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SaGa Frontier Remastered

MetManMas

Me and My Bestie
(He, him)
Was deciding between Romancing SaGa 3 and SaGa Scarlet Grace: Ambitions yesterday and earlier today. Went with Scarlet Grace in the end, mainly 'cuz the streamlining makes it a lot easier to pop into and out of when I'm alternating with a more hands-on RPG like SaGa Frontier.

Rolling with Taria right now and so far I'm enjoying it. My only complaint is that it has a mandatory "Connect a controller" screen to get through before you can play even though it can otherwise be played entirely via touch.

I may talk about it more in the other SaGa thread later. Or maybe make a thread.
 

Sprite

(He/Him/His)
I haven’t played a ton of Scarer Grace but it is definitely one of the best games in the series, and imo the best realization of the compact open world RPG that I’ve seen. My only caveat would be that it’s difficult, though not unfairly so.
 

Fyonn

did their best!
I finished Blue and Red's scenarios, have started Lute, the final one of the original set for me.

Red scenario is the worst one. It features several... questionably designed segments. I think it would be better as a Live A Live scenario.

Doll kicks ass, it's tragic she's stuck in Red's scenario. Captain Hamiliton also kicks ass, and it's tragic she's stuck in Lute's scenario. In an ideal world, I would like the "freebie" characters in the Scrap pub to be different for every character.

I encountered a weird bug where Doll just... Forgot to run out of ammo? Every time she hit 0 bullets in here Lethal Dragoons, she could Guns Akimbo Trick Shot again, reducing her bullet count to... 4??? Maybe it's because I had four guns on her? Two Lethal Dragoons and two Agni MBXs.
 
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Wandered into my first of four emperors (?) with Red bc I think I needed to fight him before doing a rune thing. (Or did I?) Random whether I could safely muddle through it (he could immediately kill most of my time by doing an aoe twice in a row) and then there was a d*ng solo battle? Which seemed Too Hard until I realized I had equipment that neutralized fire.

Anyway, I think I got a Heroic Art after the battle so I don’t need to contrive Red transforming in random battles to get anymore right? The one Heroic Art I had seemed useless compared to anything that cost WP.

As noted, very arbitrary what I’ve decided to spoiler tag, because I don’t understand what people who don’t like spoilers don’t want spoiled. Minor problem I guess.
 

nosimpleway

(he/him)
Pretty sure Alkaiser's special techs can only be used when transformed into Alkaiser, making that the only way to ever glimmer more. You can get BJ&K, EngineerCar, and Rabbit to be a backup party while you grind out Alkaiser techs. It's still contrived but hey.

I guess the other option is to wait until the last dungeon when you're permanently Alkaisered anyway, but saving a grind when you're permalocked into "your stats will never go up" form seems like kind of a bad idea.
Use Bright Fist, or whatever it's called now, until you get Al-Blaster, or whatever it's called now.
Practice Al-Blaster until you get Al-Phoenix, whatever it's called now.
When you fight Metal Black, or whatever he's called now, for the third time in his Metal Alkaiser form, wait until he does Dark Phoenix, or whatever it's called now, and then use Al-Phoenix back at him. It'll transform into Re-Al-Phoenix, or whatever it's called now but honestly I like the "Real Phoenix" wordplay there, the last and best Alkaiser move and arguably the best single move in the game.
 
In addition to those, you can get Shining Kick and Sparkling Roll from Shining Fist (Bright Fist), and Deflecting Lance from Shining Kick.

I just finished Red's scenario today. It gives a nice tour of the world, contextualizes a lot of areas that seem to have no purpose for other characters, and showcases all four races pretty well, while delivering the closest thing to normal JRPG plot and progression in SaGa Frontier. It was the first one I played in the original, and it's still one of my favorites.

Something I've been thinking about while playing this game again is how its reception might have benefited from a feature some of the later SaGa games have, where they try to guide you to the characters best suited to you. Unlimited Saga does it by showing a little blurb describing each character and their scenario, and Scarlet Grace has a personality quiz thing at the beginning and suggests a character based on that. But the structural differences between scenarios in those games aren't as pronounced as Frontier's; I don't really think someone who starts with Laura or Urpina, the generally most recommended first characters in those games, is much more likely to come away with a good first impression of them, but I could definitely see someone who picks Riki or Lute first in Frontier being put off by issues they wouldn't encounter at all with other characters.
 

spines

cyber true color
(she/her, or something)
unlimited definitely goes for a similar thing to frontier, but it's less pronounced between having fewer clear mechanical/structural gimmicks to go between the stories and the general difficulty of parsing the game on a first playthrough, which no character particularly reduces. but some definitely enhance it by having especially difficult areas early on

laura's story is pretty straightforward, and judy's is as well, with the bizarre wrinkle that (as far as i know) you aren't ever able to buy equipment which casts spells from shops. mythe's is also linear, but has the most difficult bosses in the game (combined with his party's low lp) and only starts with guns, (which you can remedy instantly, but you won't be able to win a battle with only the guns if you can't already play the reels). also there's a quest near the start where i think a lot of people didn't realize you don't have to fight a super hard boss who's in the area, hahaha

ruby gains a unique character and has to go to every wonder in her story, as i've heard, but otherwise is still pretty normal. ventus can keep doing quests via the carrier's guild virtually indefinitely, making him the easiest character to raise shop/battle/reward ranks with. (other characters can keep failing missions over and over to raise some of those things, but will use up resources and make no progress by doing so.) kurt's a bit like asellus; the story progression follows intermittently as you freely go around doing stuff, though much more rigidly since you have to "pass" quests to get stronger. also, you unrelatedly get attacked in no-stakes battles constantly the whole game, and if you beat the second to last one you can go to the last dungeon before finishing enough sidequests to get the other scenes. i think if you beat the last one it also goes away, but i didn't, so. also, you have to do one of the most confusing quests in the game with only two characters as like your second or third one while all of that other stuff is happening. (i played it second. i probably would've quit the game if i tried it first.) and armic's is similarly a bit like riki's from what i've heard; you're supposed to find stuff and there aren't so many structured/main quest elements, although rather than a specific macguffin item i understand it's more like "[x] material" that you might craft or find already in the form of a loot weapon. (it is the other one described as being pretty hard, so that's also like riki...)
 
Well, I'm at the final boss of Asellus, but it seems like there's some additional stuff I haven't seen, so I'm going to go hunt for that. Though I suppose it could be one of those cases where I've already missed the cutoff? We shall see!
 
Power went out so I took the opportunity to just breeze through the last of the emperors’ dungeons... or should I say, first of the empress’s dungeon... And I do mean breeze. No power, no time to waste, fully skipped the endless barrage of enemies. That would’ve been... annoying to me if I was doing it at normal battle speed and with no option to skip. Was there another way I missed? I don’t regret doing it my way at all...

Random battles don’t seem that exciting at this point because the game will not be letting me see DSC this playthrough and I’m not sure what else to look for. However I am finally getting random cool shit from/for robots with little understanding as to why now. (I know it’s just a short game and I don’t have much experience) Everyone has a decently powerful attack which seem good enough for the boss battles. I will do random battles often and sometimes fun things happen. I admit, probably have more punching skills among my team than anything else, but there’s some diversity...

Pleased that Cotton is still definitively pulling their weight with strong single target attacks and a powerful aoe that’s as good as Rouge’s vermillion whatever. Thunder is also good, if a bit less desirable (skill wise) and has a healing spell. Bumped Slime for Time Lord and I’m not sure how to make use of him bc I cannot give him an apparently broken combination. Before I enter the final dungeon I guess I should figure out which monster I’m supposed to absorb in the bio lab to give him good stats, I guess? I’ve given him the gift of shadow magic; is that useful at all? I’m glad he’s there but he’s probably the character on my teams I least understand how to use well at this point. (Granted, the powerful monster skill I’d absorbed for him was countered by the first boss I fought him with which maybe colored my impression bc I haven’t had him that long) I can see how time magic would be useful on other characters but not him, right now. Lot I don’t understand, of course. Mystics can learn magic like anyone, right? They just can’t glimmer weapon skills?

Still have not bothered learning heroic skills with Red. Hasn’t been necessary up to this point. Maybe I should try. BUT maybe I should just try to finish this as is, provided I can skip most random battles in the final dungeon. Really like this game and that aspect in particular makes it very convenient for my schedule.

Will not be doing the arcane quest this playthrough.
Pretty sure Alkaiser's special techs can only be used when transformed into Alkaiser, making that the only way to ever glimmer more. You can get BJ&K, EngineerCar, and Rabbit to be a backup party while you grind out Alkaiser techs. It's still contrived but hey.

I guess the other option is to wait until the last dungeon when you're permanently Alkaisered anyway, but saving a grind when you're permalocked into "your stats will never go up" form seems like kind of a bad idea.
Use Bright Fist, or whatever it's called now, until you get Al-Blaster, or whatever it's called now.
Practice Al-Blaster until you get Al-Phoenix, whatever it's called now.
When you fight Metal Black, or whatever he's called now, for the third time in his Metal Alkaiser form, wait until he does Dark Phoenix, or whatever it's called now, and then use Al-Phoenix back at him. It'll transform into Re-Al-Phoenix, or whatever it's called now but honestly I like the "Real Phoenix" wordplay there, the last and best Alkaiser move and arguably the best single move in the game.
I thought I missed this but upon researching more, maybe I haven’t. Well, now I’ll try to do it. Also to do: get an octopus board instead of a spriggan suit (apparently I must choose and may even miss both, don’t know) because one of my robot friends has a skill asking for it.
 
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nosimpleway

(he/him)
For stats, you're looking for Suzaku, maybe Snowfolk. Suzaku is +20 to everything except Charm, Snowfolk are +30 to INT, PSY, and VIT.

It looks like Time Leap got a valid nerf, somebody who's tried it may be able to verify. In the original it was "If you cast this on an enemy that hasn't moved yet, that enemy loses its turn. Nothing is immune." With some Suzaku in his gear Time Lord would have +60 speed (on top of his natural... 27? Something like that), so not much is going before he does, so he could shut down anything (including scenario bosses).
From what I'm seeing, it's now "target enemy goes last in this round", which is a lot less good but also doesn't completely neuter the game.

Originally the combination that broke the game (by accident, rather than Time Leap doing it by design) was to use Overdrive to give TL eight turns, and on the last turn, use Stasis Rune. When Stasis Rune wore off, the "take eight turns at once" status from Overdrive would still be on TL for the rest of the battle, which could trivialize pretty much anything.
(Stasis Rune is the popular way to do it, but any dispel effect will let you keep Overdrive past the one turn. Snake Oil that can be bought in Koorong works just fine, and you don't have to wait for Stasis to wear off.)
Anyway, seems they fixed that bug in the remaster.

I'd say giving him Shadow magic is a good idea, since you can (or could, at least) have a Shadow Servant double the attacks that he did while Overdrive...d. Overdrived? Overdriven? Whatever. Turn eight consecutive attacks into sixteen. That's a lot of Phantasm Shots or Dark Spheres or whatever.
 

Fyonn

did their best!
Unless they fixed it very recently, I can confirm that the Overdrive Stasis trick still works. I used it on Blue's final boss because, like, when else do you get to do that?
 
Unless they fixed it very recently, I can confirm that the Overdrive Stasis trick still works. I used it on Blue's final boss because, like, when else do you get to do that?
Damn. Wish I'd known that before fighting Blue's boss, who gave me a fair bit of trouble.

Have now finished Emilia, Blue, Asellus, and Lute, plus Fuse case files for Asellus and Emilia. Now playing Fuse/Blue.

Next main character might be Riki: I know everyone hates his story, and I'm rubbish with monsters, but I'm hoping the many other characters I've leveled up can provide support. I'm really enjoying the double-speed battles and overpowered NG+ characters: Everything moves so swiftly, and I'm able to see corners of the game I missed when I played it twenty years ago.

Also fun just giving characters ability they really shouldn't have: Rouge is learning sword techs now!
 
Thanks everyone! I think some of these options are closed to me bc I’ve had Fuse the whole game. Can’t visit some mountain. I did end up getting all Red’s Alkaiser skills and looked at a faq. Maybe I misunderstood skills and was using the wrong skills to learn more skills for DSC... nonetheless, don’t think I’ll try. Liza just won’t learn slide. That’s fine. That’s her choice. I did end up doing the Arcane Quest. I am morally unenlightened and didn’t find it charming in the least that I just had to savescum before every battle so Rouge could cast implosion on the Kraken...

I am not going to board the Cygnus yet because I need to do arbitrage to afford stuff in Manhattan. Stop asking! I’m worried I’ll click yes...
 

MetManMas

Me and My Bestie
(He, him)
I am morally unenlightened and didn’t find it charming in the least that I just had to savescum before every battle so Rouge could cast implosion on the Kraken...
The kraken fights go from being a major threat to being easy XP if you put some water-resistant (more like water no-selling) gear on your party. You can buy pearl hearts over in Manhattan and the krakens sometimes drop sea stones; both will work for that.
 
Oh, that’s a necessity. I still don’t think I ever killed one despite going all out until I learned Implosion was an instant kill, sometimes. I had to reset if Rouge was charmed/berserk/sleeping. To add insult to injury, Cotton transformed from something kind of cool into something a bit mundane, absorbing Ink, and is still there. (Got rid of Ink) It’s not a big deal. It’s over now...

Last thing I did was try to absorb something, anything in the bio research lab to up Time Lord’s stats. Took a bit but that’s done. I guess I could try to get him to learn tower but I think I’ll just try to finish the game and collect whatever nonsense I’ve committed to (that Heroic Art from a robot battle and an octopus board, somehow)
 
I have beaten this video game... kind of by the skin of my teeth because forgot to rearrange Time Lord's spells before the final battle and don't know what I'm doing anyway. Red's ending was extremely funny. I don't know if I'll take a break or try another scenario. Not sure how Fuse's works. I take it you at least... do a bit related to other main characters once you beat them?

My playtime is in the hundreds of hours because of the weird way this game's internal clock functions with at least the switch.
 

Peklo

Oh! Create!
(they/them, she/her)
If you want to retain accurate file times on Switch, pause the game before putting the system to sleep if you keep the game running when you're not playing. That prevents it from counting up when the system's asleep.
 

Paul le Fou

24/7 lofi hip hop man to study/relax to
(He)
Yeah, my first two files both had that happen before I figured out what I was and wasn't doing. NG+ carries over the play time, too, so my current file is also 13-15 hours longer and will likely stay that way. :(
 

nosimpleway

(he/him)
I keep saying "I assume they fixed this in the remaster" but it seems like they left the glitches intact. Because people liked having them?

which is a weird flex, I guess, but honestly infinite money and an easy way to get midgame gear made the game a lot more tolerable to play, even when I was younger and had more patience
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
I keep saying "I assume they fixed this in the remaster" but it seems like they left the glitches intact. Because people liked having them?

which is a weird flex, I guess, but honestly infinite money and an easy way to get midgame gear made the game a lot more tolerable to play, even when I was younger and had more patience
I gotta be honest, you don't seem to have a high opinion of this game despite (?) doing an LP of it and knowing all the ins and outs for lots of things about it. I don't wanna be confrontational or anything, it's just the impression I get from reading a lot of your posts in this thread.
 
I keep saying "I assume they fixed this in the remaster" but it seems like they left the glitches intact. Because people liked having them?

which is a weird flex, I guess, but honestly infinite money and an easy way to get midgame gear made the game a lot more tolerable to play, even when I was younger and had more patience

I'm sure it made the game easier and more fun for me but one thing I didn't think about much until the end: I missed out on opportunities to get skills bc my robots kept going first with their powerful heavy weapons. Not a big deal.

Anyway, Fuse/Red done now. Fun. I didn't bother doing any sidequests. I guess for fairness sake I kinda wanna use Ren (?) so he can participate more.... Don't really see a future in which I try to make the boss battles harder, though. Not what I want out of any experience. I enjoyed handily defeating Boss X with minimal preparation or thought after just having a tough time with him.
 

nosimpleway

(he/him)
I gotta be honest, you don't seem to have a high opinion of this game despite (?) doing an LP of it and knowing all the ins and outs for lots of things about it. I don't wanna be confrontational or anything, it's just the impression I get from reading a lot of your posts in this thread.
It's complicated. SaGa Frontier is one of those games I really want to like, and I was still in the "Squaresoft can do no wrong" mentality coming off of the SNES library when I played it. I had fond memories of it when I chose it for my LP. And... man. Those rosy nostalgia glasses came right off when I replayed it in... uh lemme check... 2013. I did the LP, including the usual LP stuff of explaining backstory elements (what is Cube?) and showing off bugs and exploits and so on. So yeah, I know a lot about it.

I like the setting, such as it is. I like a lot of the individual gameplay elements. I think some of the story hooks are rad.
I'm not a SaGa veteran or anything so this thread has already taught me that a lot of things I considered gameplay flaws are just how that series is, but even with those in mind I don't think the game is all that fun to actually play.

And everything I just said goes double for SaGa Frontier 2.
 
That is pretty much the opposite of my experience with the game, which is that I have memories of disliking it because it confused me as a child who basically wanted it to be Final Fantasy VII-2, but coming back to it recently and approaching it on its own merits I loved it and realized I like what it's doing more than the vast majority of JRPGs.
 
Couldn't figure out the trick to the
Magma Slimes in Virgil's dungeon
in Riki's quest, which seemed to be an abstruse puzzle battle. What clue was I missing? Did I have to kill them in a specific order? Nope — I looked at a FAQ and apparently
there are just a lot of them
.

Riki's quest: The worst.
 

Fyonn

did their best!
Yeah, that fight is probably the worst one in the entire game. If there were fewer of them, or if they didn't always act first, that would do so much to make it better.
The only real solution to that fight is bring several gunners with AoE capability and Quick Shot.
You can mitigate it a bit by bringing mechs with high LP and putting everyone else in the back row, especially Riki.
 

nosimpleway

(he/him)
You can also put your heavy-hitters and high-LPers in a separate party and let Riki sit that one out. If he runs out of LP it's gaaaaaame over, and 6 LP is standard for monster transforms. For a fight that's guaranteed to last at least six rounds that's a damn high risk.

Good news is that mecs get a ton of LP, EngineerCar and T260 can be brought up to speed pretty easily with the right equips, so you don't have to go fight a lot to get them decent stats. Kylin's got Reverse Gravity. Double Gale on your 'umies is a big plus.

For your monsters: If you can swing OgreLord as a monster form, that's got 10 LP (the most a monster can get) and it's got decent INT for Reverse Gravity. You'll need Ground Hit and Double Axe. Black Dragon is always popular, with 8 LP. Kraken has 8 LP and you need Ink and either Mighty Cyclone or Maelstrom to get it, so that solves the need for an AoE skill too.
 
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