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The SaGa Thread

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
That formation was my go-to for the rest of the game when I learned it. It's exceedingly effective in almost all situations, which I think I managed to gauge pretty well in fighting everything I could, including the superbosses.
I gotta admit, it is working better than I expected it to.

The next thing I did was investigate the Armed Merchant defection I was told about. This quest went extremely well and I wonder if I was actually overleveled for it? I made it to fight Garon in Nuono via Cliff Chevalier, and there was a "boss" fight of some human enemies, like it played the boss music, but the enemies in that fight were the exact same ones as another human group I just fought. I have thought that some of the encounters in quests are fixed groups, so I'm assuming my battle rank was equivalent to whatever this fixed group is set to.

After that, I investigated the Gemstone Mines because all the miners ran away. At the bottom was a spooky magic crystal, and it had an option of smashing it or not. So I smashed it, then there was another option of picking up the fragments or leaving them there. The Emperor makes a... concerning remark about its remaining magic power, so I'm just like... well ok I'll take it, I guess... hopefully it doesn't drain all my LP over time or something!
 

Pajaro Pete

(He/Himbo)
RomSag2 really was so ambitious as an open world game by giving quests multiple endings and sometimes multiple paths through
 

Positronic Brain

Out Of Warranty
(He/him)
How in hell does Kawazu gets all his games remastered for several platforms while we are still waiting on FF remasters for Switch?
 

Peklo

Oh! Create!
(they/them, she/her)
Let's go Sif!

Romancing SaGa for Super Famicom was the first of these I ever finished so at this point it's beginning to develop some sentimental nostalgia to it, and I'd been putting off the remake in hopes of just this kind of revival. Glad we still have Kawazu for everything he does and makes happen.
 
Huh, I was expecting SaGa Frontier 2 to be the next remaster, but I'll happily take this. Minstrel Song was fantastic, maybe my favorite PS2 RPG.
 

Rosewood

The metal babble flees!
(she/her)
I have fond memories of the PS2 version of Romancing Saga as the first game I spent extensive time strategizing a win for, using the US printed guide, some incomplete translated info from the Perfect Guide (or something like that), and the GameFAQS forum. It's the only SaGa game I've gotten past the first half-hour of much less finished. (I might have said something along these lines earlier in the thread, if so, sorry for the repetition.) ETA: @Peklo mine was a Sif MC playthrough!

ETA I also remember @Pajaro Pete (different user name at the time) providing useful info about "the drug trade" on the previous version of the forum. And some lore about the gods? that could have been someone else

In any case, I'm looking forward to the remaster of (I assume) the earlier version of it.
 
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Lokii

(He/Him)
Staff member
Moderator
Huh, I was expecting SaGa Frontier 2 to be the next remaster, but I'll happily take this. Minstrel Song was fantastic, maybe my favorite PS2 RPG.

I'm worried skipping over Frontier 2 means they're not able to make it look good in HD...
 
I'm worried skipping over Frontier 2 means they're not able to make it look good in HD...
Oh yeah, that might be it. The filter they used for Frontier's backgrounds probably wouldn't be great for Frontier 2's art style. Would explain skipping Unlimited Saga as well. They were able to remaster Legend of Mana, though, so maybe there's still some hope.
 
Romancing SaGa for Super Famicom was the first of these I ever finished so at this point it's beginning to develop some sentimental nostalgia to it, and I'd been putting off the remake in hopes of just this kind of revival. Glad we still have Kawazu for everything he does and makes happen.

I'm also in the boat of having played the SFC game (although not as my first time finishing one of these) but waiting around in the hopes that they'd port this remake to modern systems. Very happy to see this announcement.

I'm worried skipping over Frontier 2 means they're not able to make it look good in HD...

I wouldn't read too much into it at this point in time. Whatever principle they have for prioritizing these, it's definitely something other than strictly chronological.
 

Pajaro Pete

(He/Himbo)
ETA I also remember @Pajaro Pete (different user name at the time) providing useful info about "the drug trade" on the previous version of the forum. And some lore about the gods? that could have been someone else

In any case, I'm looking forward to the remaster of (I assume) the earlier version of it.

I definitely remember posting the mythology stuff from the Ultimania book, but I unfortunately no longer have the laptop that had all those scans on it
 

spines

cyber true color
(she/her, or something)
picked up my taria file in scarlet grace again. i wasn't very far in, but now that i've been faked out on a chapter ending a couple times already and things have returned to slow and aimless wandering, i'm kind of curious if this one stretch of the game is going to take nearly as long as my balmaint playthrough (where, to be honest, i didn't really follow through very many sidequest lines through at all, the lack of ability to wander and explore through most of the game was a bit of a downer and made starting on stuff relatively unappealing (since so many regional questlines seem to take so long...), even though balmaint and arthur themselves had amusing reactions to most things). in fact...arthur is currently one of the characters i keep running into, along with mondo, as i wandered backwards around the whole world before finally taking the teleporter to kei like i was apparently supposed to the whole time

i have already gotten a bunch of characters, a majority of whom i've never had before, and barely seen, and i've been a lot more stubborn about sidequests and gotten some scenes that seem to be fairly generalized but i didn't get equivalents of even on my urpina playthrough. by now i've ranked the smithy up to 9 already although it's not really making the game much easier, the battle rank really caught up hard several hours ago and the fights have been pretty constant lp trades for progress. i'm at least trying to keep taria up as much as possible so she can become the ultimate mage; it's pretty slow going but i'm close to having a solid foundation of stuff to cast in all five elements, and kahn's becoming a hardy tank with the greatsword whose defensive powers are really coming in clutch even as he's not too easy to kill anymore, but i'm having to cycle through quite a lot of other characters to keep on going.

it really only took a couple battles to really get back in the swing of the game though, and remember once again how exciting and great it is, and i'm mostly enjoying the feeling of really having to try some things i didn't as balmaint, in terms of formations, abilities, and overall strategies. taria's been a great lead so far as well, as someone who's more far more knowledgeable about the world than the others while still having some quirks of her own. and i didn't actually do the phoenix quest at all with the other two characters, so i'm excited to see it through this time...however much longer that takes. i was doing some of the glyphs in megdasse before i left off last night, but tonight anything could happen
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
11 weeks until...


Also, took a look at the eShop description and there's some details about what's new here:

▷New Elements
In addition to a full HD graphical upgrade, various new features expand the gameplay even further.

■ The sorceress Aldora can now be recruited!
The sorceress Aldora, who once traveled together with the legendary hero Mirsa, appears in her original form. Experience new events where she recounts the journeys of Mirsa first hand.

■Unique and interesting characters now made playable!
Fan-favourite Schiele finally joins your adventures and characters such as Marina, Monica and Flammar can now also be recruited.

■Enhanced bosses!
Several bosses now appear as super powerful enhanced versions! Take on these terrifying adversaries to a new arrangement of the battle music score.

■Improved playability!
Various new features have been added to make your play experience even more convenient, such as a high speed mode, mini maps, and a “New Game +” option that lets you carry over your progress when you play through the game again.

■And even more...
  ・New classes to expand the breadth of gameplay.
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
It's been too long since I played the game, so none of those newly recruitable characters are familiar. But that's a nice addition regardless.
 

Peklo

Oh! Create!
(they/them, she/her)
Schiele being playable is huge since she's one of the three Wicked Gods the game is about as Schirach, along with her siblings Saruin and Death. All have previously been the final boss or optional superbosses of the game, but you could not recruit any of them before despite there being lingering data in the game code since the SFC days suggesting that it was in the cards for her and Death at some point during development. SaGa remasters continue being the best in the business exactly because they pick up these dropped threads from decades prior and integrate them into the new releases.
 

Paul le Fou

24/7 lofi hip hop man to study/relax to
(He)
I'm looking forward to this one. Much better than trying to figure out the PS2 emulator I downloaded to play Minstrel Song a while ago!
 

spines

cyber true color
(she/her, or something)
i was in from the announcement, and this sounds great. i only went through one run on the original release since by the time i was thinking about going again there were rumblings that they might take another go at this game, so i've been waiting a couple years now for this release. and in particular "new classes" is extremely exciting, not just because it's a pretty fun element of the game as it is, but it also makes me think that when/if they get to unlimited it makes it's a lot more likely they'll take the opportunity to rebalance and maybe add to some of the skill trees which i honestly think is one of that game's biggest faults as it stands
 
Dang, here I was just hoping they'd base the remaster on the Japanese version so the herb and ore gathering skills would be useful. I guess I'm still hoping for that, but they've already confirmed something better. I wonder whether they're recording new voice lines for the newly playable characters?
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
Bumping this thread because for some dang reason, I've decided to start a new file in Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song despite the remaster coming out in... 5 weeks? I picked Aisha this time, who I don't think I've ever picked before. Her intro segment is so hilariously unguided I daresay it is the quintessential Narrative SaGa Experience: the narrator says "One day, Aisha decides to set off on her favorite mount." So you get a horse and leave to the Steppes outside her nomad village... but there's literally nothing much to do and you're the only character in the party. The trigger for advancing anything is to die in battle, at which point Prince Neidhart comes in to save you and takes you back the village to talk to your father into subjugating your people into the kingdom. I've been playing for 5 hours now and there has been no elaboration on that last narrative thread yet; perhaps it's because I initially refused to go with the Prince to Crystal City? Anyway, I made a new thread for SaGa Frontier Remastered, so I think I'll make one for Minstrel Song Remastered as well? I don't anticipate Minstrel Song getting quite the same traction on this board as SF, though, but perhaps I will be surprised.
 

spines

cyber true color
(she/her, or something)
i didn't see the neidhart storyline much at all when i played as aisha, but yeah, that intro definitely threw me for a loop

i do feel like a lot of the reactions in the frontier thread were "this game is really weird" which minsaga is a lot less likely to see. it's still a little obscure and the early game progression was a bit rough on my first playthrough, but i feel like as a game it's somewhat more "normal" and the implications of your choices feel more immediate and less esoteric, since there's so much common content and stuff like the classes give you goals and expectations for character building. it's a game where you can play it once and feel satisfied you've seen it a lot of it too...i'm honestly really excited about it, more than anything else that's released all year haha
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
i didn't see the neidhart storyline much at all when i played as aisha, but yeah, that intro definitely threw me for a loop
I had somehow guessed what I needed to do, so I suppose I've played enough of these games to finally start predicting their idiosyncratic quest triggers.

it's a game where you can play it once and feel satisfied you've seen it a lot of it too
Yeah I agree with this too. I know there's quests that are legit failable and/or missable if you don't do stuff right or quick enough or whatever, but as far as I've seen, those ones aren't really that numerous.

I rewatched a trailer for the remaster and I can immediately appreciate the up-res of all the environments, plus what seems to be a higher framerate. The only other QoL-type thing I hope they add, and they probably will?, is the ability to rotate the dang camera yourself.
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
So one thing about Scarlet Grace I've really come to appreciate now is that it gives each protagonist a full entourage at the very start. And even more than that, it gives them all some semblance of a personality rather than feeling extremely generic. Previous SaGa games do tend to have at least 1 ally start with your chosen protagonist, but never a full party I don't think. And in the case of Minstrel Song, it also has generic unnamed characters you can recruit, but they are designed to be replaced soon due to their very low LP total. This is also an aspect of Scarlet Grace that contributes to being an easy recommendation for series newcomers; a new player doesn't have to worry much about how to recruit a full party or even worry about building an "unbalanced" party, because all 4 protagonists have an adequately balanced party right away.
 
The Minstrel Song Remaster comes out in two days! I'm considering a rare (for me) release day purchase, at least shortly after, because I want to learn about platform differences, if any.

Title searching on twitter, it looks like at least one reviewer says it runs well on PC:


It seems to be reviewing in the mid-70s so far, which might seem low but that's substantially better than the initial release. The score doesn't mean much to mean in itself because I know I like these games much more than the average reviewer, but it is interesting to see more understanding that these games aren't broken just because their priorities are different than a Final Fantasy-like.

On the other hand, this is funny and I hope it's elaborated on at some point:

 
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