It doesn't feel too offensive to me. No random battles, has kind of a Persona 3 - 4 system where you run up to monsters and then a battle ensues on another screen. Then it feels to me kinda like FFXII just a bit, where you directly control one person/monster and everyone else is running around, and you can switch who you control at any time, plus swap out monsters at any time. FFXII again with how towns feel (I mean this in a good way), plus job boards and bounty hunts that pop up as you go. Secret of Mana in the sense of progression, how the world is put together, the style of each main party character, the desert/ice/forest level motifs (so far), and how new equipment seems to pop up in each new town.
Honestly my biggest complaint with the game at this point is that in many ways it just makes me want to go play FFXII again. But the music and art are fantastic, and I just want to see and explore more of the world. Plus the companion tome is fun (even in PDF form) and the monster designs are just fantastic, so I want to see more, and collect *ahem* them all. The battle mechanics are pretty great so far now that things are opening up a bit. I suspect this will continue to improve as it goes.
Might be worth waiting for a price drop if you're on the fence, but I don't think this one will be overly JRPG for you. It hasn't been for me so far. I mean it's unquestionably the quintessential JRPG in many ways, but the combat is fun and bouncy and active, so it hasn't bored me the way a lot of RPGs have. Other than the annoying "you're in a battle! cue annoying battle music! kill everything! end battle summary screen! you got xp, gold, and items!" thing, which is sort of as annoying here when you're fighting multiple quick battles as it has been in EVERY FUCKING RPG EVER. But that can't really be helped, I suppose. haha
I will say this: the storytelling is a touch weird. Everything looks like a Studio Ghibli movie, so you sort of constantly expect everything to be one... but that doesn't happen. You have some dumb RPG dialogue (though the localization is good, and Mr. Drippy is fucking awesome), some moments that are a little stilted because they're being told in text panel by panel, characters who sometimes seem to leap over a few stages of emotional development on their way from point A to point G. No more offensive here than any other RPG, but it does seem weird when you have production values like this. It constantly sets you up to expect more than you sometimes get because you're in a minor part of the story, or a side thing, or one of the mechanical links on the way from MAJOR STORY SECTION II BIG EVENT A to MAJOR STORY SECTION II BIG EVENT B.
And it does feel a little bit childish thus far, at least here and there. I've heard numerous times from others that it isn't a kid's game and that this becomes apparent as things go, but this feels more like a kiddie thing to me than any of the Studio Ghibli movies have. Or at least there are touches that strike me that way. I suspect the game will grow up as it goes and deal with more interesting stuff and more varied/less strictly cartoonish stuff, but some of the strokes are pretty damned broad so far with a few characters and features (though to be fair, that's certainly not always). The first big fantasy town, for instance, is named "Ding Dong Dell". I have no idea why. You'd think there'd be a bell or something with a name like that, but there isn't, and it sounds dorky as fuck every time someone says it. And the main character really seems like he's 10 years old or something, with a constant sheepish awkwardness and dialogue to match (and voice acting). Which isn't strictly a problem or a bad thing, it just adds to the vibe, along with the fact that he never understands anything and has every last fucking thing explained to him by Mr. Drippy, who ceases to be entertaining only when he's getting overly verbose about game mechanics or objectives that are completely obvious to anyone over 5 years old. Normally I read every line in an RPG with care, just as a force of habit, but I've found myself clicking very quickly through the ends of a lot of conversations where it's just: Oliver: "Really? Does that mean..." Drippy: "Exactly! It's because <xyz>!" O: "NEATO!" D: "Sure is!" O: "Well gee, so should we go over to the place now?" D: "Why yes, maybe we should GO TO THE NEXT STORY LOCATION AND DO THE THING I SAID WE SHOULD DO."
That shit has definitely gotten old, and I'm really hoping they curb that a bit. I think so much of this stuff is just kind of par for the course now that people don't even question it, though. In reading/watching reviews, I didn't see any of this kind of thing mentioned at all, and while it honestly hasn't hampered my play experience where it counts, I do find it sort of constantly annoying in small ways.
But anyway, that's really about as negative as I can be so far. The game really is a treasure. Even if at times it's felt a touch juvenile, it has totally made up for that because it's capable of instilling an appropriately childlike wonder and joy on a regular basis. There's an innocence here that stretches beyond itself into a realm of earnestness at the prospect of light and moral goodness. This is, as it must have been intended to be, a storybook come to life.