Saga Series

[Anonymous No.4891092]

Sup /vr/? I'm looking to get into the Saga series. You guys used to have an amazing Saga General, and I was hoping some of you guys were still around. Where's a good place to start with the series? I was told either Saga Frontier 1 or 2. What would you say is the best entry point for someone that's never played a Saga game in their life?

[Anonymous No.4891198]

>>4891092
I would definitely help you if this were the SaGa general but as is I'm kind of tired of typing out why you should go play SaGa Frontier and then come back to talk about it.

[Anonymous No.4891205]

SaGa Frontier 1, definitely. 2 is an odd game. Good, but not as good as the first in my opinion. The Romancing SaGa games on SFC are good too, as well as the Final Fantasy Legend series, although those are a bit dated.

[Anonymous No.4891283]

>>4891092
I started with SaGa Frontier, it's great. Starting with anybody is fine, but Red's story is a good first choice if you're having trouble deciding. Riki and Asellus might be difficult on your first run.

[Anonymous No.4891926]

SaGa Frontier 1 is a great starting game because it has a lot of mechanics from the other games while not always being overwhelming. SF1 lacks event rank like the Romancing SaGa games and some of the quests are a bit more straight forward compared to RS1 and 3. It gives you a little taste of the Gameboy games with various races that develop differently from one another and has the free scenario system from RS1 and 3. You get sparking, combos, and exploration (even if the game itself is linear) coupled with the series more lenient battle rank so it is harder to grind yourself into an unwinnable situation.

[Anonymous No.4892095]

>>4891092
The first Frontier is a good place to start as it's the one that encapsulates the biggest amount of staple mechanics in the modern series' standard while also being accessible to newcomers.
Romancing SaGa 3 is a close second, but it lacks some other modern concepts like comboing that have been introduced by Frontier, it is also another very accessible game with its own share of unique mechanics you won't find anywhere else.
The Gameboy SaGa games(AKA Final Fantasy Legends in the west) are also a good starting point but bear in mind that outside of a few common core elements they barely play like the modern series, they're still good though outside of vanilla SaGa 3 which is the black sheep of the series due to being the only game in the series to not have been directed or produced by Kawazu, the series' creator, but both SaGa 2 and SaGa 3 got extensive remakes for the NDS and so SaGa 3 actually got the overhaul it needed to become a full fledged SaGa game.
The first SaGa is also the world's first handheld RPG and had a massive influence on the industry as a whole, for both its plot and gameplay, it is dated nowadays but it's an important piece of history for the industry.

Generally speaking you can progress through the series in either production order or how you want, both have their advantages.
If you start by production order you'll see how the series evolved and you'll be able to learn mechanics in an orderly manner, making each game a bit easier to get into and also being able to appreciate and understand how the series' evolved in such a way, the problem with production order is that there might be a few bumps along the road in terms of difficulty/complexity/polish.
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[Anonymous No.4892097]

If you play in a free order you can streamline your experience by playing the games that appeal more to you in terms of mechanics, difficulty or scenarios, SaGa games have all sets of completely unique mechanics and design choices to each entry that make each game stand on its own, even when certain games share a similar idea it is always elaborated upon or redesigned to work in a different way so the experience will still be fresh even if you play games randomly.

However, the games have gone through a very steady and defined evolution that decidedly changed the games' nature, unlike other series like Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy, SaGa changed its nature consistently through the time up to this day where the "contemporary" standard looks and plays very differently from the older standards.
This doesn't mean that the series became a completely different thing, in fact the series' identity is still very consistent and true to itself, but the way you play the games changed considerably, if once can divide the games into eras it would be somewhat like this:

>Old/Original
-SaGa
-SaGa 2
-SaGa 3
The beginning of the series, linear, Dungeon Crawler-ish games that created the very basic mechanical design of the series, from SaGa 3 onwards the series drops Character Creation for predefined yet customizable characters.

>Classic/Romancing
-Romancing SaGa
-Romancing SaGa 2
-Romancing SaGa 3
Beginning of the series as we know it, introduces non linearity, multiple MCs and key series mechanics like sparking, formations and so on.

>Modern
-SaGa Frontier
-SaGa Frontier 2
-SaGa 2 DS(Remake)
-SaGa 3 DS(Remake)
-Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song(Remake)
-The Last Remnant("Gaiden" game/Not Retro)
The first Frontier introduces more key mechanics like combos while the second reintroduces old mechanics like weapon durability, the rest comes much later but still share the same design philosophy as the early games, Frontier 2 might be considered a transition title to the last era.
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[Anonymous No.4892106]

>Contemporary
-Unlimited: Saga(Not Retro)
-SaGa Scarlet Grace(Not Retro)
Extreme focus on abstraction and tranlation of board game design and mechanics make the game behave and play differently while still sharing the same philosophy.

Now, the series basic design philosophy is:
>Player freedom
The players should be free of progressing through the game(Though that's true from the Classic era onwards as the GB games are all linear) and play the game how they want, there's very little handholding or railroading, even SF2 lets you progress through the game's plot in a chronological non linear way if you want to.
All characters are freely customizable though some of them might have traits unique to them or other quirks like locked equipment, TLR is perhaps the more restrictive title but customization works on a different basis altogether.
>Replayability
The games are focused on being replayable, either through rerunning the game with a different party setting(GB SaGa/TLR/SF2) and/or simply by taking a different path that leads to different events or outcomes, the games have many events, many of which are dynamic and the casts are also massive, not to mention that many games also have multiple main characters with their own story and content unique to them.
>Exploring new design possibilities
The series isn't afraid of cooking up completely new design choices, like having a levelless/EXP.less approach to battles or many signature mechanics like sparking, Battle Rank or the classic era's four races which all grow and behave differently.
That resulted in the series being able to effectively predate many design choices that were used years later by other games or influence the genre as whole, SaGa 3 for instance predated CT's time travel gimmick while Unlimited and Minstrel Song predated Lightning Returns' monster echology system by nearly a decade, or Darkest Dungeon's phobia mechanics.
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[Anonymous No.4892117]

Coincidentially, this approach to mechanics and design made the series pretty niche in the west, and the extreme approach to tabletop-like design also made Unlimited pretty unpopular in Japan too, coupled with the fact that the game's manual was pretty bad, and the game was so different from the rest of the series even veterans had trouble getting the hang of it.

In this place, SaGa has been often called a series made by game designers for game designers and I tend to agree with that sentiment, many people will tell you that SaGa games have no story or nothing interesting outside of game mechanics and I have to disagree with that, SaGa games tend to put story in second place in respect to the mechanical side of the games, but the stories and characters, while often down to earth, are told pretty well and are most often endearing and charming, they just have a different narrative approach than the usual games, relying more on the player's filling the gap and often interpreting things like they want, most narrative from SaGa games tend to be open ended.
Many games in the series end up being a bit rough due to their experimental nature, so you should be prepared for that, but they also give you an experience you'll hardly find anywhere else, which I hope you'll be able to appreciate as much as I do.

One last piece of advice, try to avoid using the western outlets like the western SaGa wiki, they're awfully managed and in the hands of a certain obsessed person you will identify soon enough if you do try to get into that, I'd also recommend you to learn japanese if you already haven't because the games often have very bad localizations which butcher the writing a lot.

Hope you have a good time with the series, and get a lightbulb PTSD fetish like all of us have now.

[Anonymous No.4893058]

Good thread, I was also thinking of getting into the series

[Anonymous No.4893334]

is that a jojo reference

[Anonymous No.4893358]

>>4893334

[Anonymous No.4893378]

>>4893358
post the one where they feed the snakes

[Anonymous No.4893391]

>>4893378
I must have missed that, then again there's so many JoJo fanart for SaGa games.

[Anonymous No.4894461]

Fuck, I've been try to play SaGa Frontier 2 since its euro release, but I just don't GET IT.

It's all so confusing! The story, the fucking combat mechanics, the combo bullshit...!

And then I tried SaGa Frontier 1, and I couldn't play for more than 30 minutes because I had absolutely no idea what the fuck was going on, gameplay and story-wise, which is a big no for me.

FUCK YOU SAGA FRONTIER, YOU LOOK AMAZING, YOU SOUND AMAZING, I WANT TO LOVE YOU BUT YOU JUST WON'T LET ME BECAUSE YOU'RE SO BIZARRE AND CRYPTIC

[Anonymous No.4894527]

I know its not retro but was the latest entry good? That vita one? Just wondering if the series is in a good place now

[Anonymous No.4894536]

>>4894461
have you read the manual for 1? The mechanics are pretty transparent for that game, except maybe monster transformations.

[Anonymous No.4894623]

>>4894536

I only have vague memories about it, but I'm sure it doesn't explain the weird level scaling bullshit, or why there's a character from Treasure Hunter G.

And how about these motherfuckers?

[Anonymous No.4894640]

>>4894623
>weird
it's fairly common, for example BG and TES have it. The only people thrown off by it probably only played FF and DQ their entire life.

[Anonymous No.4894698]

>>4894527
Scarlet Grace is a very good game despite the bizarre premise of having no dungeons, but it works very differently compared to the rest of the series, every major mechanic has been reworked, just to give you a short list of major features:

>Sparking works differently depending on the waza, active waza spark after your actions have been finalized so you effectively get an action for free
>Waza is now learned through weapons, your weapon has a waza skillset you can learn permanently according to the weapon's type, embedded waza are also back but don't need to be sparked.
>Magic works on a new Flux based system, fusing field elements through your equipped wand gives you a chance of sparking a new spell depending on the fusion and your proficiency level with said elements
>Magic has now casting time in terms of turns spent to cast magic, getting stunned while in casting time leads to much butthurt as you can imagine, casting time can also be delayed
>Magic goes back to GB SaGa format, so straightforward damage/buffs/healing, no weird shit like Overdrive or Guard Beast
>Growth is back to the fixed stat model, only HP grows, everything else is fixed and there's more focus on equipment bonus/malus
>BP is now a collective pool working on tabletop rules, each turn or action you do nets you BP depending on your formation
>Formations are effect focused, an incomplete formation is still considered active
>Timeline system manages your position instead of formations, the Timeline system is a more indepth and less broken elaboration of Grandia's own turn management system
>Combos are now Rengeki and are tied to the Timeline system's mechanics, focus on big combo damage has been swapped for in battle benefits like BP discounts
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[Anonymous No.4894703]

>>4894698
>Healing is almost non existent and barely viable when it does, making the battles much more focused than other entries
>Pantheon/gods system is a mixture of SaGa 2 DS and Minstrel Song and ties into formations, battle history and some geographical submechanics
>Forging follows TLR's design but the game doesn't have money, only materials
>Forging has Ranks, the more you forge the higher your rank, you can't forge items on a FR higher than your current rank
>You get materials as rewards for finishing quests or fullfilling battle objectives
>Battle Rank has been reworked into Party Level, Party level is determined by the number of initiated fights AND how many "different" fights you have initiated
>Scenario structure is MC specific, Leonard's scenario is the most freeform(Pretty much what Fuse's scenario should have been), Urpina/Taria have a longer prologue than other characters before you can go freeform, Balmaint is heavily route based and restricts you depending on how you progress through his scenario, route structure is based on SaGa Frontier but with RS2 amounts of event variation
>MCs can get stat bonus/malus through an optional quiz at the beginning of the choice which also determines which MC you get, think of it as the Tarot sections in Ogre Battle games, that also ties into NG+
>Roles from SF2 are back but work differently, you also stack roles
>Scenarios are route based similarly to Frontier, outside of Leonard who has all routes happening at once
>BP, Blessing and Material systems make this game VERY resource management based, though not in the usual sense
>Cast of recruitable characters is up to 78(79) confirmed characters for the rerelease, game follows a Unique/"Generic"/"Semigeneric" base though all characters are effectively unique in more ways than one.
>Scarlet Grace has the highest event and event variation density in the series so far
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[Anonymous No.4894705]

>>4894703
>All characters you meet in the game get an extra Fire Emblem style ending section during the staff roll, each MC also has multiple endings
>Final Boss gets the usual powered up form depending on how you play through the game, though Leonard can choose to fight the normal or super version regardless of his scenario history
>All MCs other than Leonard can get into a Final Boss rush where other particular bosses or even recruitable characters might appear as foes during the final battle depending on how you played through the game and your decisions/scenario history
>You can fight a lot of recruitable characters depending on your decisions, some characters can also be killed off permanently including other MCs
>Game narrative is MC/coprotagonist focused with most of the banter happening between them, the script is the richest and longest in the series

This isn't even a comprehensive list, but most key features are here, I hope you could get an idea of how the game works more or less.
I'd personally say that design wise the series is in a very good place and Kawazu definitely didn't lose his touch given how he personally got his hands dirty on this entry when it comes to most things, he's still a madman.
Of course, Scarlet Grace works very differently from the rest of the series and it is indeed designed as a handheld game you can play in short bursts, so certain elements had to be streamlined or changed coming from previous games, it plays very much as a portable tabletop game, there's even some cute touches here and there like FoW for regions you haven't explored yet, and the popup diorama design for the world map is very endearing, it's a very solid title but it's also very different from most other entries.

Scarlet was also very well received and kickstarted the SaGa Project, which finally gave the series it's own small team and relevance again, expect some surprise next year.

[Anonymous No.4894713]

>>4894705
Very interesting thank you.

[Anonymous No.4894731]

>>4894640
Unsurprisingly, I hate both BG and TSE because I find the gameplay terrible, and the story boring. To each his own.

[Anonymous No.4894746]

>>4894713
You're welcome.
Among other things, Kawazu is going to appear on stage at the Squenix section for this year's TGS, he said he's gonna finally show the Romancing SaGa 3 remaster, announce a release date and talk about it for a bit.

Another thing he's doing lately is tweeting various snippets about Scarlet Grace's lore, mechanics or characters, some of these tweets are very interesting because he talks about certain design choices and what they mean for the series in general.
This one is pretty interesting for instance, if I can attempt a rough translation:

その1. コマンドRPG
バトルでの行動を、じっくり考えながらリストから選ぶのがコマンドRPGです。マンガで、一瞬の行動の間に色んな事を考えてるセリフが出てくる、そんな感じが実体験出来るコマンドRPG。それがサガです。

-Number 1: "Command based" RPG
Carefully thinking and selecting actions through a command list during battle is what makes a command based RPG.
In Manga, various dialogue lines are used to describe various things and decisions happening during action sequences, Command RPGs also recreate this design choice in their own way. SaGa is like that.
>>4894731
Classic Battle Rank mechanics aren't orthodox level scaling since you get batches of new enemies altogether, certain bosses do get more HP depedning on your BR in Frontier though, still, there's games that also lack BR mechanics entirely, the the GB games or SaGa Frontier 2.
I'm not sure whether the american manual mentions BR, but the Japanese one doesn't, mostly because the series already adopted that designed since the SNES days so it was taken for granted and really not mentioned anymore other than giving you tables for BR variations in the various Ultimania guides.
It's not even a real problem anyway since it's pretty hard to get fucked over by BR in most games unless you don't listen to people telling you to not stop and grind mindlessly.

[Anonymous No.4894831]

>>4894746
I like how the voice acted saga games have party members who complain when you're still grinding and it's time to go and beat the game already.

[Anonymous No.4894857]

>>4891092
Final fantasy legend

[Anonymous No.4895028]

>>4894831
Party banter has always been pretty good in the games that had it.
I also like how characters react when somebody gets KO'd, like Galahad going "COWARD! FACE ME!" or Gray's "This doesn't look so good..." when you're in a bad spot, and of course Saruin's taunting on you during the last battle if things go south.
Actually TLR also had a lot of detailed party banter during battles for a lot of situations, I don't think I've seen such care put into it in most other games, especially since the cast was massive.

[Anonymous No.4895550]

Just today I noticed that the intro themes for RS1 and SF1 sound somewhat similar in composition. Hellion even fused them together.

Which is your favorite intro in the series?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-uXfpI5f8A

[Anonymous No.4895584]

>>4895550
gonna have to go with saga frontier though if pressed to explain why I'm just not sure

[Anonymous No.4895695]

>>4895550
In terms of music, leaving out non retro entries these are my personal favorites by far:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-sHCj0IFvo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiEp-YGQMu4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxYrNVc_0qA

As far as game intro in general I'd have to agree with you and choose Romancing SaGa 2, the intro cutscene music is ominous and mysterious, the narration and imagery sets up the tone of the story and the main intrigue very well and seeing the fight against the Spriggan play out as an actual in game fight is a very nice touch.
Romancing SaGa 3 also has a cool looking intro but it lacks the flair of 2 for me overall, very curious to see how the remaster will handle it, can't wait.

The rest of the games have barely any real intro sequences, the Frontier games have a short effect for the main title and no cutscene to set up the game like the other games and the GB games aren't much different, though SaGa 2's small prologue with Dad getting out of the window is still endearing in its simplicity.

[Anonymous No.4897013]

Can you fight subier in RS2 if you skip to the final emperor in the first generation? Or do you need time to pass for the pirate ship stuff to occur?
And how are a character's starting magic spells determined? Can they be manipulated as you please, within the available spell pool? I need to know whether to hold back on levelling spells until I get my final party in a playthrough without the magic research center.

[Anonymous No.4897249]

>>4897013
>Can you fight subier in RS2 if you skip to the final emperor in the first generation?
Yeah.
>Or do you need time to pass for the pirate ship stuff to occur?
Time still passes if you do a Last Emperor run, you can do all quests but the Mermaid quest and the Dark Magic route in Komulune, you can still initiate and complete both of these but you end up getting an "unorthodox" game over if you do complete them since these two quests force an abdication to which the last emperors aren't immune to.
>And how are a character's starting magic spells determined?
Global party level determines that, together with your characters' class iirc.
>Can they be manipulated as you please, within the available spell pool?
I guess you can to a certain extent, though I do not remember the classes' layouts for those, you should look that up.
Imperial Guards do tend to start with Moonlight and Sword Barrier at high levels, whereas Tacticians end up with Stone Rain and I suppose Crimson Flare and Galaxy if you level their proficiencies high enough.

Also, on a slightly unrelated side note:
Leith Torles's surname has been mistranslated, his surname is actually Torres, as a homage to Fernando Torres because Kawazu was deeply impressed by his mad dribbling skills at the time Unlimited was being worked on.

https://twitter.com/superkamisama/status/1016888687399862273

This is funny because while Unlimited did get many arbitrary name changes like other games in the series Leith's surname lost its reference altogether whereas Kong Ming retained his, I guess Torle is also actually named Torre at this point.

[Anonymous No.4898053]

>>4897249
From what I've heard the first generation works a bit differently in some areas; for example you're stuck with Hiraga the inventor #1 and only his descendants can create the windmaker and stuff. Therefore the canal fort is mandatory in a Final Emperor run because you need the bard's instrument the pirate guy gives you to reach Wagnas. Another thing would be molemen not repopulating without a generation skip, meaning you can't recruit them.
In theory you should be able to get the thief, brawler, and amazon as emperors (for formations) within the first generation then suicide*100 to get to Final.
It's neat that different classes have different spells they prefer. I would like to look up all sorts of information but I'm not sure where to look; I remember using the Avalon University site but it's dead now.

[Anonymous No.4898924]

in SF2, what are those effects in battle that keep popping up, like VIGOR UP after a wood skill is used?

[Anonymous No.4899379]

>>4898053
Yes, a Final Emperor run does work a bit differently as you said, obviously you do not have as much freedom as in a normal run, certain events develop a bit differently, and as I mentioned before, you also have to skip a quest or two.
>I would like to look up all sorts of information but I'm not sure where to look
Kaerulabo is my go to when I need to look at some in depth info about mechanics in RS2/3, however I'm not sure whether they also had info about each class' spell tables, and I don't really know where I could redirect you for that, I'm sorry.
>>4898924
They're buffs/debuffs relative to either your target's stats or your equipment.
You can find more indepth info in here:

http://seesaawiki.jp/w/se4753/d/%c6%c3%bc%ec%b8%fa%b2%cc%b5%bb%bd%d1%b0%ec%cd%f7#content_3_10

[Anonymous No.4899552]

At my final emperor in RS2. How's this for a final squad?
Emperor M
Crusader F
Ninja/Brawler
Iris or Moleman
Imperial Guard

Also the only fights I have left are the rematch at the sealed tomb, Dantarg, and I think Noel(I almost beat him but chose to run away, so IDK of I can fight him again). Any idea where to find Dantarg? I'm not getting any Intel on him and I feel like I've gone pretty much everywhere.

[Anonymous No.4899576]

>>4899552
You forgot the Imperial Guard's gender, you can beat the final boss with any class combination as long as you gear up well enough and have the right spells, that's what you should worry about the most.

You can fight Noel again and Dantarg roams in the Saigo clan's territory, his location changes depending on your playthroughs, did you to the quest with the lost child and the mu? If you didn't he's probably there.

The final boss fight is pretty brutal so don't be surprised if you wipe out a few times, preparation is half the fight as always, but this one really tests your knowledge of the game, unless of course you have enough fuel for a certain crutch spell.

[Anonymous No.4899605]

>>4899576
Not sure what the big difference is between the genders. I had a female for emperor last gen so I'll probably pick a male guard.

I didn't do the lost child quest so I'll go look for him there. Also I hope you're not talking about hasten time.

[Anonymous No.4899630]

>>4899605
>Not sure what the big difference is between the genders
You're eventually realize that very fast, trust me.
>Also I hope you're not talking about hasten time.
Is that how it's called in the localization?

[Anonymous No.4900850]

Who are your favorite units in romancing saga 2? What are your preferred formations, equipment, tactics, etc?

[Anonymous No.4901161]

>>4900850
Coppelia.
Amazon&rapidstream
obsidian spear was on all my attackers
Three casters hidden in mist cover, piling support skills on emperor and Coppelia (got me through 7 eroes on my second attempt)

[Anonymous No.4901323]

>>4894623
I thought it was pretty cool the Dev title for the Monster Transformations was "Devil Life System"

[Anonymous No.4901339]

>>4900850
>You'll never be a Kungfu David Bowie hanging out listening to the harp

[Anonymous No.4901461]

>>4900850
>Who are your favorite units in romancing saga 2?
Gerald, he is best boy and his golden armor set is balling.
City Thief Female, Cat has great a character and colour scheme, and I also ship her with Gerald
Holy Orders, great design and story all around
Saigo Clan, I like their poses and sprites
Hannibal because 25 STR
Coppelia for obvious reasons
Last Empress because of her amazing design
>What are your preferred formations
Rapid Stream, Holy Wall, Mu Fence
>equipment
Amethyst Axe and Liberty Staff
>tactics
Smashing everything with Galaxy, if that can even be considered tactics, using the Seven Heroes signature waza, though that requires some grinding and things like Red Dragon Wave or Marionette are kinda shitty when you use them yourself.

[Anonymous No.4901636]

Brehs
It's finally happening
Frontier Remake SOON

[Anonymous No.4901765]

>>4901323
that one sounds a bit too on the nose for a devilman reference though

[Anonymous No.4902103]

>>4901636
Mixed feels.
I hope they just make a more polished version like the RS2 remake, instead of redesigning the whole game like they did with Minstrel Song.

[Anonymous No.4902110]

>>4901636
I just want my boy fuse, the rest can remain as is

[Anonymous No.4902506]

>>4902103
I can see them adding all the stuff that didn't make it into the original game and maybe adding a few other gimmicks here and there, like the King of Regions 98 quest in the vein of the Zweig tournament.
Gameplay wise there shouldn't be any need to add things like MS did, just polish what's already there and make a few things less broken would be more than enough, just add the new staples like linking enemies and maybe some additional stuff like forging weapons in Scrap, cross combos from Frontier 2 would also help.

To be honest though, I'd really like if they did use some kind of massive battle mode like TLR if you link up too many enemies, that would also be a good way to implement the original squad system so you can use all 15 characters you recruit at once instead of swapping teams.

Another big question is how will the game look like, if Scarlet's anything to go by they'll use a similar character style for the models, albeit with more realistic proportions, I don't see them redesigning the cast either.
>>4902110
Fuse is 100% gonna be a new MC, everybody wants him in and the team knows.

[Anonymous No.4903817]

In RS2 suppose Gerard goes through the canal fort, walks around the continent, and meets the mermaid. Then before making the potion he dies a million times and I end up with the final empress. Once I clear the gemstone mine and meet the Nereid will I be able to do the moonlight comb stuff to recruit her? Or do I need to recruit the Nereid while the mermaid quest is still possible to complete?

[Anonymous No.4904054]

>>4901161
>coppelia
Is this a Hoffmann reference?

[Anonymous No.4904060]

>>4902103
I wouldn't mind the game being remade in the RS3 engine. The pre-rendered graphics of SF were quite frankly hideous. Then again we have the technology to do much nicer pre-renders these days.

[Anonymous No.4904110]

>>4892106
>The series isn't afraid of cooking up completely new design choices
This is what sets SaGa apart, it's a very innovative series and it's what makes it so divisive, even among dedicated fans of the series. It simultaneously throws out and expands upon common JRPG mechanics with controversial results. I've been recommending Alliance Alive on the 3DS as a "transitional" game to those interested in the SaGa series (same director and it shows) but feel a bit overwhelmed by its unapologetic difficulty and unorthodox systems, then tell them to try Legend of Legacy or Minstrel Song, or maybe the SaGa 2 DS remake. If they want to go straight for the deep end I point them towards Romancing SaGa 2.

I tend to ward them away from Unlimited Saga as that is an unorthodox game in an unorthodox series, and the tabletop influences of Mr Koizumi's design philosophy are laid bare. I compare it to a digital tabletop game and tell them one of my friends described it as the "JRPG Final Exam".

The best way to approach the series is to act like you are underleveled and in dire need of new skills at all times. That means using every tool available to you, especially formations. Link related (too big to post)

https://steamusercontent-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/912407416587713977/BFCACD32E4BB7B053F97809173A09107F9DF768A/

[Anonymous No.4904179]

>>4904054
I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

[Anonymous No.4904239]

>>4904060
I thought the game looked good, though that is mostly because of the art direction rather than technology.

[Anonymous No.4905109]

>>4903817
Iirc, you shouldn't need to complete the Mermaid quest to make the nereids available for recruiting, but I'm not quite sure whether you can continue the quest if you mess up with the system that much, especially with a gender change for the Emperor.
You should complete the quest until you give all the moonlight comb to Thetys just to be sure.
>>4904054
It is, Kawazu is a notorious history and art junkie, Romancing SaGa 2 is perhaps the more evident case since all the recruitable characters outside of the unique protagonists follow specific naming conventions that fall into either historical, scientific or artistic fields.
Scarlet Grace is also heavily based on classic Roman history, mixed it up a bit with Mesoamerican influences and also a spice of various world lore, from Irish to chinese, indian and obviously japanese tidbits, Unlimited was also similar, with the whole Iskandar plotline being evidently based on Alexander the Great, the Seven Wonders being a reimagination of our own Seven Wonders or characters like Kong Ming and again, Iskandar, being based on real world figures.

Kobayashi herself isn't much different, she usually sneaks some of her favorite musicians in the casts when she can, Ward from RS3 is based on Slash from Guns'n Roses, Fuse from SaGa Frontier is based on Steward Copeland and Balmaint is suspiciously similar to Gene Simmons, especially given that stealth hint with Simmons' KISS Firehawk Axe bass and the fact that Balmaint is a proficient Axe user due to his background.

SaGa games tend to be pretty meaty when it comes to cultural subtext, and not in a bad or pretentious way, they feel very genuine.
>>4904110
Very curious to see how Koizumi's child will evolve eventually, as one of Kawazu's "students" he has the same taste for exploring new designs, much like Kimura.

[Anonymous No.4905245]

Decide who I play as. But don't pick Riki because Riki sucks.

[Anonymous No.4905251]

>>4905245
Lute

[Anonymous No.4905254]

>>4905245
Play Riki and get good with the DEVIL LIFE SYSTEM, aka the monster transformations

Otherwise play T260G

[Anonymous No.4905264]

>>4905245
play as Blue and use martial arts

when you get Overdrive you're pretty much a Jojo character.

[Anonymous No.4905292]

>>4905264

I like this idea.

[Anonymous No.4905319]

>>4905264
>play as Blue and use martial arts
That's gonna take a while.

[Anonymous No.4905329]

>>4905319
Blue actually has a really high learning rate for most Martial Arts

[Anonymous No.4905337]

>>4905329

And he can recruit Fist of the North Liza

[Anonymous No.4905353]

>>4905329
His STR growth is pretty low though.

[Anonymous No.4905412]

>>4905264
Use the overdrive trick and self combo 8 crossshots with twogun and shoot them 80 times in a row

[Anonymous No.4905435]

>>4905337
And if he wants he can turn Blue into a swordsman since Light Sword is the strongest in the game and comes with a free deflect.

Also its possible to combo Life Sprinkler three times in a 5 hit combo

>>4905353
His starting strength is a bit below average.
I thought the moves you used + the challenge rating of the enemies you were fighting dictated stat growth. I don't recall it being a big issue eitherway

[Anonymous No.4906439]

>A SaGa thread
Bless.

Anyone here play Minstrel Song?
I have a character I intend to have a frontline fighter (Herman) and they have a strong Compassion growth. Compassion raises the chance a character will defend an ally from an attack, the class Castle Knight also raises this.

I'm wondering if it's worth it to push for this niche mechanic or if I'd be better off making this character a Rosalian Officer, which gives a boost to fighter in Defense mode.

[Anonymous No.4906497]

>>4906439
Typically if you're going to have a rosalian officer you can just go ahead and leave them as the only frontliner and put everyone else in the back, mitigating the need for pretty much any secondary physical defensive classes.

Castle Knights on the other hand work best when you have two and then you can even put them in the front and have like, two mages and an archer or something.

none of this does anything to protect you from magical attacks.

[Anonymous No.4906504]

>>4906497
>none of this does anything to protect you from magical attacks.
Is there anything you'd recommend for that? Other than this character, I will also have a martial artist, an archer, and two mages

[Anonymous No.4906527]

>>4906504
there's a number of ways to reduce the magic damage you take, mostly by having good equipment and having magic stats that aren't terrible.

If I told you what else you could do about it that would basically be spoilers.

[Anonymous No.4906539]

>>4906527
Fair enough. SaGa is a pretty interesting series where a lot of the appeal is learning the game's mechanics and
experimenting with them. I always feel pretty sad when i see posts dismissing Romancing SaGa for things like "it has no story, it's nothing but side quests" or "the characters look weird".

[Anonymous No.4906653]

For SaGa frontier 1 is it required to read the manual? I started with Red and I keep getting fucked by BlackX troops in the second trip.

[Anonymous No.4906867]

>>4906539
>I always feel pretty sad when i see posts dismissing Romancing SaGa for things like "it has no story, it's nothing but side quests"
You should feel more sad by knowing that it's also not true in the slightest.
>>4906653
>For SaGa frontier 1 is it required to read the manual?
Yes.
>I keep getting fucked by BlackX troops in the second trip.
Really?
Well, I guess that's the same problem with people losing to Viker in the canal fortress in RS2, it's a simple problem of prioritizing your targets, it might seem hard to do at first but it's more than enough doable, you can also clear Sei's tomb and get all the treasures with Red alone too, which will give you a major powerup if you manage to do it that early.

Don't use Alkaiser as a crutch, once you henshin you won't get any stat growth at the end of the battle.

[Anonymous No.4906872]

>tfw can't enjoy most JRPGs anymore because SaGa is my favorite series and I can't help but compare others to it and they end up lacking for one reason or another
Me playing Minstrel Song during my last high school years is the big culprit. Now, I feel like most JRPG are all the same shallow grindfest that come with different flavors of gimmick slapped on top.
Even the newest series pale compared to SaGa Frontier or Rom SaGa 2

[Anonymous No.4907242]

>>4892117
>One last piece of advice, try to avoid using the western outlets like the western SaGa wiki, they're awfully managed
>and in the hands of a certain obsessed person
I'm really curious as to who you're talking about? Why would I care if they're managing it if they are still providing me with relevant info?

[Anonymous No.4907253]

>>4907242
I'm not that guy but I'm guessing if it's anything like other wikis I've seen then it's laced with half-truths and fanfiction for no fucking reason

[Anonymous No.4907580]

>>4907242
I've looked through the romancing saga 2 stuff and it seems to be a useful translation from japanese sources. Maybe there's a lot of mistakes?

[Anonymous No.4908154]

>>4907242
The problem is that they are not providing you with relevant info at all that you can't already find on places like Gamefaqs or wikipedia.

The western Wiki is a dumpster fire with little actual information at all outside of small character or story bios, which are all either incomplete of wrong.
If you want indepth info about mechanics there's barely ANYTHING at all outside of some copypasted messes from some JP wiki(Most of it for RS2), this is without considering the simple fact that there's not even a proper link for ANY of the pages which contain mechanical information, you have to go to that certain entry's main article then scroll all the way to some general links, and you also have to hope those pages even have any working links at all.

I took a glance at the Scarlet Grace section some time ago and they even got the names of the characters all wrong DESPITE them having an official romanization already, this is without counting how again, there's barely any actual info on anything and what's there is riddled with typos, glaring inaccuracies or just plain wrong info.

[Anonymous No.4908519]

>>4906872
SaGa tends to do that if you really get into it.
The only series which I still enjoy nowadays are SaGa and Metal Max, outside of the odd game that ends up being surprisingly interesting I can't say I can enjoy much when it comes to JRPGs after getting into SaGa.
Though to be frank, I don't even enjoy most WRPGs anymore, the whole levelless approach where what you do shapes your characters instead of relying on arbitrarily assigning points or following a rigid class template did a number on me, I got really spoiled and can't go back to those models anymore unless I'm playing roguelikes.

I recently tried to go back to Neverwinter and I got bored one hour in the game and forgot about it, despite greatly enjoying the game when I was younger, I just can't deal with that stuff anymore after I found out SaGa games, they might be more limited in some aspects but they're a lot more fluid and addictive.

[Anonymous No.4908940]

>>4907580
>blocks after action
Defense boost would be more accurate wording than blocks, not to mention that position 2's defense boost is before action, not after.

[Anonymous No.4909674]

>>4908940
Depending on the formation the character may defend before or after the action. If it's before action the defense is the same as using the defend command, i.e. damage is halved and the block rate with shields (only the ones that add defense, not the ones that evade attacks entirely) is doubled. In the super famicom version the formations that put the character in defense AFTER attacking did not work the same way; damage was still halved but there was no boost to block rate. Does anyone know if this is still the case in the remaster?

[Anonymous No.4910162]

>people who played SaGa frontier claim it's similar to Octopath Traveler

Revs my orbs reading that shit cause Octopath (not retro) is nothing like SaGa games outside of "muh multiple characters"

Anyways, got into SaGa frontier for my first SaGa game, started with Blue first but got frustrating so I started over with Emilia. It's weird how loading into combat is longer than the actual combat. All I do is mash the basic moves to trigger new techs. Am I doing something wrong?

[Anonymous No.4910183]

>>4910162
>I started over with Emilia
How do i get out of the prison?
Last time I played SaGa Frontier, I was playing Emelia and I just couldn't find the exit while running through the pipes of the prison.

[Anonymous No.4910192]

>>4910162
Octopath is a fine game and you're being a bit too autistic in your criteria for similarity, obviously if it's not a SaGa game it's not going to have SaGa systems, that doesn't mean theres nothing in common.

[Anonymous No.4910202]

I miss SaGa general...
I feel isolated because I dont have anywhere to discuss my favorite jrpg series.

[Anonymous No.4910208]

>>4910202
it feels sad saying the same things about them over and over

I can't just replay the games like I used to

everything is missing

[Anonymous No.4910216]

>>4910208
Who am I going to celebrate to when I finally defeat Awakened Jewel Beast in Minstrel Song? Or Shirach, or Death, or even 10 Fatestone Saruin?
Being able to defeat them at all is the reward itself.
Yet... I just wish i had someplace to share my victorious feelings.

[Anonymous No.4910218]

>>4910216
At this point I'm not sure I believe that death was ever actually hard, if I ever had trouble I must have just refused to fight him properly.

The other three all have the same solution and it's a tactic I used in my first playthrough of the game. That made me happy, and then quite sad when I realized it.

[Anonymous No.4910237]

>>4910218
>The other three all have the same solution and it's a tactic I used in my first playthrough of the game. That made me happy, and then quite sad when I realized it.
This tactic of yours is something that has eluded me then.
What is this tactic? I'm at a point where I feel like I'm finally getting a hang of RS:MS's more subtle mechanics yet I can tell I haven't mastered them.

[Anonymous No.4910243]

>>4910237
It would be a real headslapper if I just told you.

You can do something that will prevent these enemies from killing you with huge spell damage, but it doesn't require any spells to achieve this effect.

This same basic technique can counter every single boss in the game and mitigate any advantage if you can survive long enough to pull it off and get it rolling.

[Anonymous No.4910417]

>>4910162
>It's weird how loading into combat is longer than the actual combat
Frontier's loading time are pretty short though, especially compared to other titles of the time, battle don't take much because the battle and animation speed is a lot faster than the average games, and you're still at the beginning of the game, there will be plenty of longer battles later on.
>All I do is mash the basic moves to trigger new techs
That's right, by using techs you'll have a chance to learn new ones, though certain techs can be learned faster by using other base techs, while others can only be learned and used by using Katana type swords and all characters have a list of techs they can and "cannot" learn.
Martial arts and sword techs are learned in the middle of the fight, gun techs or new magic spells are learned at the end, and for magic, you need characters to have the gift for that specific magic school in order to learn advanced spells, these are the basics for human characters, the other races work differently.
>>4910218
>At this point I'm not sure I believe that death was ever actually hard
You can say that for all RPGs in existence, once you find the solution for your troubles it all seems easy in retrospect, and Minstrel Song does have a very powerful general strategy, though so have all of the other games, that is the price to pay for versatile and expanded systems and games designed around player freedom.

Still, how many times have you slammed your head at a boss before realizing what were you doing wrong? You say that if you had troubles you probably weren't fighting properly, but the point of this kind of games is how fast you realize what you're doing wrong, and the game doesn't really force you to use THAT strategy unless you fight 10FS Saruin.

[Anonymous No.4910450]

Will I miss anything lore wise by starting with the Romancing games and moving onto Frontier?

[Anonymous No.4910467]

>>4910450
The games don't have a shared continuity. The only shared link between... most SaGa games after Romancing got started was that there is a bard/minstrel character of some kind dicking around in the world with few ties to the actual plot.

The bard is in RS 1-3 and Lute plays the role in SF1... I'm not sure if there's one in SF2 or Unlimited.

[Anonymous No.4910724]

>>4910183
One of the escort characters was stopping me to point the direction after a while. Also quicksaving was my friend in case I was taking a detour that made me end up further back (that scamming elevator).

>>4910192
>you're a bit too autistic in your criteria for similarity
Octopath is a great game but it's not a SaGa game beyond the multiple characters thing.

[Anonymous No.4910824]

>>4910724
>Octopath is a great game but it's not a SaGa game beyond the multiple characters thing.
are you a fucking idiot nobody is saying it's a fucking saga game like they are last remnant or scarlet grace you fucking actual god damn moron

[Anonymous No.4910840]

>>4910450
Outside of recurring names, items or monsters, not really, all games are standalones and share no continuity at all.
>>4910824
Plenty of people on /v/ said it was a "spiritual successor" to SaGa games or a SaGa game in "anything but name", that of course isn't true but it lead to some confusion and irritation on the side of people who liked SaGa.
You can check the archives for that.

[Anonymous No.4910883]

>>4910840
this isn't /v where a bunch of 13 year olds repeat versions of things other people say to pretend they know shit while getting everything wrong. if a person just believes shit they hear or gets upset or confused when someone supplies them bullshit then they are a stupid child

[Anonymous No.4910935]

>>4910883
Dude, calm down, I'm only telling you what the fuss is about and why there's this whole mess with Octopath as of late.

[Anonymous No.4910952]

>>4910883
I see a lot of people claim Octopath is a SaGa game on /v/ and it annoys me, too.

Also on /v/ I notice that there are a lot of really cancerous JRPG shitpost threads with obnoxious bait in the OP, and every time I see one of those threads I see a SaGafag making a pitch begging people to give the series a try. I understand your enthusiasm for the series and the desire for more people to play it but I really think you ought to reconsider your audience; we want more SaGafags but we could do without more shitposters.

[Anonymous No.4910969]

>>4910952
>every time I see one of those threads I see a SaGafag making a pitch begging people to give the series a try
I only saw it during one thread which was immediately turned into a surprisingly civil thread after people started talking about the series, other than those you'll hardly see SaGa games mentioned, Octopath threads were pretty much the only threads were the games have been mentioned consistently and you know what the results were.

I did notice quite a few falseflags made to incite shitposting against the games in other threads though, but that's /v/ so that's to be expected.

[Anonymous No.4911069]

>>4910824
>are you a fucking idiot nobody is saying it's a fucking saga game
Unfortunately I spoke with lots of "nobodies"

[Anonymous No.4911107]

>>4911069
why man why would you ever speak to idiots and think what they think is important

they are fucking tools and shills and brainwashed internet babies, you can and should ignore everything they care about knowing that all they will ever do is imitate the decisions of actual real people anyway

[Anonymous No.4911139]

>>4911069
oh man you don't know the half of it

[Anonymous No.4911140]

>>4911069
>>4911107
Come on guys, let's drop this silly argument already, it leads to nowhere anyway.
We should be more hyped for TGS and the RS3 remake, and next year we'll have the 30th anniversary celebration for the series.

[Anonymous No.4911169]

hahahah oh man wow

[Anonymous No.4911178]

>>4911139
>>4911169
tl;dr

[Anonymous No.4911183]

>>4911178
check this one out

[Anonymous No.4911302]

>>4911139
>>4911169
>>4911183
spooky.
Just goes to show you should always take what you read online with a grain of salt.

[Anonymous No.4911415]

>>4910824
A lot of people that don't play SaGa games have been saying this. There is nothing wrong with making some sort of comparison like saying Octopath has the same free scenario system like some of the SaGa games (many starting main characters with their own stories and starting points), but they say it is like SaGa or everything but in name which has heavy implications on the game mechanics.

[Anonymous No.4911472]

>Be Emilia
>reach the cave under Baccarat while chasing Joker
>boss wipes the floor with me with Quake

What the fuck do I do wrong? Also, how "free" is the progress in these games? Can I just ignore the whole Joker chasing and do whatever dungeon/area I want?

[Anonymous No.4911483]

>>4911472
I don't even remember that guy using quake
anyway, one easy way to bypass it is equipping the right shoes

[Anonymous No.4911484]

>>4911472
quake won't hurt you if you're not touching the ground.

[Anonymous No.4911492]

>>4891092
Never played the games but the logo always reminds me of Fruitopia and god do I miss that stuff.

[Anonymous No.4911495]

>>4911483
>>4911484
Yeah I ended up leaving the area and Emelia gave me a "Joker has escaped again!" and went back to the restaurant.

[Anonymous No.4911497]

>>4911139
>>4911169
>>4911183
Sauce? Also: The Google Captcha show news pictures everytime when you click fast on the parts.
If you click slowly, maybe the algorithm thinks you're bad captcha solver and don't bothers you anymore.
Just experienced it.

[Anonymous No.4911503]

>>4911497
Oh, my eyes are bad today, it's written above. Sry.

[Anonymous No.4911509]

>>4911415
Octopath doesn't use the free scenario system though, its main quest(s) are all episodes scattered on a map similar to SaGa Frontier 2, and even there SaGa Frontier 2 let you progress through the game in a non linear way, which Octopath doesn't outside of letting you choose which MC's chapter you play through and all MCs have to follow the same story structure chronologically with no real variation or input on it.
The similarities only really begin and end with the game having multiple main characters, which at this point are barely even multiple main characters in the actual sense since the game is not structured like SaGa games as to give each MC their unique content and interactions with the world, all MCs can access their own contents in a single game file, making your MC choice a mere formality that only makes you start the game with a certain character instead of another.
>>4911472
>What the fuck do I do wrong?
Who knows? What's your party and setup?
>Can I just ignore the whole Joker chasing and do whatever dungeon/area I want?
Sure, Emilia's story has a few areas you can only visit in there though, so don't be surprised when it brings you to completely new areas you can't access while wandering around, most MCs have that kind of story structure.
There's only three areas that aren't immediately accessible and require you to complete some other side quests first, those are Timelord's region, Kirin's region and Fascinaturu, Wakatu also require you to recruit a certain character before being able to go there, but the game gives you a hint about that which I won't spoiler.

Regarding those hints in general, Frontier's narrative is a bit intertwined, a lot of the world's lore is explained through different MCs scenarios, only T260g's story will shed some light about the high-tech vessels in Shingrow, a certain character you meet in Emilia's story is a key figure in another MC's and so on.

[Anonymous No.4911557]

Spoiler question for Blue's campaign:
Is there any disadvantage in allowing Blue to lose his big duel and finishing the game as Rouge?

[Anonymous No.4911574]

>>4911557
No, there's no disadvantage at all because of plot reasons, you'll see why, prepare for some twist.

[Anonymous No.4911593]

>>4911495
you missed the good ending

[Anonymous No.4913505]

>>4911557
>>4911574
Blue's story is objectively the best of the game. It could have even been expanded into its own RPG game.

[Anonymous No.4913517]

>>4913505
That's a funny way of spelling Red

[Anonymous No.4913523]

You're both wrong, Asellus' story reigns supreme.

[Anonymous No.4913527]

>>4911557
If you did any work improving Blue's physical stats that will all be erased. You still keep the weapon techs you learned though.

[Anonymous No.4913646]

>>4913505
>>4913517
>>4913523
Yer all wrong.
T260G has the best story and game me the strongest feelerinos.
Though really, all of Frontier's stories are good, some just need a bit more meat to them to truly shine, but there's something for everyone.

[Anonymous No.4913706]

Minstrel Song was my first SaGa and has, ever since, been my #1 jrpg. Because I liked it so much, I was excited to play the other entries, which is something still ongoing to this day. I won't bother describing why I love it, anyone here who has played it aready knows why.

However, while Minstrel Song is still my favorite, my recent playthrough of it these past few days along with my experience with other entries have made it easier to describe ways I think the game could be improved. The game has 3 flaws that first come to mind.

First, the camera is bad. It trails far behind the character and you cannot move it alone. In dungeons there are many times where you must run around a corner blind, making it easy to be ambushed. Also, it easy to become disoriented in dungeons. A top down view is preferable to this.

Second, there is too much running around. The hours of running through towns, visiting shops, mentors, and blacksmiths begin to quickly pile up. In dungeons, you have proficiensies that make this phase more interesting but the character is still pretty slow. Personally, I think Unlimited's method of navigation via menus and panels is nothing short of perfection.

Third, unskippable cutscenes and dialogue. Personally, voice acting in most rpgs is a waste of time and effort; Minstrel Song is no exception. That said, the corniess of some scenes due to the english delivery can be pretty funny. Voices during battle are perfectly fine as well.

The perfect jrpg then would be mostly like Minstrel Song but with the navigation of Unlimited and more unique character content like Frontier.

[Anonymous No.4913737]

>>4913706
I agree with most of your complaints, however:
>there is too much running around
I wouldn't say that the running around is necessarily bad as much as the running speed itself is the problem, I much prefer Unlimited's navigaton system too but that's a very unpopular opinion.
Mechanically and functionally speaking, nothing has topped Unlimited's navigation even though MS basically wholly converted it into an action based system outside of some minor aspects, Unlimited's navigation is just too functional and can't be properly recreated in an action based environment, that said, both are valid solution appealing to different people.
>unskippable cutscenes and dialogue
They're really too short for me to complain about it, there's really nothing that long for me to bother skipping outside of maybe Ewey's cutscene in the isle of evil, the ending sequence should have been skippable though, especially because it's all the same stuff outside of your MC's personal epilogue either way.
>The perfect jrpg then would be mostly like Minstrel Song but with the navigation of Unlimited and more unique character content like Frontier.
I can agree with that to a certain degree, but MS' battle design was too erratic and less focused than Unlimited, at times there's simply too many systems and eventually that's what makes the game kinda fall upon itself because all the systems are equally valid ways to solve your problems in any situation bar 10FS saruin, which forces you to use the most overpowered general strategy in the game.
Unlimited, while also having its problem with weapon balancing, had a better meta to it, and the turn system is more interesting than MS'.

Scarlet Grace also offers a completely new model, but I don't think most people would be willing to give up SaGa's usual character multitasking in order to achieve that degree of battle balance.

Good post though, anon.

[Anonymous No.4913971]

>>4913706
>The hours of running through towns, visiting shops, mentors, and blacksmiths begin to quickly pile up.
I agree with this in principle. Lately I'm realizing that I dislike explorable towns in RPGs, with only rare exceptions when towns incorporate optional quests involving battles, mini-dungeons, or other engaging gameplay (MM3 and 2R come to mind). If the town is merely going to serve as a hub for services, it's preferable to make it entirely menu-based like in Unlimited. Minstrel Song does have some stuff going on in towns, but like the above poster said the movement speed is too damn slow.

I agree with most of your other points as well, and I would personally add that Minstrel Song had a few overly gimmicky dungeons, such as Twin Moon Temple and Isle of Evil. Netherworld was also pretty underwhelming compared to the original. I seem to be one of the few people around here who really likes the original Romancing SaGa, and I think the atmosphere and sense of scale of many dungeons didn't translate all that well to the remake.

[Anonymous No.4914193]

>>4913646

"The scene at the end when they hug"

Can not finish it...can not finish at all.

[Anonymous No.4914415]

>>4906872
>>4908519
You guys already played Valkyrie Profile? It's not similar to SaGa but has a very original gameplay and a nice story. Might work as a breathe of fresh air.

It also has a non-retro sequel for PS2.

[Anonymous No.4914418]

>>4914415
No but I'll check it out, Anon. Thanks!

[Anonymous No.4914428]

>>4914415
if octopath doesn't count as a saga-like game, does exist archive count as a valkyrie profile-like game?

[Anonymous No.4914554]

>>4908519
>>4906872
I found SaGa deeply influence my taste in JRPGs in general. Kinda does that when my first JRPGs were Final Fantasy Legend III, II, then I. There are still other JRPGs that I do play and do like but I find a lot more of them mediocre, and often over hyped by others because those games are often mechanically lacking.

With that said I don't think there will be a JRPG that can topple Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song for me. It is just above and beyond anything that came before and after it.

>>4913706
Personally I didn't see that as a big detractor. It is a shame that they were restricted to the SNES game because things like field skills could have been a bit more impactful. You have Mt. Scurve for climbing, the lake for using jump, and then what really? I believe if it was a new entry and wasn't constrained to a previous blue print the field skills would have been a lot more fleshed out. It was something you didn't get to do as often in Unlimited as well. You could disarm traps, unlock chests, fortune tell contents in a box, but I wanted more lock picking doors, swimming across waters, and maneuvering across obstacles. I want skills that allow me to go to places that you are unable to without a certain proficiency. Giving you possible short cuts, new items, or entire new areas and quests.

[Anonymous No.4914562]

>>4913737
>but MS' battle design was too erratic and less focused than Unlimited, at times there's simply too many systems and eventually that's what makes the game kinda fall upon itself because all the systems are equally valid ways to solve your problems in any situation

I'm really interested in what you mean by this?
There being so many systems at play in the battle system is a huge part of why I enjoy Minstrel Song. It is a JRPG that has a higher-than-usual skill cieling. Perhaps, "knowledge cieling" would be a more appropriate term.

The game is quite challenging and seeing myself be able to defeat harder bosses and progress at a better pace is, in and of itself, a reward.

[Anonymous No.4914684]

>>4914562
I'm not the guy you replied to but man, once you know the thing you do to win against 10FSS it really breaks down how much the rest of the game could have just been about being faster sometimes or changing your equipment for one battle and grinding and buying all the spells for everyone and all that shit was just a big waste of time since it basically just amounted to wanting to win a certain way when you always could have won.

In that sense, hiding the answer in plain sight but never indicating it, yet allowing the player to grind and get on the wrong track was really never a good design in the first place.

Which means that SaGa games should have either a fixed amount of character development resources (monsters) available, or they should be of infinite duration (imperial saga).

[Anonymous No.4914746]

>>4910162
I'd say Octopath is halfway between SaGa and Bravely Default, like they had a baby or something.

[Anonymous No.4914821]

>>4914562
>I'm really interested in what you mean by this?
The fact that MS simply offers you too many valid answers in solving a problem, it lacks focus and consequently it lacks consistent challenge.
Take Flame Tyrant for instance, he has its Self Burning gimmick, doesn't he? Problem is that you can solve Flame Tyrant whole's gimmick with all of these:

>Comboing, since it bypasses self burning altogether outside of the combo starter
>Using ranged techs for melee weapons
>Using bows
>Using the Ice Sword
>Using Magic
>Paralyze Flame Tyrant and then use any of the above methods turns the fight into a shitshow
>Combo into a vortex for even more damage
>Simulacrum
>Just get top tier equipment from the shops by doing a few quests before getting to him, selling the dino eggs for instance already gives you enormous amounts of cash
>The almighty debuff strategy

As you can see there's simply TOO much in terms of choices and while it's true some of these are not immediately evident to some people it doesn't take that much to get them, and most of these strategies can be used universally too.
This is the same problem that plagues a lot of RPGs with free roaming in general, when there's so much freedom the general challenge of the game kinda wanes, but MS' problems are also deeply tied to how expansive the battle system is, there's simply too much at play on the players' side and the enemy doesn't have any appropriate answer to that, and cumulative debuffs/buffs have always been a mistake, which Unlimited also has to deal with.

However, Unlimited doesn't have that problem because its battle system is a lot more focused and restricted, you don't have vortexes, combos aren't that strong, LP focus is important, and while it's nice to have "unorthodox" magic like Simulacrum or Overdrive it's also a lot harder to properly balance it, which is why I think Unlimited also does magic better at the end of the day without limiting it to a boring attack/heal/buff paradigm.
>>

[Anonymous No.4914824]

>>4914821
To make an example, take Tagut from the Nakle lines.
Tagut's whole gimmick is high LP damage and paralysis, this isn't any more complex than Flame Tyrant, however the system in itself is built around it much better.
You don't really have many answers to Tagut's high damage attacks and paralysis other than forging equipment with paralysis resistance and maybe LP guard if you have the ingredients, battle wise, there's also not a lot of leeway to Tagut outside of minding your formation and battle pace, starting with someone slow and tanky like Anzan, Iskandar or Musol Yanii solves the problem of tanking the high LP damage and avoiding cross comboing in a way no other strategy would have done, there's simply no other answer like in MS, doing anything else is simply not as functional and this strategy is by far optimal compared to any other choice.

Conversely, this tanking strategy doesn't help you much against other enemies either, it works with Tagut because it doesn't have mass attacks, it's whole design is about causing massive damage to single targets and incapacitating them, but doing the same positioning strategy against say, a Dragon, helps very little, because what you should worry about with Dragons is their AoE attacks like breaths or tail slam mass stunning your party, so drawing aggro on the first slot like you would do with Tagut is a waste of time, it's much better to start with a general defensive turn to buff yourself and then make sure you don't cross combo until you have the upper hand.
Of course, Unlimited also suffers from the cumulative debuff problem and severe equipment unbalance once you learn how to work with forging and commerce, but it's in no way as broken as MS when it comes to combat design, there's simply less functions to it on the player's side, and cross comboing also keeps you on your toes, unlike MS.
>>

[Anonymous No.4914826]

>>4914824
In this regard I kind of agree with>>4914684, SaGa should have fixed resources and a lot more focus on resource management, which is why I'm thinking that Scarlet Grace is a step in the right direction to further refine the series despite it doing away with character multitasking and making character development a lot more limited, you all see what I mean when it comes out in the west, it is by far the game with the most consistent challenge when it comes to battles and a much more focused approach on adaptability instead of building an invincible team that can counter anything like most other games.

That said, I don't agree with this at all:
>hiding the answer in plain sight but never indicating it---was really never a good design in the first place.
Mostly because there's hardly any situation where you get screwed up into an unwinnable game file like you'd do in games like Morrowind, secondly because giving too many details essentially kills the pleasure of learning the system's intricacies while also focusing on a "standard" way of solving a problem, this is essentially the same mistake as reading guides, it robs you of the challenge and also misguides you into a set of precooked answers that tunnel you into a general mindset, this isn't what RPGs should be about.
Another thing I like about SaGa is that there's really a lot to the games even if you want to minmax, and not in the way of games like FFV where you're essentially just doing the same thing with a different animation or dress, there's a lot to learn and sometimes even the most simple things end up being surprisingly useful, see how many people fall into the usual Axe build for Unlimited when a mixed Bow build is a lot more powerful, or see how things like Simulacrum in MS were initially considered useless until somebody really put some effort into them and found how useful they can be, this is a level of elasticity you don't find often, even though it often leads to balance problems.

[Anonymous No.4915253]

>>4914826.
>Another thing I like about SaGa is that there's really a lot to the games even if you want to minmax, and not in the way of games like FFV where you're essentially just doing the same thing with a different animation or dress,
in a game with such a distinct weapon and skill set (chemist, oracle, Blue Mage for example) it nakes me wonder how you think that, I'd be with you if you named another FF. At least it's a deeper game than the original SaGa trilogy and I keep finding new things about it every year.

[Anonymous No.4915364]

>>4915253
>it nakes me wonder how you think that
Because a lot of the skillset in FFV is bloated and gimmicky, and not in a good way, if you look at it mechanically, a lot of commands are exactly the same thing but achieved through different activation conditions, the chemist, blue mage, geomancer or necromancer in the Advance version are some of the classes that are especially guilty of this.
Some classes like the Red Mage also only have a single command that is original to them, other classes like Beastmasters also have their toolset often conflicting with the Blue Mage, many released monsters are effectively a one use Blue Magic cast others are a one use strong physical attack and the rest is a mix of various other magic or rarely, a monster specific attack, which is in most of the cases standard magic with a different name and animation, the Geomancer uses a slot machine set of attacks that are essentially repurposed magic, some of them admittedly have added effects like statuses and the fact that the game doesn't consider the Gaia command as magic also means you don't have to worry about Reflect...if there were any significant amount of enemies you'd have to worry about, and so on.

Now, FFV being a class based system makes this work more or less well depending on who you ask, but there's no denying that a lot of the skillsets and commands are just the same exact mini spell, the same exact poison spell or the same exact blue magic repurposed by giving them a different animation or activation condition, the activation condition does give them a bit of uniqueness, but at the end of the day it's just gimmicky if you ask me, it does somewhat work in that particular game's environment but I can't say I like it.

[Anonymous No.4915785]

Anyone else have the autistic drive to make a hack of this game that fixes some of the cut content? The closest thing to an editor right now is SnakeOil and that's still in alpha.

[Anonymous No.4916141]

>>4915785
How do you fix stuff that isn't even on the disc?
Outside of restoring things that are there like Asellus throwing herself into Kurenai there's really not a lot of stuff you can do without having to actually code in new stuff and Frontier is notorious for having spaghetti code.

[Anonymous No.4916240]

>>4915785
Wait for the remake

[Anonymous No.4916264]

>>4914826
>That said, I don't agree with this at all:
>>hiding the answer in plain sight but never indicating it---was really never a good design in the first place.
>Mostly because there's hardly any situation where you get screwed up into an unwinnable game file like you'd do in games like Morrowind
Ah but what about Last Remnant where it misleads you about the usefulness of remnants and makes it seem like dual wielding and big shields are better than being one-handed

and tons of people just struggle and struggle with it wanting it to make sense or trying to figure out why the game got all hard all of a sudden when it's just because they gave everyone remnant weapons which have 3 times as much burden as any other weapon type and completely bogged down their entire army

and if they just used a straight sword or a katana and buckler they would have been perfectly fine, deflecting attacks and going first like a boss

[Anonymous No.4916751]

I just started SaGa Frontier. Is there any kind of order I should play the characters, or one that's recommended to start with?

I know absolutely nothing about this game going in and picked Asellus at random.

[Anonymous No.4916756]

>>4891092
2 was my first, and I liked it. I haven’t played any of the games beyond 2 though. I went back and played one and liked it as well. I would recommend 1&2.

[Anonymous No.4916763]

>>4891092
Man that 2D art is some of the best on PS1. What a pretty game.

[Anonymous No.4916923]

>>4916751
a fine choice

[Anonymous No.4917084]

>>4916264
>Ah but what about Last Remnant where it misleads you about the usefulness of remnants
It does? Remnant accessories are pretty much all semi-mandatory since your characters wil pester you to give them pretty much every time you get to the world map, Remnant weapons are the same, just seeing how people like Roberto, Jager or Gaou are scripted to ask you to give them the Ice Sword and Obsidian Sword and then ignore everything else should give you a big clue, or just how fucking much Duke of Ghor can hit for with Bilqis compared to anyone else but Rush and Torgal when you get him, and as soon as you get to the first upgrade layer for those you'll see how they outclass pretty much everything, Irina/Emmy are also a case of showing you just how useful Remant weapons are just because of the other bonuses they give you outside of offensive power, I wouldn't say the game misleads you at all.
>makes it seem like dual wielding and big shields are better than being one-handed
I don't think the game ever does that though, though I agree that if you don't have previous knowledge of SaGa games you'll very probably ignore shields, but then again, David comes with a shield and you can see how much he parries compared to the rest of the main cast, then there's Raphael, Jorgen(possibly) and tons of other generics with shields that show you how good they can be.
Also, a normal playthrough doesn't really need shields and you don't really begin to notice the difference until later upgrades where the stats begin to matter and you'll actually need to parry as much as possible, and if we want to be honest, Hina's Earring+Shield of the Vanquisher is what really make endgame Sword and Board that good compared to other builds.
>and if they just used a straight sword or a katana and buckler they would have been perfectly fine
That only applies to Rush, David, Raphael and one Jorgen variant, Katana also have less defense values than swords.
>>>

[Anonymous No.4917087]

Also, I'm curious as to why you mention the burden problem, I've never seen anyone even mentioning that, nor have I had any problems with it myself.
You only begin to get Remnant weapons at the six bases and by then your stats should be more than enough to make the burden values a non issue for anything outside doing optional stuff like The Fallen as soon as they're available, and this is without considering weapon arts for Remnant weapons, things like Schiavona and Wrath of Bel'Qwinith completely outclass other weapon arts, same for mass arts like Megalore.

I'd say that TLR has other problems in terms of misleading players or hiding information, that is not telling you that Weapon Arts are unlocked by your proficiency levels which the game hides from you for no good reason, the obnoxious rare monster hunts, many of which drop unique material needed for upgrading weapon lines, some of which are also tied to quests.
I'm mostly fine with the rest of the game and while I don't see why they needed to hide proficiencies it's also not the first case of something like that happening, SF2 also hid your characters' innate stat table, though unlike SF2 those proficiency levels also matter in your class development in TLR, which is pretty annoying at first until you understand that proficiencies do exist and matter.

However, I'd also like to point out another thing, people overwhelmingly complain about basic mechanics that are plenty discernible, like locking mechanics, you'll hardly see anyone complaining about the really well hidden stuff, and to be frank, most people also complain about games like MS where you have a in game guide which does explain a lot of stuff, and people also complained about Scarlet Grace not pointing out certain systems like blessing mechanics or the nuances of Reserve mechanics despite having an extremely in depth ingame manual and a system that goes as far as telling you all command attributes during battles.
>>>

[Anonymous No.4917092]

Moreover, the same people who complain about SaGa games hiding things are more than happy about playing other games that also hide things in the same exact way, take FFV or just about any FF really.

People are very eager to complain about things like Battle Rank, Spark tables or whatever else when it comes to SaGa games, but nobody complains about things like Mix tables in FFV or Gaia commands, hidden weapon mechanics like Tifa's Premium Heart being unintuitively less powerful than her other weapons due to its hidden ATK multiplier dependent on limit gauge, or the Materia mechanics in general.
This is also without mentioning that most people emulate the games so they start without the game manuals, which contain all the basics, SF2's western manual went as far as giving the players the entire list of waza WITH DUEL COMMANDS included.

So again, the whole argument of SaGa games hiding mechanics or somehow "misleading" the players stands on very shaky grounds for a whole lot of reasons and I personally don't really support the opinion of it being bad outside of a handful of unforgivable fuckups that shouldn't be condoned even by fans of the series but it's in no way unique to the series or uncommon in general.

[Anonymous No.4917443]

>>4917092
>SF2's western manual went as far as giving the players the entire list of waza WITH DUEL COMMANDS included.
I don't know about PAL, but that's not in the north american manual.

[Anonymous No.4918161]

>>4913523
Patrician taste

[Anonymous No.4918261]

>>4917084
The values on the wiki which are certainly copied from a better source seem to indicate that an average katana has a burden of 4 while an axe of the same size might have 6, a small shield is worth 2 burden, while a fully upgraded Nightbloom is worth 15

Irina with Nightbloom fully upgraded is as slow as Emmy if she were dumb enough to carry 3 broadswords.


You can see how much of a difference this makes pretty early, if you give rush a single katana, maybe plus a buckler, and keep his burden under 6, he can almost always go first in formations. If you dual wield any combo or try to give him an axe and a SOV, you can go ahead and watch him go last almost every single time.

Even without counting shield evasion, burden has such an enormous effect on blocks and dodges and turn order that it changes everything. It lets you move across the map faster and act sooner, it protects your characters and keeps them alive when you keep it low.

Every single remnant weapon is a newbie trap that cripples your character. If they don't give you high defense with their speed, you'll watching them die over and over. If you make Irina a healer she'll never make it to heal her allies, she'll be too slow, all the time, over and over.

If you just fill your army with fast qsiti using item arts you'll probably sodomize that game.

[Anonymous No.4918597]

>>4917443
Just checked, you're right, the US manual doesn't have the list, although the PAL version does, strangely enough it's also only 16 pages somehow, they really messed that up bad.
>>4918261
>Irina with Nightbloom fully upgraded is as slow as Emmy if she were dumb enough to carry 3 broadswords.
Burden hardly matters by the time you get a fully upgraded Nightbloom since Irina will most likely have 40-50 Speed by then and make any sort of burden a non issue, the huge boost to her AP pool makes it more than worth it.
>It lets you move across the map faster and act sooner
This makes hardly any difference for any union but Mystic unions that can cast Arcana/Megalore/Gae Bolg for a matter of map clearing convenience, whether you act before or after an enemy union is irrelevant as long you build your unions accordingly, especially because most of the times four out of five unions will be in deadlocks, and speed only really gives you an edge in terms of raidlocks, attack and defense stats matter a lot more than speed in TLR, especially since stunning is hardly exploitable and you don't have LP penalties or healing restrictions as to make healing so vital to require asap intervention.
>Every single remnant weapon is a newbie trap that cripples your character
This is a claim only a madman can make, Remnants give you absurdly powerful weapon arts and other bonuses, there's a reason both Jager and DoG shit on every other damage dealer but Rush, because their Remnant weapons have absurdly strong firepower, there's a world of difference between Jager using a Schiavona Virtutis and Jaeger using a Vulcanlance, not to mention that the Schiavona in particular also gives him a whopping 15% bonus to speed at just the second layer of upgrades, meaning that even that burden of 20 at the third layer means nothing at all, especially given the other bonus you get against giants AND the Schiavona weapon art.
>>>

[Anonymous No.4918602]

>>4918597
>If you just fill your army with fast qsiti using item arts you'll probably sodomize that game.
No, Item arts are effectively useless against small unions and completely worthless against unions with just one unit, this is some really wild theorycrafting on par with pretending things like traps being more useful than what they are, the only Item art that is relevant at high levels is Shards and basically no one learns Shards, especially Qsiti, and it requires so much fucking grinding AND money that you'd be so strong as to make Burden even more of a non issue by the time you get a team of Shard/item arts users, try fighting The Lost/Jhana Royals with an army of Qsiti Item users and see how it goes.

Speed is worthless if you don't have the power to take down your target, this is all the more evident when fighting, what you'll want is unions capables of dealing and withstanding as much damage as possible while controlling Morale, not to mention that there's also things like Band of Champions that make Burden even less relevant if it scares you so much.

Your whole claim of Remnants being newbie traps is seriously not even worth considering, not just because Burden is hardly an issue by the time you get them, it completely fails to consider just how strong Remnant weapons are due to their stats, bonuses and weapon arts, if a character can equip a Remnant weapon there's literally no reason not to give it to them, and even when you could make an argument in favour of slow units like Yama it still doesn't matter because Yama are slow by nature and Burden doesn't change anything, Gaou doesn't gain anything by being marginally faster and losing out on a field wipe, 15% STR bonus and an added Instakill chance on any attack.
Hell the Seven themselves are all carried by their Remnant weapons outside of Ludope being the only actually good member in terms of ability pool.

[Anonymous No.4919397]

>>4916751
cont.
I just spent an age wandering around the castle and town before I randomly figured how to progress. I thought you had to train until Asellus can beat the 3 battles, but no, checking a locked door did the trick.

Is the whole game like this? I can see why some people struggle to get into it.

[Anonymous No.4919481]

>>4919397
Yeah, Asellus is notorious for trapping unexperienced players in the training loop.
>Is the whole game like this?
No, Asellus' prologue is the only part of the game that tries to deliberately fool you into that.
There's more to it too, did you check Rei's chamber and had White Rose tell you her story? You could also buy absurdly strong items from Gozarus that early in the game, Asellus' prologue has quite a few tricks to it, you're greatly rewarded if you explore Fascinaturu.

[Anonymous No.4920125]

>>4892097
You forgot Unlimited.

[Anonymous No.4920180]

>>4910183
I don't even remember how I got out. Just ran around until I stumbled into a boos battle.

[Anonymous No.4921218]

>>4918597
yeah but dealing a lot of damage isn't something that excites me or interests me in this game

[Anonymous No.4921324]

I mean sure remnant weapons sound good when you cherry pick the exact examples where the weapon has huge defense scores and/or synergistic bonuses, but this really only justifies one union with all of those guys on it. It might be a lot better to just keep Irina's speed and defense higher and have her union focus on healing and shards.

[Anonymous No.4921741]

From what I've heard the switch version of RS2 is ruined by input delay. Are the PC and Vita versions also fucked up?

[Anonymous No.4921904]

>>4921741
No, the Switch version is surprisingly the only one with input delay, the Vita version runs fine other than having some slight loading times that the Switch version doesn't have while the PC version is the overall best version.

[Anonymous No.4922645]

What's the optimal starting to tear through this game?

[Anonymous No.4922646]

>>4922645
* starting party

[Anonymous No.4922812]

>>4922645
All bots all the time.

[Anonymous No.4924052]

You faggots have me playing SF1 again.

[Anonymous No.4924583]

>>4924052
Any timeline where you play SF1 is the best possible timeline.

[Anonymous No.4924592]

>>4919481
Yeah, I found the secret shop and (I think) most of White Rose's dialogue.

Just how much of a cheat is it to buy the Asura? I gave it a shot and Asellus became incredibly strong. I thought it was going to trivialise the game, so I unequipped it.

[Anonymous No.4924838]

https://youtu.be/A_zsv0B4HtE

Just finished watching this 48 minute Asellus speedrun. Hard to imagine a playthrough with no Bio Lab grinding.

[Anonymous No.4924968]

>>4924592
>Just how much of a cheat is it to buy the Asura?
It's like one of the only chances you get to play with it early so you might as well not worry about "balance".

It's probably way better on Mechs, but Asellus doesn't have any.

[Anonymous No.4924996]

>>4924592
No, it comes at a steep cost of 3 of your max LP, so you are paying a very sharp amount of your own life for that (LP is your life and HP your stamina). You are giving yourself a double edged sword; Asura is one of the strongest blades in the game, but you have to give something valuable up to get it, it is a fair price to give up 3 LP and hinder yourself but at the same time get a very powerful blade early on.

[Anonymous No.4926223]

>>4924838
Biolab grinding is only really necessary if you're soloing, even with a full party, as long as you use the Scrap trick you can safely ignore the Biolab, and even if you don't, knowing a good combo will still make it fairly pointless since by keeping your BR low the final boss' HP will also be low, the key is equipment, as always.
Iirc there's a JP TAS for Asellus that lasts around 30 minutes with no biolab grind.

[Anonymous No.4926540]

>>4924968
magic equipment is actually bad on mecs but they do increase psychic which makes them more able to tank a magic attack.

[Anonymous No.4926926]

>>4922645
Getting at least a monster. Mid and late game they can really transform into some nasty monsters that wreck groups.

[Anonymous No.4926930]

>>4924996
>>4924968
Cool. Any advice on which areas/quests I should prioritise point in the game? So far I've really just dipped my feet into each area. I've recruited Rogue and killed two of the Sages sent after Asellus, so that's good I suppose.

[Anonymous No.4927065]

>>4926930
Once you have something resembling a full party, go do one of the Light or Shadow magic quests, which is a very short dungeon each for their treasures and Magic Gift respectively.

Then go poke around Sei's Tomb and the Shingrow Ruins for treasures.

[Anonymous No.4927852]

What's the best character to start with in Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song?
I don't necessarily mean a character with a story that's guides you in a direction since I'm experienced with SaGa, but a character that has early access to good recruits

[Anonymous No.4927887]

>>4927852
>What's the best character to start with in Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song?
I can tell you who's the worst character to start with and that's Grey.
The overall best is probably Barbara but to give you a quick rundown:
>Barbara
+Best starting point in the Frontier, can easily access all content in the game thanks to that.
+Great BP regen and good stats overall
+-Her quest basically doesn't exist
>Aisha
+Good starting point
+Good main quest pacing
-Starts weak
+-Little girl MC of this game
-Kinda forced prologue
>Albert
+Decent all rounder
+Pretty much the only character with a personal beef with Saruin
+Can get a cool ass alternate costume
-No real talent to make him stand out
-His redesign is ugleh
-Long main quest prologue
-"Starts" in Valhalland, which is kind of eh
>Jamil
+Speedy
+Fun character all around
+Good starting point
-Kinda long prologue
-His quest has kind of unintuitive branching paths
-His way of recruiting both Farah and Dowd is overly complicated if you want to do a thematic party
>Sif
+Stronk
+appreciates Real Men™
+Her own quest gives her the best accessory in the game
-meh BP rate
-Starts in Valhalland
-Slow as molasses, not good with magic
-Her own starting quest can easily mess up your initial ER
>Claudia
+Oppai
+Good caster/ranger
+Good BP regen rate
+alright starting point
-Kind of a boring character
-Brau/Silven
>Hawke
+He's Captain Hawke
+Guella is his bro
+Awesome pirate music
+Strong as fuck, good with water magic
-meh BP rate
--Starts in the Coral sea, probably the worst starting point in the game
-His prologue quest is kinda similar to Sif and can fuck up your early BR
>Grey
+Has access to the Demonbrand, which is bullshit strong
+Gets a slight costume change
+overall good fighter
+Can get Dino eggs very early for massive cash
-He's even more of an asshole than Blue
-Bad starting point and the Ligau tunnels can be frustrating to navigate
-Overall uninteresting story and character
---His own quest will probably drive you mad

[Anonymous No.4927947]

>>4927887
Thanks dude, this is some really useful info

[Anonymous No.4928254]

>start Barbara's story
>take a quest which leads to fighting a sea serpent
>feel ridiculously outmached and about to die
>decide to let out one last attack before my characters are wiped using strongest wazas
>get a combo which ends up killing the serpent
This is why I love this series

[Anonymous No.4929138]

>>4916240
That's decades away

[Anonymous No.4929645]

Has anyone tried playing SaGa Frontier 1 or 2 on a (hacked) vita? Are there any issues or do they run perfectly?

[Anonymous No.4929648]

>>4929645
I have the JP PSN files and they run like a charm, even got the Pocketstation files for SF2 and it all works perfectly.
The Vita PS emulator is pretty much the same from the PSP, except with some new functions, so what runs on PSP runs on Vita.

[Anonymous No.4929658]

>>4927887
Sif also has the best dialogue with Saruin she cuts him off in the middle of his monologue

[Anonymous No.4929661]

>Played through Final Fantasy Legend 1-3 on Gameboy no problem
>Start Playing Romsncing Saga 1 on SNES
>Playing as Albert
>Enemies fucking everywhere
>Like there has to be like 30 fucking encounters on one dungeon floor
>Keep playing anyway cause it's interesting and I start picking up some party members
>Wandering around aimlessly trying to find quests and exploring dungeons only to come up to boss fights that kill me in one hit

What the fuck am I supposed to be doing in this game? I'm like 5 hours in and I don't even understand how the stat increases work, like I've had characters gain strength even though they didn't even perform an action during combat.

Wild game, gonna keep playing though

[Anonymous No.4929675]

>>4929658
And she also tells him that he's pretty much that one kid who was bullied in school and that he should grow a pair and fight her instead of talking.
Sif does tend to shit talk a lot in general, that's one of the many reasons why she's best girl.

In a twist of fate she's also voiced by Megan Hollingshead in the english dub, so you end up playing with a balls to the wall, no nonsense Lenneth.
>>4929661
SNES RS1 is kind of clunky and with a lot of half assed design decisions so if you feel that's too weird for you feel free to skip it and play Minstrel Song.
>I've had characters gain strength even though they didn't even perform an action during combat.
You don't really need an action to be finalized in order to count, as long as the selection is over the game considers it part of the battle history, so even if a character doesn't act they might still get stats up at the end of the battle.

[Anonymous No.4929689]

>>4929648
Sorry I'm very new to this. Does that mean if I want to play PS1 games on a vita I should download special PSN files (officially or pirate-friendly)? Whereas there's also a regular PS1 emulator that's the same as the PSP (and just how good is the PSP)?
I don't mind buying SaGa games but will I be able to play translated games like Tear Ring Saga and Front Mission 2?

[Anonymous No.4929701]

>>4929689
Not really, you can use a converted PS ISO file and the Vita will run those too, if you hacked it that is, I chose to buy them because I want to support the series and they also come with scans of the original manuals and other commodities like the virtual pocketstation if you download the PSN app for that.
>and just how good is the PSP
It's mostly fine, there's a handful of games that have compatibility problems but nothing you can't solve with POPsloader, I don't know how the Vita handles POPs though so you have to look that out for yourself.
>will I be able to play translated games like Tear Ring Saga and Front Mission 2?
Nope, or rather, you can choose to buy those the SaGa Frontier games but to play either of those two in English you'll need to hack it and use a patched ISO since neither of those games came out of Japan.
You'd also have to check whether the SaGa games are on your region's PSN too.

[Anonymous No.4929704]

>>4929689
I think the games might be available on the JP store but you can get them to work no problem on any vita.

I've personally used henkaku to play SaGa Frontier on Vita and it worked fine. It was a bit of a labor to set it up though, and the flash cards have some problems lasting

[Anonymous No.4929856]

>>4929701
Speaking of manuals, does anyone have a PDF for SF1? I can easily fine SF2, but not the first game.

[Anonymous No.4929892]

>>4929856
https://mega.nz/#!mbwSVIZT!4tClK_-7xduzekjed-1Iw0lGqKVvE-rtccHWX3qouwE

[Anonymous No.4930102]

>>4929645
SF2 is slow during the battles

[Anonymous No.4930132]

>>4930102
SF2 is slow just like it is on the original hardware, that's how it has always been.

[Anonymous No.4931056]

>>4929892
Thanks!

[Anonymous No.4932583]

So, one guy asked Kawazu about remaking SF and he says that remakes for both Frontier games are going to be tough due to their original designs and that he has no real plan ready, especially SF2, though that's not a surprise.
Seems we'll probably get another mainline before SF gets a remake.