What Happened to the First Nonlinear Turn Based JRPGs [Metal Max Series]

I actually never played a Metal Max game until the fan translation of Metal Max Returns in 2016 and I instantly fell in love with this adult nonlinear open world turn based JRPG series that I was way too young to play in 1991. What followed was pretty much a marathon of every other Metal Max game I could find in English and total disbelief that the majority of this series went very much unheard of in the west for over 30 years. I made this video to spread the word in the hopes that someday these Japanese games might garner more attention and get the Live A Live treatment in the west.
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What Happened to the First Nonlinear Turn Based Jrpgs [Metal Max Series]
Metal Max Creative Direction and Influences (my other Metal Max video): • Metal Max Is a Dystopi...

[@ciddurand8759]

Its Fallout. From Japan, if the world was more...relaxed. One of the best JRPG series I ever played.

[@gyneve]

Fallout from Japan... if everything in the game got the wild wasteland treatment. 😂

[@RocketSlime]

Metal max As I've always described it as Fo (Post Apocalytic setting with alot of scifi shit) + Ff (True Turned based Side Facing Battles) + Dq (Early Dq with its full open world) + Eb (Modern Weapons & Whacky Humour and Oddness) + Mh (Huntable monster bounties gaining weapons and such from them) then add tons of tank customization and such that's Metal Max in a Nut shell

[@gyneve]

@@RocketSlime Forgive my ignorance, but what does "Eb" stand for?

[@RocketSlime]

@@gyneve earthbound

[@RocketSlime]

@@gyneve aka the Mother Series

[@Aerynolae]

Metal Saga (PS2) was my entry point to this series. I borrowed it from a friend when he finished it and moved on to playing Grandia. I did not expect it to be this good. Played it religiously as a kid: hunted all the bounties, did every minigames, once I learned of it and how to do it, I farmed the hell out of the numbers game in the train casino for money, rigged my Maus with so much firepower but didn't neglect my Merkava and Firetruck... Most memorable time I had with the game was when I finally gunned down that roaming bomber in the first region (using the Gepard iirc, it's been years). That plane was a bane in my back during my treasure hunts. Fun times. Still hoping Cygames would do something with the IP.

[@MrKitsunae]

Finally, someone actually doing a decent overview of this series. Great video.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Thank you.

[@finnthecake8859]

Great overview! If you hate fantasy, than this series is probably one of the best RPGs you'll ever play.

[@TheEdgeOfUnknown]

This was in many ways the first video game series I ever devoted serious time to playing. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for making this video, as after having played through every single installment except for the PS4 one I cannot overstate just how much this series meant and continues to mean to me. ❤

[@juanmacias5922]

I had never heard of this series, thanks for sharing!

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Thank you for leaving a comment on my video!

[@StiffAftermath]

I bought Metal Max Returns, dumped the rom, applied a fan translation and now enjoy it anywhere I please. What a great openworld game 😊

[@maycontainviolence5587]

This looks amazing. 😮 Never heard of this series and now I must play them all. 🎉 Thanks for this vid. Im enjoying your channel. Weaponized dogs? Im so in.

[@污萌螃蟹]

For me, Metal Max 2 Reloaded has almost the same level of freedom gameplay as original Skyrim.

[@RocketSlime]

​@@污萌螃蟹mmr and mm3 too also have insane freedom

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Thank you for leaving a comment!

[@bobobo4555]

It was 20 years ago when I first played this game.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

That was way before me!

[@thomasffrench3639]

Honestly it would be cool to see more people covering NES/Famicom RPGs.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

I'd love to see more people covering those games too!

[@EnzoRoberto]

MM: Wild West lives rent free in my head. I love MM Xeno Reborn, but i cant ignore the lack of towns, npc, story and open world

[@Noelis]

The first experience of Metal Max for was Xeno Reborn which is kinda weird, I liked the lack of plot, just being in the tank and killing stuff - tho it felt something was missing. Nice to know there's more.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Yeah, Metal Max Xeno does capture the Metal Max vibe of tank fighting. It's just... like you said, there's definitely more.

[@mariusamber3237]

Hopefully there's a chance we'd get some remakes of the earlier games in English, with the new owners of the IP. It's a shame we never got them, but frankly, based on the sales numbers, this series was never really 'that' popular and more of a niche even in Japan. It's a shame, because all the numbered entries are fun, especially the bounty hunting process!

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Yeah, you've hit the nail on the head. Even in Japan the series is pretty niche. I think it has so much potential to be huge in the future though with the right treatment.

[@Jasahu_loyal]

nice video bro

[@masadorabasilica2565]

after resurrected allies in metal max 3 nds , my party in battle is forever confused , why?

[@Failedlegend]

sad to see another turn based rpg series switch to the action genre, hopefully their new owners go back to turn based. I loved Metal Saga so ill def try out those fan translations

[@LoopBell]

5:51 yo, wat the dog is doin

[@charlie_nax]

my first experience with the metal max series was way back in the 00's with metal saga for the ps2 and i remember i loved the game, loved to see a early example of a semi open world turn based game and always excited to see how wacky and intimidating the next wanted would be or wander the wasteland to just stumble upon a endgame wanted that rekt me but just looked so cool, that impression lived with me for years and i wish the later entries had better worldbuilding and plot, what i would recommend the current owner of the series would be just remaster metal max reloaded or metal max 2 reloaded and localize it to steam, it would probly do good considering how badly xeno did but how good metal dogs performed critically (because update 5 months after this review, metal dogs still holds a 8x% approval on steam)

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Wow, I didn't realize Metal Dogs was doing that well! That's cool to know. Crea-tech and Cygames could really lean into the dogs as mascots for their next Metal Max game whatever they decide to do with it. Metal Saga is an interesting game. Maybe I was a little too hard on it in this video, but it just felt like a step back for me compared to the numbered flagship games with the tank customization. But yeah, that thrill of just stumbling onto an overpowered wanted enemy way before you're strong enough to fight it is definitely a part of the Metal Max experience!

[@joniden2215]

Considering how Metal Max is about tanks, you'd think they would have released more games in the USA.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

I know right! Americans love that stuff; at least the Americans I know as an American myself.

[@joniden2215]

​@@GaiusIsidoroI'm an American and I love my tanks.

[@ExeErdna]

That was my impression since we had games of that them on the NES. They really dropped the ball especially on Metal Max Returns and 2 on SNES. That would have been BIG over here.

[@yujukiyuuki7203]

Yup metal max is the best game

[@GaiusIsidoro]

It's so good. I just wish more people could play it.

[@mageofjapanbackup]

I really liked Xeno and I found whole drama of Reborn so odd that I played that right after (I found it just awful compared to OG xeno only thing really had going for it was bring back the dog and dungeons that werent all the same) Atm am playing Metal Saga and while it has its flaws I'm still enjoying it during that time I've gotten copies of MMR,MM2R,MM3,MM4,MSDS (I oddly already owned PS4 copy of Metal Dogs from PA sale before I even played Xeno lol) Also there been trailer for new Metal Saga drop so looking forward seeing what that leads to also

[@黑慕]

Can I repost your video？I'll label the source.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Sorry I didn't see your comment until today, but I don't mind at all! The more people that talk about or even just know about Metal Max, especially if we can actually get like a huge influencer or, even better, someone who works at Cygames or Crea-tech to see that there are people in the west that would love to support the developers of these games and buy them. The better it will be for everyone I think.

[@TheDarkEnigma]

With my first metal max being Xeno Reborn (i then played xeno and both have things i prefer, like Xeno having an ACTUAL STORY), but ive not figured out a good way to play the rest. I know emulator is an option but idk.. I kind want to play them as close to og as possible. Seeing them rereleased with an appropriate art style on a console in a collection or something would be great but im not holding out hope...

[@demonking41-l8j]

Considering how unpopular this franchise is on the west, Emulation is the way to go, wether you like it or not. Hell, barely half of these games have fan translations, and you can count the games that made it over here on one hand. All 3 of them.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Yeah, it's a shame there's no easy way to get the original experience in English. There's so many barriers to getting the authentic OG experience, especially if you can't read Japanese.

[@vilvismargots5937]

If any of these gems ever come to the west im buying them day one full price!

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Same!

[@rowanoak_]

SaGa actually predates Metal Max as the first nonlinear turn based RPG, unless there's another series that predates that. afaik, SaGa wrote the book on nonlinear JRPGs.

[@GaiusIsidoro]

I recently made a video on the SaGa series on my channel in which I admittedly didn't lean into the cool nonlinear aspects of the series as much as I should have tbh . SaGa 1 - 3 weren't really that nonlinear as far as I could tell when I played them, although those games do predate the release of Metal Max (and are very fun in their own way imo). That's just my opinion though -- I'm not the authority I just played the games. But Romancing SaGa was definitely nonlinear, and that game was released in 1992, approximately 1 year after Metal Max's 1991 release. I do love the nonlinear aspects of the SaGa series in much the same way I like Metal Max's though, and during my research into Metal Max I also noticed a big overlap with the SaGa series in that there was a good chance that if people loved the SaGa games they also enjoyed Metal Max. I see both series talked about in the same discussions often. I happen to love both series too.

[@codak29]

d0r0

[@GaiusIsidoro]

Uh oh, someone knows my openly secret identity!