Whoa, classic!

Well the first section of Generations was pretty good I think (launch of the Enterprise B). It's all downhill melodramatic from there... despite my love for the TNG crew...

Think about it for a while. The eats the shyguy. Then shits him out as an egg. Imagine how big his anus must be now...

Some SMT games sometimes really do kick my butt (Strange Journey for instance). Also, Tales on Unkown or Chaos mode (which are not available on your first playthrough) are pretty hard, at least on bosses.

You don't need to backtrack much. As I said, every dungeon and area is split into many screens/floors/whatever, and usually the next transition to the next screen is very close (not to mention if you want to manually save on the world map or something, there are Teleport Stones in abundance that instantly move to you…

Tales series games for example have always had dynamic difficulty settings (it is actually used similarly to the encounter settings in Bravely Default, as higher difficulty settings can - given enough skill - make you level faster because you can string together higher combos and get more high hit combo experience…

Because there are times when random encounters are just annoying, like in a dungeon that is more puzzle-oriented or exploration-oriented. When you're thinking about how to solve a puzzle to advance, it breaks your train of thought and the flow of the puzzle if you have to fight all the time.

Most JRPGs I played recently do offer difficulty settings, sometimes even changeable on-the-fly (instead of just at the very beginning of the game).

I think the point is that you can crank the setting UP (not down) for leveling sessions (reduces run-around-like-stupid time).

Most people like me use it not to turn it off (and I dont really care if less skilled players turn it off), but to turn it up. It's not an on/off setting, it's a 5 graded setting, and I usually have it maxed out when I want to grind, and on normal when I explore ("normal" setting has just exactly the right amount of…

Everything you wrote except the visible enemies is also in Bravely Default. Sure, the battles arent as hard as SMT games, but they're still strategic, and if you have a bad set of autobattle commands put in (auto-battle basically repeats what you input most recently), you could die on occasion too, especially in areas…

Eh, actually the encounter option even improves that too. In face, I never turned random encounters off. I turned it up, for exactly those spots that give a lot of JP/EXP with a city or any healing place nearby (the city of Florem in Bravely Default is a good spot... the Alraune group that you encounter there…

Uh, it doesnt save you from actually having to battle, because if you avoid all random encounters, the bosses are going to be way to hard for you.

Uhm, Bravely Default also has autosave - it automatically saves whenever you go to the next screen/section of a dungeon/area (or into or out of the world map). Works for me.

For some reason the menu music reminds me of the puzzle music from Professor Layton...

I did touch it. To max. For leveling up. It's brilliant.

There were a bunch of very very Japanese levels in Super Mario 3D World (kinda Dojo-like), so if they can put an Italian plumber in a japanese setting, I can't see why not Zelda. Even if it's just some area or town that's distinctly japanese-style.

It was still challenging for me, but not in a fun way, more in a "damnit, this is just too much stress and too little gameplay fun" switching around paradigms all the time.

Eh, Mario also has successfully played around with Mario games. See Super Mario Galaxy.

I always thought Star Wars was already "for everyone", and popcorn cinema at its best, far from anything "mature".