This is probably a pretty good example why most JRPGs Storylines suck:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/ ... ta-Stories
I used to love this stuff, the 16 and 32bit Square Games were still really good. Story-wise, Final Fantasy Tactics probably kicked the ball out of the park in that era. But around the late 90s, Square sort of forgot how to tell stories and how to create interesting characters.
I sooooo used to love Squaresoft back then for what they were trying to do with games when there were still so many technical limitations around - but now, as most of the technical limitations are gone, they dropped the ball on what made them great back then. There's a lesson to be learned here.