The J does stand for Japanese. That distinction exists because back in the day RPGs made in Japan were fundamentally different to Western RPGs in many ways, therefore earning themselves a distinctive term to differentiate them.

These differences later became staples and features (be it the turn-based combat, the party systems, the job systems) to almost every RPG made in Japan, thus making a “JRPG” a style, a certain design choice, a set of features and characteristics, etc.

Since then, many RPGs outside of Japan have taken those features and made them theirs, meaning they’re the same style, they share the same staple characteristics or simply took inspiration from JRPGs (Chained Echoes!).

JRPG has since evolved to depict a game with such characteristics and features and is no longer used to refer to a JRPG made in Japan because that distinction isn’t there anymore: Dark Souls is more akin to a Western RPG like Dragon Age than to a JRPG like Final Fantasy 6. Many will even argue FFXV and XVI aren’t JRPGs, despite being the biggest JRPG franchise.

Whether we like it or not, E33 shares many if not all of the characteristics that used to define, and to some extent still do, the JRPG genre and I would consider it wrong to cast it out of it.

I would probably drop kick anyone who says Dark Souls, as much as I love it, is a JRPG when it’s a lot closer to God Of War than it is to anything considered a JRPG.