When it comes to anime-based games, the West does not receive a majority of them. That’s because licensing out these properties overseas has a lot of issues tied to the process. That’s one reason but there are others as well such as popularity.
If an anime like Dragon Ball Z wasn’t popular in the West, its video games would have less likely of a chance to get localized in the West. The games that do come over tend to mostly be fighting games. That being said, there are plenty of other genres often ignored like RPGs. What has and hasn’t released in North America worth looking into for the RPG enthusiast out there?
10 Attack On Titan
Attack on Titan is an action RPG that hit consoles such as the PS4 in 2016. It was made by the Dynasty Warriors team over at Omega Force who has made several other anime spinoffs. This is their best anime tie-in game though as it perfectly emulates the feeling of whipping around titans at full speed.
It covers the first season of the anime and a little bit of the second. It received two sequels that go further than this but this original is still the best.
9 Dragon Ball Z: Attack Of The Saiyans
There have been many RPGs in this long-running anime series. Dragon Ball Z: Attack of the Saiyans is one of the more obscure and forgotten titles from the DS era but it should be remembered. As the name suggests it takes place around the Saiyan saga. It is a turn-based RPG with excellent sprite work. It’s a little simple for an RPG but still good as a Dragon Ball game.
8 Digimon Adventure
Digimon Adventure was a Japanese exclusive PSP release. It covers the first season of the anime pretty faithfully. This is unlike most Digimon games which tend to focus on original characters for those games and those games only. That’s why this turn-based RPG is so special.
While it never officially made it to the West the good news is that it has been fully translated into English by fans.
7 Yo-kai Watch
Yo-kai Watch first started on the 3DS. Plain and simple it is a Pokemon clone. Instead of catching monsters, players instead befriend ghosts. This series was started by Level-5 who rolled out a media blitz to promote the game with an anime, toys, and so on.
The difference between this and Pokemon is that the Yo-kai Watch game and anime are more closely related as far as characters and the art style go. Most games have come out over here but there are still some trapped in Japan.
6 Fullmetal Alchemist: Stray Rondo
Fullmetal Alchemist: Stray Rondo is another turn-based RPG but this time for the Game Boy Advance. It starts out by following the first few episodes of the anime before branching off into original content. It also received a sequel called Fullmetal Alchemist: Sonata of Memories. Both of these games were exclusive to Japan but thankfully they two have received English fan patches.
5 Bleach: The 3rd Phantom
Bleach: The 3rd Phantom is a DS tactical RPG. Players get to command Ichigo and a vast number of other iconic characters from the anime in order fight off the growing army of Hollows. It is mostly an original game with a few nods to the anime as well.
It’s unique in that most Bleach titles are fighting games. Unfortunately this game is hard to find physically now as is the Dragon Ball Z RPG.
4 Shaman King: Master Of Spirits
Shaman King: Master of Spirits is a Konami made action RPG for the GBA. It is very much a clone of the Castlevania GBA games such as Aria of Sorrow. Fight enemies, level up, equip gear, and steal their abilities.
This game and its sequel are certainly not as good as the main series it is trying to emulate. However, both prove to be good tie-in games for Shaman King as well as decent Metroidvanias on their own.
3 Mobile Suit Gundam Age
Mobile Suit Gundam Age released for the PSP in two versions. Both games are almost identical except for the story so it’s a bit more elaborate than the Pokemon games. It’s another Level-5 joint, but only in Japan.
There are no complete fan translations for either of these games. There are some that patch menus in order to make this action RPG more playable but there is still a lot of work to do. It’s still worth checking out as a great game about mechs.
2 Super Robot Wars T
Super Robot Wars is a huge franchise in Japan with little to no releases to speak of in the West. They are strategy RPGs that crossover tons of anime like Gundam. That’s up until now when it was announced the next game would get an official English translation.
Curious mech fans can check out Super Robot Wars T while they wait for the new game. The Switch and PS4 version didn’t officially release over here, but the Asian version of the game does have English subtitles.
1 Heroes Phantasia
Heroes Phantasia is another crossover RPG but one that's more traditional. The anime series included may be a bit obscure to some that didn’t thrive in the early 90s and 2000s. These anime include Sgt. Frog, Slayers, Blood+, and many others. The battle system is turn-based, a lot like Valkyria Profile, with each character mapped to a button.
It was for the PSP and was only released in Japan. There are patches finished yet. It’s a really gorgeous game with lavish hand-drawn character sprites so it’s a shame it never came to the West.