"Defying all odds" is the phase or term that I would like to describe the Saga series. When Saga Frontier first came out on the Playstation, it received both poor reviews and poor sales. Hoping that second time around would be better, Square released a Saga Frontier II anyways. Unfortunately Saga Frontier II met the same fate as Saga Frontier. Poor reviews and poor sales. Now by then you would think that Square got the message from the masses in the rpg crowd. But no. I guess at this point, Square is hoping that the third time is a charm and went ahead and release the third installment called Unlimited Saga. Is third time the charm? We'll see....
STORY
We're comic book characters!
Let me introduce my story.
Unlimited Saga story works in the same way as Saga Frontier. Instead of providing one in-depth story, you have a bunch of mini stories. With this in mind, it's pointless for me to describe to you what the entire story is about. There are seven different mini stories in total base around the seven main characters. All of the stories in general are base on each of the characters point of views that involve The Seven Wonders of the World. Even though it's base around The Seven Wonders, it's still seven different adventures and stories. Now these stories are very short and under-develope in general. Some stories are okay and you have an understanding of them while others are pointless and have no meaning. Very similar to Saga Frontier. If you're not into very short rpg stories then you would be better off to skip this game. None of these short stories are very good to begin with. I don't have a problem with short rpg stories if they are good. But the problem with these short stories are that they are nearly all under-develope and pretty bad. This game isn't about storylines at all. Which is a shame cause rpgs are about storylines. Remember that you've been warned here. Pick up this game thinking about a cool storyline and you will be greatly disappointed.
Score 5/10
CHARACTERS
The good, the bad, & the monsters.
There are 7 main characters in this game. Each of them with their own unique mini story. And some will also be a supporting character outside of their own adventure. In addition to the main characters, there are numerous cast of supporting characters. Quantity in characters is not a problem here. However, quality is. Truth to be told, none of the characters in this game, from the main characters to the supporting characters are really develope much in terms of personality and background history. This is due to the fact that each of the mini stories are so short that there's no room for any character developement at all. Depending on the character that you are playing, some main character maybe a little bit more develope than the other but in general they are all both pretty badly under-developed. I didn't find any character in this game to be interesting at all. The presentation of the characters is very much like Saga Frontier characters. That can be a good thing or a bad thing. Depending on how you take it.
Score: 5/10
GRAPHICS
I'm drawn beautifully, ain't I?
Visually speaking, the graphics are beautiful. It's different from regular rpg graphics. It's not 3-D polygon or cel-shading. The game use sketch motion CG and 2-D animation artwork. You really have to
appreciate how excellent the artwork is. In terms of 2-D artwork, they are illustrated to near perfection. Each of the town's artwork are beautifully illustrated. The colors used within the artworks compliment the artworks even more. The graphic setting is like an interactive comic book. People may not like the settings of the 2-D graphics and game in terms of it being a 2-D side to side world with
bubbles that display what the characters are saying but that doesn't mean the artwork isn't excellent. The only evidence of 3-D is during the battle sequence. The surrounding of the battle system is base on 3-D but the background of the battle settings are still done in an artwork setting. Character designs are done in hand drawn artwork sprites. These sprites are drawn very nicely giving them that animated realistic look. But what's most visually appealing is the sketch motion artwork CG sequence that you see in the game. In all the scenarios, there's one spot where you can see the sketch motion CG. That spot is in the festival. It's really stunning looking at this sketch motion artwork CG for the first time. It's too bad that the game doesn't use more of this cutting edge sketch motion CG. However nothing is perfect in this game. Dungeon designs or travel area designs are very poorly done. The overall game is design with exceptional artwork detail but for some reason the dungeons and travel areas are kept to a simple design. Your character is drawn like a chest piece set on a board. The dungeons are drawn like a 2-D chess board that have mazes. Not exactly the greatest of designs here. You basically have a chest set like character (indicating the player) that's been place on a 2-D dungeon like maze moving one square at a time. It's the only thing that's not very appealing to look at in this game. But a minor thing at best.
Score: 8/10
MUSIC
Let's dance to the music.
The music and sound in this game is top notch. Sound effects and music are exceptional in quality delivered by Dolby Pro Logic II. While traveling through your quests, you can here the exceptionally realistic sound effects from the surrounding areas. If you're in a forest, you can hear the sound of birds chirping and leaves blowing in the air. Near beaches, you can hear the sound of waves from the ocean. You get the idea. Very realistic sound effects from this game. Music is also done exceptionally well too. Most of the music are base on different town themes, battle themes, and quest themes. The quest themes are the best one which really shows off the musical aspect of the game. Some are done through a beautiful piano rendition. Despite the fact that the game's individual quests are short, listening to the quest themes can fool you into thinking that it's a huge and long quest. That's how powerful and influencial the music can be. There isn't really a strong love theme that will strike a cord with gamers
though. This is the drawback as most likely you will forget about the music once you finish the game. There are some voice acting in this game but for the most part, it's held to a limited portion and really have no effect in the overall game.
Score: 8/10
GAMEPLAY
See, I'm sparkling.
Of Heaven and Earth.
Game Information
Genre: Traditional Rpg
Publisher: Square Enix
Disc:1 DVD Disc
Memory:260 KB
Players: 1 Player
Mode
Vibration:Yes
Dual Analog:Yes
Digital Control:Yes
Rating: Teen
Release:June 2003
Words to describe this game? Hard, complex, unique, and extremely hard. This is not the average rpg game. I'll start with the easy basic before going into details on what the key unique features are. When you start the game, you are given an option to choose which of the seven characters to play. Once you pick one, you will start off in the town that they came from. As you progress in the game, more towns will open up. There are no exploration in towns at all. Each town will consists of an INN and a Carrier Guild. Of course some towns will have a Magic Shop or a Blacksmith shop as well. You won't be able to access the Carrier Guild at all unless you are playing a specific main character. But the other three you can access. You main objective in a town is to always visit the INN. The INN will consists of the menu options for you to start your quest on. The menu options inside the INN is as follows: Shop (where you can buy and sell equipment), Information (where you can find party members and find the latest gossip), Adventures (where you can head out on your main story quest or do sidequests), Equipment (where you can equip equipments for you party members), and Save (to save the game of course). The basic concept is to visit the Shop first to upgrade any equipment. Then visit the Information to see if there's any new party members to recruit and to open up the next story quest. Then head to the Adventures to either move forward on the story quest or do some sidequest. That's the basic of the gameplay. But sometimes it's not that simple. Sometimes you have no idea what to do next. And there are quite a lot of these moments. So keep that in mind. But lets get to the key features in this game and there are a lot of them.
Growth Panel: Fighters do not level up in this game. So how do you increase your fighters stats and HP? Through the Growth Panel. The Growth Panel consists of seven empty panels. Each panel will effect a particular part of a fighter's stat. At the end of each mission quests, the Growth Panel will appear for each fighter. Along with the Growth Panel will be 4 random panels. These panels can consist of either skill panels, magic tablets, familiars, or weapon panels. You will then be allowed to pick only 1 of the 4 panels that appear and place that panel onto one of the seven panels of the Growth Panel. Depending on where you place that panel, it will boost some of the fighter stats. What kind of boost you get depends on what panels you pick. Mastering the Growth Panel is a very important part of this game as it is the only means to increasing all your fighters stats. LP: Unlike other rpgs, this game uses life points more than health points (HP). Now the game still uses HP but each character comes with a set number of LP. Your HP is set up as a shield to your LP. If you lose all your LP then you die. While you can heal your HP during battle, you cannot however heal your LP. On the surface this looks like a good idea. Have your HP act as a shield to your LP. But the game's deductions of LP is very unbalance. Sometimes you can attack monsters and do an enormous amount of HP damage beyond the monsters HP and yet the monsters still won't die cause you didn't do any LP damage. While other times you can do little HP damage and end up doing quite a bit of LP damage. A cheesy kill. Problem is that this will also work on you. Cheesy LP damage by the bosses and monsters. And it's very frustrating. Each character comes with a set number of LP. Some with high LP which is great while others with low LP. Since you can't replenish LP loss, fighters that have low LP by default becomes useless. It makes you wonder what's the point of getting these characters as fighters in the quest. Uneven distribution of LP among fighters to cheesy attacks from monsters that can do LP damage makes the whole LP system annoying. Nothing pisses you off more than seeing a monster do only 80HP damage but inflicting 2 LP damage. It wouldn't be too bad if there was a way to replenish LP. Blacksmith: Customizing your own weapons and accessories as well as repairing your weapons are an important feature in this game. Each weapon comes in a different type of material with it's own stats. Now it's possible to buy better weapons in a shop but inorder to get the really good strong weapons, you are going to be required to make your own weapon by combining different materials. This isn't too bad however there's really no road map at all in what type of materials is needed inorder to make the best weapons in the game. Unless you have internet access. That's the major downside. Add in the fact that you have to constantly repair your weapons too and things don't look so good. Like with Saga Frontier 2, Unlimited Saga uses durability stats for each weapon. Everytime you use a weapon, it's durability stats goes down. Once it reaches zero then your weapon breaks and become useless. And the only way to repair a weapon like that is by combining it with another weapon to increase it's durability stat again or by using a skill called Quick Fix. I see no real purpose for this durability stat feature other than to annoy the heck out of the gamers. And that's the honest truth. Traps and Chests: This game is littered with traps and treasure chests. But just like with all the other key features, they are just another annoyance in the game. During your exploration of areas, random traps will pop up. Pretty much every three step you take, a trap will pop up. Once that happens, a trap roulette reel starts to spin. At this point your goal is to try and stop the trap reel on a green spot in the reel. If you manage to stop the trap roulette reel on a green spot then no damage will be taken on your party. Otherwise you will take a certain amount of damage from HP to LP. Now at a limited usage this little trap feature isn't too bad. But when you have a trap popping up every three steps, this get's old really fast and becomes really annoying. It really interferes with the gameflow. So we come to the treasure chests. Treasure chests can be dropped by monsters, or randomly pop up while you are exploring, or can be found in a certain spot. Here comes the annoying part. About 90% of all treasure chests are booby trap and locked. Before you can attempt to unlock a treasure chest, you need to defuse it first. Guess what? It's another stupid roulette reel. We can call this the defuse roulette reel. Just like with the trap roulette reel, you have to try and stop the reel on a green spot. If done correctly then the treasure chest will be defuse. Otherwise try again or the chest will blow up. Now if you manage to defuse a chest, then we go to the unlocking part. Can you guess what's next? If you say an unlock roulette reel then you are correct. It's the same procedure. Stop the reel on a green spot and the chest will unlock. If not then keep trying again and again. For some strange reason this game seem to take some of the simply feature and make them so annoying that it just turn people off. By the time you are done with this game, you don't want to see anymore roulette reel again. That's how bad it is. Skills and Magic Arts: There are three types of skills. Offensive skills that can be found on all weapons. Defensive skills that can be found on all equipments. And non combative skills that will help you during your quest from a skill panel on your Growth Panel. Weapon and equipment skills are usually hidden at first. But as you battle monsters, they will slowly be unlock but randomly. There's no way of figuring out how weapon and equipment skills are unlocked so just play the game and they will eventually be unlocked. Magic can only be used on characters that are equip with a weapon that have a magic art or from a Familiar panel in their Growth Panel. A Familiar is a little summon creature that cast magic. Just to let you know.
Now let's take a look at the battle system. When going on a quest, you can take up to seven party members. You can have a total of nine party members but only seven of those can come along with you. As you travel through the various mazes, monsters will pop up. Sometimes you can avoid them but in most cases you will be engage in a battle with them. In this game you cannot run from battles. In other words this game forces you to fight every single battle that you are engage in. You decide on whether or not this is a good idea to force gamers to fight every single battles. Once battle begins, you are given up to five action turns per round. You can use these five action turns to attack. Now with five action turns per round, you can split this up and have five party members using one action each or you can have one party member use all five turns or just plain split up the five turns with whatever members you want to take part in the battle for each round. So in conclusion, you can have up to five party members
participate in battle. While the option is there to have between one to five party members participate in a battle round, it's a good idea to use the maximum number of party members in a battle round. This will help distribute the damage to the entire party during the fight instead of having one or two individuals being gang up by the monsters. Now lets look at three key battle features. Battle Reel. Like with everything else in the game, the battle system is made up of a roulette reel system. This is known as the Battle Reel and the bulk of the entire battle system. Before the Battle Reel starts, you need to choose what five actions are you going to take in the battle rounds and who's going to be taking those actions. Once all of that is decided, the Battle Reel will start to spin. Now the Battle Reel consists of panels that you have chosen as your action. For example, if you chose to attack with a sword, then the battle panels will consists of sword panels. For the most part, the Battle Reel will consists of level 1 green panels which indictate a regular attack. As you learn some special attacks, those will be added onto your Battle Reel. The key is to stop the Battle Reel on the panels that consists of your special attacks. Easier said then done. It will take some time to be able to master the Battle Reel. Of course you don't need to take an action right away, what you can do is hold off your action to take the next action. This brings up a second Battle Reel. There's one Battle Reel per action. By holding off an action, you are in a sense lining up to do combo attacks. You can actually have up to five Battle Reels spinning at one time for a super combo attack. Note that due to the Battle Reel system, you cannot use items in this game. Other than that, the Battle Reel system isn't too hard to learn. It's unique but yet is limited to only attacking options. It's hard to heal in this game and even harder to heal from status ailments. And there's no item recover during battles. Combos. The game uses two types of combos during battle. Individual combos and group combos. Group combos consists of party members lining up attacks with other party members while individual combos consists of an individual lining up his/her own attacks to form a combo. The more combo you do, the more damage you can inflict. The maximum string of combo is five since you can use up to five action turn per round. Of course getting off a good combo isn't that easy as monsters will try to interrupt your combo attacks whenever possible. But it's not that hard to master combo strings and it's a must to master combos if you want to finish this game. Sparkling. As a fighter attack during battle, sometimes a light bulb will sparkle over his head. This is known as sparkling. Learning a special attack. Each type of attack has a set number of special attacks that a fighter can learn. The highest special attack level a fighter can learn is level 5. Now sparkling is done randomly so there's no secret way to learn special attacks quickly. Although you have a better chance to sparkle when going up against boss fights then against regular monster fights. That's about it for the battle system.
Closing thoughts. Is it impossible to enjoy this game? No. But everytime you think you can start enjoying this game, something comes up and reminds you of just how bad and hard the gameplay is. The sheer fact of the matter is is that you have to play at least 20 hours of the game to have a grasp of the gameplay and to even start to enjoy the game. This is a sign of what's wrong with this game. When people buy a game, they want to be able to understand and enjoy the game right away. People aren't going to sit around for at least 20 hours or so to try and understand this game. More than likely they will return the game to the video game store and ask for another game. The instruction book only explain about 10% of what the game is about. Making the instruction book useless. And there are no strategy guides out there to help you. So what's left? Getting help from the internet community. The only reason as to why I was able to complete 6 out of the 7 characters in this game was with the help of the internet community. I pity the poor souls that don't have internet access. The advertising campaign for this game is, "Are you chicken or hardcore?". Well I got news for you, I'm hardcore but not that hardcore. I would've put this game away within 10 hours of playing it if it weren't for the fact that I had to force myself to continue to play this game for the sheer fact of writing this review. And that's the truth. You can listen to the truth or you can listen to the fanboys that says this is the most underrated and best game ever. The decision is yours to make.
Score: 5/10
EXTRAS/REPLAY
Extra Boss Fight!!
Thick and heavy is how I would describe it. This game is riddled with numerous sidequests. When you play each of the character's scenarios, you will notice that almost every town or village will have a certain number of sidequests for you to do. These optional sidequests can be short or long with extra hard bosses for you to fight. Since the overall gameplay for each scenarios can be pretty short at times, these sidequests are an important way for you to use to help raise your character stats further. Be warned that some of these extra bosses can be tough. Replay value comes from the sheer fact that you can play up to seven different character. Once you finish one character, you can then move on to play the next character by doing a new game+. Since each scenario represent a character's point of view, the replay value is more meaningful. Finish all 7 scenarios and you get a full ending. The only drawback is that there are too many sidequests that it over shadow the regular quests at times.
Score: 10/10
In baseball, it's three strike and you're out. Well, Saga Frontier is strike one. Saga Frontier II is strike two. Unlimited Saga is strike three. So it's safe to say that the Saga series is out. Unless of
course Square is asking for more punishment in poor sales and reviews from a fourth Saga game. The Saga series as a whole has the right idea. And maybe one day they will get it right. Unfortunately those days have run out. I would not force this game on anyone. Either than the pretty graphics and music, there's nothing in this game that is appealing. If you're a casual rpg gamer then find something better to do. If you're a hardcore rpg gamer and want to spend time feeling agonizing pain then go ahead and pick up this game. Unless you have a real commitment like writing a review for this game, I fail to see why anyone would be willing to spend many hours with this game. The sheer fact that after only two months of being released, Unlimited Saga received a major price drop from $49.99 to $29.99. This would be a good indication as to how poorly this game is selling and the bad word of mouth that it is getting. Not to
mention the bad reviews and the many return copies from those that brought the game. A final score of 6.8 is very misleading. That's mostly due to the high score from the graphics and music. So keep that in mind
when you are looking at the final review score for this game from Rpg Dreamers.
