ResidentLeever: 2. No I think that's one of the early, proper JRPGs after FF3 and Phantasy Star, which go in that direction but are limited partly by being 8-bit games. Haven't played DQ4 yet.
Phantasy Star 1 honestly still feels like an early WRPG, or perhaps what I'd call a proto-RPG. Many of the elements seem to resemble earlier Ultima games, actually. In particular, we see a few elements that aren't exactly standard in the JRPG genre:
* While the overworld is in overhead view, dungeons are first person, much like in Ultima 1-5.
* You have to spend time fighting enemies to earn experience in order to level up to continue with the game, particularly early on. In addition, this game has mandatory purchases that can take a fair amount of money, and are for essential items such as vehicles. (Purchasing vehicles reminds me of Ultima 1, actually.)
* While the first half of the game is linear, the second half is non-linear, which is not that common in JRPGs. (With that said, you do see non-linear parts in some JRPGs, most famously Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger, which are structurally similar (ignoring Chrono Trigger's early victory possibilities) to Phantasy Star 1.
Final Fantasy 3 feels like an expanded Final Fantasy 1, except without the non-linearity, and it does suffer from boring random encounter design in a way that FF1 does not.
Dragon Quest 4 is interesting in its chapter structure, with each chapter starring different characters. By the way, if you play a remake version of DQ4 and want a more authentic feel, try not using the "Follow Orders" tactic in Chapter 5; the original didn't let you directly control your characters in the last chapter, and that gives the game a rather unique feel. (I would say it's still OK to choose different tactics for different characters, even though the original did not allow this, as you would still get the same feel this way; furthermore, Chapter 6 was not in the original so I would say it's not necessary to continue using AI control at that point.)
(Interesting that I've found reason to mention Chrono Trigger twice in this thread.)