A Mascot RPG is a Role-Playing Game that brings together pre-established characters or mascots in a spin-off of a video game franchise, typically of another genre (such as a Platform Game or First-Person Shooter). When it involves characters or mascots from multiple franchises or properties, it doubles as a Massive Multiplayer Crossover. It's essentially the level-grinding, stats-oriented, and often turn-based Sister Trope to the Mascot Fighter and Mascot Racer genres. These games often provide unique opportunities for game developers to give depth to their characters or worlds that cannot be as easily conveyed in mediums or genres that have more visual storytelling. A spin-off Mascot RPG will usually take a few gameplay elements from its parent franchise; for example, Super Mario RPG and other Mario roleplaying games feature Action Commands that are similar to the platforming elements in the Mario main series, while Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars is an RPG that makes having cover and elevation key gameplay mechanics like its First-Person Shooter parent series.
Regardless if it is a crossover or a spin-off, a Mascot RPG will almost always have their own casts of Original Generation characters and storytelling elements created exclusively for the game, usually within a Crossover Alternate Universe. Many Mascot RPGs are also tactical roleplaying games, following the example set by Super Robot Wars, a Trope Codifier of this genre. The makers of Super Robot Wars, Bandai Namco Entertainment, not coincidentally loves the Mascot RPG genre, with a lot of the games below being published by them. This type of game has a tendency to be exclusive to Japan, with some examples falling into No Export for You due to international licensing problems that have plagued the Mascot RPG for about as long as they've existed.
Games that fit this subgenre:
- Angry Birds Epic is a light RPG spinoff of Angry Birds, featuring the birds and pigs from Rovio Entertainment's well-known franchise reimagined as characters in a new fantasy setting. Much like its parent series, the game streamlines RPG mechanics into a simple touch-based interface.
- Chaos Wars is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover Mascot RPG featuring characters by Idea Factory, Aruze, Red Entertainment, and Atlus that received attention overseas due to the Western release's memetically bad translation and voice acting.
- Cross Edge is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover Mascot RPG by Nippon Ichi, Idea Factory, and Gust Corporation that averted the No Export for You legal troubles common to the genre. It brings together characters from the Atelier Series, Darkstalkers, Disgaea, Ar tonelico: Melody of Elemia, Mana Khemia 2: Fall of Alchemy, and Blazing Souls Accelate. The game is a Spiritual Sequel to Chaos Wars, with a similar Trapped in Another World premise.
- Trinity Universe shares a battle system and some monsters with Cross Edge, but only brings two universes from that title: the Atelier Series and Disgaea.
- Dengeki Gakuen RPG: Cross of Venus is the Mascot RPG predecessor to the Mascot Fighter Dengeki Bunko: Fighting Climax that features characters and storytelling elements from the various titles published under the Light Novel imprint Dengeki Bunko.
- Dengeki Bunko Crossing Void is the mobile follow-up, which also wasn't exported abroad.
- Disney Heroes: Battle Mode, Disney Sorcerer's Arena, and Disney Mirrorverse are a trio of mobile Mascot RPGs that serves as a crossover for the Disney Animated Canon. Unlike Kingdom Hearts (for the most part), the characters from the different films and shows interact more with each other and are truly part of a common universe as opposed to being spread out on their own planets.
- Doom has a Mascot RPG appropriately titled Doom RPG that was released in 2005. The Doom RPG is meant to be within the same continuity as the main series, picking up plot threads from Doom³ while taking visual cues from Doom and Doom II. There was even a follow up called Doom II RPG which shares a game engine and continuity with Wolfenstein RPG (see below). If we consider these games to be canon, this could mean all of Doom and Wolfenstein are in the same universe.
- Famicom Jump: Hero Retsuden is a Mascot RPG crossover between Shonen Jump characters including Kenshiro from Fist Ofthe North Star, Goku from Dragon Ball, and Joseph Joestar from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. The game predates Jump Super Stars, coming out in 1989 for the Famicom. The game was followed by a sequel in 1991, Famicom Jump II: Saikyo no Shichinin.
- FusionFall was a rare Western example of this trope from 2009: an Animesque crossover of Cartoon Network properties into the same Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.
- Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars is a Mascot RPG spin-off of Ghost Recon, which incorporates some of the FPS elements of its parent series such as the importance of cover and elevation to its battle system.
- Heroes Phantasia is a crossover Mascot RPG by Banpresto (who worked on Super Robot Wars) that brings together characters from Blood+, Darker than Black, My-HiME, Revolution, Slayers, Sorcerer Stabber Orphen, Read or Die, Rune Soldier Louie, and Sgt. Frog.
- Kingdom Hearts is a Mascot RPG that served as the Genre Popularizer for Western audiences, a Massive Multiplayer Crossover for the numerous characters of the Disney Animated Canon as well as the money-printingly popular Final Fantasy series. Its Original Generation characters such as Sora have become iconic enough to feature in other crossovers such as the Mascot Fighter Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and the Mascot RPG World of Final Fantasy.
- Kirara Fantasia was a Mascot RPG crossover between the characters of the predominantly moe yonkoma seinen magazine Manga Time Kirara including K-On!, Slow Start, and Yuyushiki, among many others.
- Majokko Daisakusen: Little Witching Mischiefs is a 1999 PlayStation Massive Multiplayer Crossover between classic Magical Girl characters including Cutey Honey, Hana no Ko Lunlun, Himitsu no Akko-chan, Mahou Shojo Lalabel, Mahou Tsukai Chappy, Majokko Meg-chan, and Sally the Witch. The game uses assets from The Un Holy War and Pandemonium by the same developer, Toys for Bob. Toys for Bob is an American studio known for the critically acclaimed Star Control series. There were translation problems all throughout development including receiving untranslated Japanese bug reports — leading to the studio simply unplugging their fax machine. Even after release, Toys for Bob still had no idea how the game actually did because their contact at Bandai quit.
- Mario has multiple spin-offs in the Mascot RPG genre, with Super Mario RPG by Square serving as the standalone proof-of-concept that also proved to be the Trope Codifier for Action Commands. Action Commands would be retained in the Mascot RPG spiritual successor series Paper Mario by Intelligent Systems as well as Mario & Luigi by AlphaDream.
- Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is unique in that it's both a Mascot RPG crossover (between Mario and Raving Rabbids) and a Mascot RPG spin-off for both series which typically tend to be in other genres.
- Mega Man has the most Mascot RPG spin-offs of any video games franchise aside from Mario, with Mega Man Battle Network and Mega Man Star Force each being a side-series in their own right, while Mega Man X: Command Mission is a standalone Mega Man Mascot RPG.
- Mortal Kombat: Onslaught is an upcoming Mascot RPG for Mortal Kombat to be released on mobile with elements from other genres. Mortal Kombat's foray into the RPG genre was foreshadowed by the Konquest mode, which had action RPG elements.
- Namco × Capcom is a Mascot RPG with Original Generation characters and a battle system that re-appear in the other Mascot RPG games Endless Frontier and Project × Zone. Namco games represented include Dig Dug, Soul Series, Tales Series, Tekken, and Xenosaga, while Capcom games include Final Fight, Mega Man Legends, Resident Evil, and Street Fighter.
- Project × Zone is the Spiritual Successor (and an outright sequel, plot-wise) that brings Sega characters into the mix, while the sequel even has Nintendo characters to make it clear that this is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover.
- Namco Super Wars was a 2002 WonderSwan crossover Mascot RPG that brought together Namco characters from games as disparate as Dig Dug to Dragon Valor, The Legend of Valkyrie and The Tower of Druaga. If that sounds familiar, is because in many ways this game is an spiritual predecessor of Namco × Capcom.
- Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood is a Sonic Mascot RPG by BioWare, an outside heavy-hitter in the RPG genre much like how Super Mario RPG brought in Square for its RPG outing. The game is also notable for the story and character cues it took from the Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics), with Ken Penders (unsuccessfully) attempting to sue over the similarities.
- Spyro: Shadow Legacy is a different genre than the rest of the series as it's a Mascot RPG, but its made unique because it continues the plot of the previous main series games.
- Super Heroine Chronicle is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover and Mascot RPG for the characters of Higurashi: When They Cry and Di Gi Charat, as well as Aria the Scarlet Ammo, Kaitou Tenshi Twin Angel, Kyousogiga, Super Sonico, Infinite Stratos, The Familiar of Zero, and Dream Hunter Rem with Original Generation characters thrown into the mix. Some consider it be the Distaff Counterpart to the Trope Codifier Super Robot Wars.
- Super Robot Wars is an entire Massive Multiplayer Crossover Mascot RPG franchise for Humongous Mecha anime such as Getter Robo, Gundam, and Mazinger Z. There are far too many franchises used and entires in the series to list either one, but it has been a poster child for this trope since its debut on the Game Boy in 1991.
- Tales of the World is the Mascot RPG for the various games of the Tales Series, an unsurprising addition to the genre given Namco's love of these kind of crossovers and the amount of Mascot RPGs the Tales series characters have appeared in.
- TimeStalkers (or Climax Landers in Japan) is a Crossover between various games released by developer Climax Entertainment in 1999 for the Sega Dreamcast.
- Wolfenstein has Wolfenstein RPG, which is a Mascot RPG with a more light-hearted approach to the franchise. While it has no sequel as of yet, it received something of a follow-up in Doom II RPG.
- World of Final Fantasy is a Mascot RPG that serves as a Bat Family Crossover for the iconic monsters, locations, and main characters of the many games in the dead-horse-beatingly popular Final Fantasy series, as well as a more straightforward Crossover that features character appearances from Kingdom Hearts, Sigma Harmonics, and Xenogears.