Inspired by Anand's 'choose your top 5' roundtable, I am curious to find out your opinion on another topic dear to my heart: what are your top 5 non-Square Enix RPGs on Nintendo systems? I decided to make it non-Square Enix to avoid the Chrono Triggers, Final Fantasies, and Dragon Quests that will surely pop up on many lists.

I'm still thinking about my list. It definitely has Xenoblade, Earthbound, perhaps Breath of Fire II. Maybe Last Story? I'm going to need a Pokemon game on there too (and a Mario RPG, for sure). There's also Tales of Symphonia, Baten Kaitos, Skies of Arcadia Legends...

Note: I'm considering strategy RPGs a different genre, so Fire Emblem won't be on my list.

I'll give it some thought; in the mean time, what about you?

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Y'know, I thought about putting Phantasy Star Online and Phantasy Star Zero in my list. I really enjoyed them both. But do they really count as RPGs?

@GameDadGrant

Good point. PSO was close to cracking my list. Still love that game.

This thread is making me realize just how few non-square RPGs on Nintendo consoles I've actually played.

1. Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga - Close behind Mario RPG as my favorite Mario RPG ever. The best writing in the series IMO, the best battle system (maybe in any RPG...so much fun), some of the best music (same composer as Mario RPG I believe?), GREAT animations that IMO add way more charm than the sprites in the Paper Mario games. A fun story with fun little twists. Maybe the only game that truly, truly made me feel like Mario and Luigi are actually brothers.
2. Pokemon Black - I didn't really know which game in the series to put on here. I almost put Heart Gold, but I remember being a little disappointed with certain things in the game - notably its slow pace compared to Black. I was surprised I had so much fun with Pokemon Black, and given the fact that it's still so similar to the other games in the series, I had to put it at the top. Blue will always have my heart in terms of nostalgia though. I still don't think you can really beat those first 151 Pokemon. Too classic.
3. Radiant Historia: A great game that probably was better in theory than in execution, but still a really cool game. Only main complaint was that the game was too, too long.
4. Tales of Symphonia - I liked ToS. I didn't think it was Earth shatteringly awesome, but I had fun times with it during the week I got my wisdom teeth removed.

Not really sure what else...I guess you can throw on another Pokemon game, or maybe a 2D Castlevania if we count some of the later games in the series.

I probably should have looked at the lists of others before posting, that may have given me some ideas.

Let's see, I never played Baten Kaitos, Skies of Arcadia, Lufia, Radiant Historia, ToS 2, or Breath of Fire, so those are out.

I recall trying the first Golden Sun and really not liking it, so that series is also out. Paper Mario games have never done anything for me, they're too simple and the writing is tedious, so they won't be on my list. Pokémon games are decent, but I've never liked any of them enough to consider them my top anything.

I think I need to play some of the other choices before I can pick a fifth

Tales of Symphonia. Xenoblade. Skies of Arcadia. Contact. Baten Kaitos.

Oh yeah, Golden Sun! I know people dog that game for being too formulaic but I still loved it. Its sequel was great too but I remember the story being confusing, and some of the objectives being too obtuse (I remember walking around for a WHILE a couple times in the game just figuring out what I was supposed to do). Loved the battle system, minus the lack of auto-targeting.

Damn, the only RPGs that I have played are FF rpgs. Seriously. Other than that, I played Super Mario RPG, but I can't use that cause Square developed it.

I did play the Super Mario game for the Wii, the one where would can flip the screen from 2D to the 3Dish...and that really isn't what I would call a rpg, so, I guess I don't have a top 5. I do own Xenoblade, but I let my son borrow it and I have not gotten it back yet.