the story or the art. It is whether you enjoy the fight you are going to repeat a thousand times.

So the list below is sorted by combat rather than by score. These are the PS5 JRPGs we have live seller prices for, grouped by what the battles actually feel like, with a price column that moves as the shops move.

A caveat on the ratings: Steam only holds reviews for the PC version of these games, so every Steam verdict quoted here comes from the PC release. Read it as a general quality signal rather than as a verdict on the PS5 build.

What kind of fight do you actually want?

Answer that first and the shortlist gets very short very quickly. Here is the whole page in one table: the combat system, how the same game is rated on PC, and the live price on PS5.

GameCombatSteam verdict (PC version)Price on PS5
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33Turn-based with real-time parriesOverwhelmingly Positive · 180,000+ reviews11.52
Metaphor: ReFantazioTurn-basedVery Positive · 24,000+ reviews21.40
Persona 5 RoyalTurn-basedOverwhelmingly Positive · 90,000+ reviews15.53 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Persona 3 ReloadTurn-basedVery Positive · 42,000+ reviews14.27 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Final Fantasy VII Remake IntergradeAction with tactical pauseVery Positive · 42,000+ reviews10.49 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Final Fantasy VII RebirthAction with tactical pauseMostly Positive · 24,000+ reviews14.54 (with coupon SEPGOC10)
Final Fantasy XVIPure actionMostly Positive · 23,000+ reviews9.47
Granblue Fantasy: RelinkCo-op actionVery Positive · 40,000+ reviews26.87 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Wo Long: Fallen DynastyAction built on deflectionMixed · 20,000+ reviews18.47 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Fate/Samurai RemnantMusou-style actionVery Positive · 5,000+ reviews26.87 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Like a Dragon: Infinite WealthTurn-basedVery Positive · 16,000+ reviews7.96
Like a Dragon GaidenPure actionOverwhelmingly Positive · 9,000+ reviews33.59 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in HawaiiPure actionVery Positive · 6,400+ reviews11.91
OCTOPATH TRAVELER IITurn-basedVery Positive · 13,000+ reviews14.69 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Sea of StarsTurn-based with timed hitsVery Positive · 11,900+ reviews23.51 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Trails in the Sky 1st ChapterTurn-basedOverwhelmingly Positive · 4,300+ reviews19.73 (with coupon Gocdkeys)
Tactics Ogre: RebornTactics on a gridMostly Positive · 4,000+ reviews8.56 (with coupon Gocdkeys)

The four that define the genre right now

If you have not touched a JRPG in a decade and want to know why everyone is talking about them again, start here. Four turn-based games, all of them enormous, and between them they explain most of the genre's current run of form.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 — the one that broke out

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, from Sandfall Interactive, carries Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam with more than 180,000 reviews and a 90 on Metacritic: the strongest combination on this page by a distance. Turn-based, but with real-time parries and dodges on every enemy attack, so you never get to look away. It also has more shops selling it than anything else in this group, which usually means the best price.

Metaphor: ReFantazio — the newest from the Persona team

Metaphor: ReFantazio, by ATLUS. Very Positive with more than 24,000 reviews and a 92 on Metacritic. Same calendar-and-social structure that made Persona famous, moved into fantasy, and slightly friendlier to newcomers because you are not also learning a Japanese school year.

Persona 5 Royal — still the reference

Persona 5 Royal, also ATLUS. Overwhelmingly Positive with more than 90,000 reviews and a 94 on Metacritic for this PS5 version. If you only ever play one game from this page, the consensus still points here, with one warning: it is the longest commitment on the list.

Persona 3 Reload — the shorter way in

Persona 3 Reload. Overwhelmingly Positive with more than 42,000 reviews and an 89 on Metacritic. A full remake of the game that invented the formula, and noticeably tighter than Royal. The sensible first Persona if a hundred hours sounds like a threat rather than a promise.

The prices below already have each shop's own coupon deducted, so our order will not always match what a store shows on its own page.

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Final Fantasy, put in order

Three games with the same name on the box and almost nothing in common underneath. The usual mistake here is buying by the number in the title instead of by how it plays.

Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade — where the remake starts

Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade, Square Enix. Very Positive with more than 42,000 reviews. Action combat with a tactical pause that slows everything down when you open the command menu, which is the compromise that keeps both camps reasonably happy. This is chapter one: do not start with the sequel.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth — the middle chapter, and the biggest

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Mostly Positive with more than 24,000 reviews, a step down from the first part, and worth understanding before you buy: the criticism is almost entirely about the volume of side activities, not the combat, which most people consider better than Remake's.

Final Fantasy XVI — the one with no turns at all

Final Fantasy XVI. Mostly Positive with more than 23,000 reviews, and the most divisive entry on this page, for one reason: there is no party management and no menu-driven combat. It is a straight action game with a Final Fantasy story attached. It also has the most shops selling it of the three, so it is usually the cheapest way into the modern series.

What if turns are not your thing?

Three games that keep the Japanese role-playing structure — parties, gear, long stories — and throw out the menus.

Granblue Fantasy: Relink — the co-op one

Granblue Fantasy: Relink, by Cygames. Very Positive with more than 40,000 reviews. Short missions, a huge roster and a loop built to be played with other people, which makes it the odd one out on a page full of solitary hundred-hour campaigns.

Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty — read the verdict before you buy

Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, KOEI TECMO. A 79 on Metacritic but a Mixed verdict from more than 20,000 Steam reviews, and that gap is the useful information: it is a deflection-based action game in the Nioh mould, punishing on its own terms, and most of the negative reviews come from people who expected something gentler.

Fate/Samurai Remnant — the crowd-clearing one

Fate/Samurai Remnant, also KOEI TECMO. Very Positive with more than 5,000 reviews and an 80 on Metacritic. Closer to a musou than to a role-playing game in the moment-to-moment, with a proper story around it. The relaxed pick of this group.

Like a Dragon: the way in is not the one you think

The series that turned itself from a brawler into a turn-based role-playing game halfway through, which is why the entry point matters more here than anywhere else on the page.

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth — the big turn-based one

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, RGG Studio. Very Positive with more than 16,000 reviews and an 89 on Metacritic. Full turn-based combat, two cities, and an amount of side content that would be a whole game elsewhere.

Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name — the short one

Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name. Overwhelmingly Positive with more than 9,000 reviews and the best review ratio of the three. Real-time brawling, a fraction of the length, and the cheapest honest test of whether this series is for you.

Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii — the silly one, and it means it

Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii. Very Positive with more than 6,400 reviews and an 81 on Metacritic. Action combat again, a ship, and no requirement to have played anything else first.

One of the longest seller lists on the page, again with every coupon already deducted.

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Classic turns, pixels and HD-2D

The group people underestimate. Smaller games, smaller prices, and the ones most likely to actually get finished.

Octopath Traveler II — the beautiful one

OCTOPATH TRAVELER II, Square Enix. Very Positive with more than 13,000 reviews. Eight protagonists, HD-2D art that still has no real competition, and a combat system built around breaking enemy defences on the right turn.

Sea of Stars — the one to start with

Sea of Stars, Sabotage Studio. Very Positive with more than 11,900 reviews and an 87 on Metacritic. Turn-based with timed hits, no random encounters, no grinding, and short enough to finish. If someone has never played a JRPG, this is the one to hand them.

Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter — the start of the long saga

Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter, Nihon Falcom. Overwhelmingly Positive with more than 4,300 reviews and an 89 on Metacritic. The opening of the densest continuity in the genre. Start here or do not start at all.

Tactics Ogre: Reborn — the one on a grid

Tactics Ogre: Reborn, Square Enix. Mostly Positive with more than 4,000 reviews and an 84 on Metacritic. Tactical combat on a grid rather than a party facing a line of enemies, and a political story that treats you as an adult. Different genre in practice; same shelf.

If you only want one line out of all this: Sea of Stars if you have never played one, Persona 3 Reload if you want the full Persona experience without the longest version of it, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 if you want the game everybody is arguing about, and Final Fantasy XVI if the menus are what put you off in the first place.

When you have decided, you can buy Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 key or buy Final Fantasy XVI key straight from the seller list, with each shop's coupon already deducted.

Luis Abrines
Luis Abrines

I have been a gamer for as long as I can remember, and for the last 14 years I have been making life easier for other gamers. CEO and co-founder of Gocdkeys.

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