[[2026 Games]] ## 2026-01-03 **Rogue Galaxy** is so strange to me. I know so many people who remember this game fondly, with some calling it a top ten [[PlayStation 2]] [[JRPG]]. Why? I’m not asking because I don’t think it’s a good game — though, hang on, we’ll get to that — I’m asking because I don’t think it’d be most people’s favorite game. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug, maybe? The reason I say this is because I think **Rogue Galaxy** is not much of a [[JRPG]] at all. And if it is, it’s a very bad one. I’m about 9 hours into it right now, finally getting over the bump in Rosencaster Prison that stopped me from getting through it so many years ago. And I’m not seeing a JRPG here. The characters barely exist, and hours have gone by where no dialog happens at all, outside of the admittedly cool incidental talking that happens as you move through the world, which was novel for 2007. >[!INFO]- Fun fact > If you leave the game running for 6 hours the party basically says that you should stop playing for a while and go touch grass. I’ve been running the game off of a very long save state so that caught me by surprise, lmfao. There isn’t much of a plot to speak of, and what’s there isn’t exactly **Nier** territory either. So if the JRPG trappings aren’t really there, and the plot isn’t captivating, then what are we doing here? My friends: the answer is some good old fashioned, grindy, monotonous, egregious, motherfucking ***DUNGEON CRAWLING*** BABY!!! I am baffled by the status **Rogue Galaxy** has as a sleeper hit because it is a game for sickos. It is a 3/7 JRPG hiding a 6/7 Dungeon Crawler under its trench coat. All you do in this game is fight down long corridors until you hit the next plot point about once every hour and thirty minutes. That’s it. Yeah, there’s insectron and I believe some factory minigame later, but the core loop is just killing shit and leveling up. And the craziest part is, even the combat aspect *isn’t super great either*! The moment-to-moment gameplay leaves a little to be desired! It’s a very clunky, unrefined version of what **Final Fantasy VII Remake** would perfect nearly 20 years later. Your next question might be, “okay bro, so why are you still playing this game? Why are you 10 hours in?” And the answer hinges on the thing [[Level 5]] has always been good at, regardless of how mediocre one of their games might be overall: their progression systems. The weapon leveling and fusion system of **Rogue Galaxy** is so damn addictive to me it’s almost stupid. I love maxing out weapons and slamming them together like I did with my transformers as a toddler. I love it so much I sometimes wish the already high encounter rate was a little higher, so I could do it more, faster. I love finding random items and putting them on my party’s poor excuse for [[Final Fantasy XII]]’s license board, because apparently picking up a gecko’s tail is the reason Jaster can finally increase his defense stat. None of it makes any sense, but it all clicks together for me in the same way **Grandia Xtreme** does. In fact, these two games are very similar to me, in the sense that they’re both terrible JRPGs that are fantastic dungeon crawling games. I don’t know how anyone could have loved **Rogue Galaxy** in 2007, when second-screening wasn’t a thing. But goddamn if I don’t love it now, ripping through it on one monitor while **Make Some Noise** plays on the other. I realize these thoughts sound almost like negging, but I promise I mean every word. Even now, typing this, I’m itching to go back in and see what fucked up little sword I can make next. I might get tired of it eventually, but this mediocre-ass game was made for my brand of brain worms.