With the recent announcement of a Western release of SaGa: Scarlet Grace, as well as a remastered version of Romancing SaGa 3 in the West this fall, many fans are rejoicing. To most, however, the announcement will most likely go unnoticed, and those who do notice will probably be puzzled (unless they’ve played the fairly recent remaster of Romancing SaGa 2, available on Steam, PS4 and Switch, among other platforms).
It’s a shame, really, as SaGa may be one of the most innovative JRPG series out there. With some truly out-there ideas and a very strong identity, SaGa is definitely a weird little gem of a series that deserves some recognition.
Beginnings – The Final Fantasy Legend
It all started in 1989. The first three games in the series – released in the West as The Final Fantasy Legend I, II and III, for marketing purposes – were an attempt to create a robust JRPG experience on the original Gameboy. The games were headed by Akitoshi Kawazu, who would later be responsible for designing every single entry.
Akitoshi Kawazu’s previous work included Final Fantasy II – he was the mastermind behind the controversial leveling system, and this influence definitely shows in both the Final Fantasy Legend, as well as SaGa in general. None of the Final Fantasy Legend games have a traditional leveling system. Instead, you get to create a party of characters made up of various races, each of which progresses differently. Humans are only as strong as the equipment you give them, mystics gain random stat changes after certain battles, robots can be enhanced with items, while monsters change after being fed meat.
The games are, of course, smaller in scale than most RPGs at the time, but there was definitely a lot to dig into here for a Gameboy game. The first game is notable for being the first JRPG released in the West in which the final boss is God – though it’s far from the first Japanese game to go there, as that honor goes to the Megami Tensei series.
Growing the Beard – Romancing SaGa
No longer having to rely on the Final Fantasy title for star power, Romancing SaGa feels more like a reboot of the series rather than a continuation. Now released on the Super Nintendo, these games are far larger, richer, and are a much finer realization of Kawazu’s non-standard concepts.
Romancing SaGa is distinct from most other JRPGs, especially those of the time, in that the three games in the series are almost completely non-linear and set in an open world – more akin to Western games like the Elder Scrolls, rather than following the typical Final Fantasy formula. The first game, as well as Romancing SaGa 3, have you choose among 8 protagonists and let you customize your party and decide how your adventure unfolds from there. The same is true for Romancing SaGa 2, though instead of choosing from one of several protagonist, you play through an entire dynasty of an imperial family across multiple generations.
All characters now level up like mystics, i.e. they get random stat gains after battles, but there are far more interesting mechanics when it comes to learning skills. All of these aspects make Romancing SaGa a truly unique experience. While they haven’t been released in the West during the 90s, the first game got a rerelease in the form of Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song on the PS2, with Romancing SaGa 2 coming much later for multiple platforms and, finally, Romancing SaGa 3 coming later this year. Once that and the release of Scarlet Grace occur, all of the SaGa games will have been released in the West.
Pushing Boundaries – SaGa Frontier
We move on to the Playstation era, and with it come changes to the SaGa series. Here we have a duology of games called SaGa Frontier. While the first one still has some similarities to Romancing SaGa, SaGa Frontier 2 is a completely different beast. The non-linear aspect is still present to some degree, but the games are overall much more story-focused than their predecessors, with SaGa Frontier 2 going so far as to embody the storybook aesthetic in its graphics.
These games were released in the West as the first SaGa games ever to bear that name, as Romancing SaGa was as of yet not released here, and the first three games were considered Final Fantasy spin-offs. As such, they were considered oddities at the time, though not without their appeal. Sadly, the same cannot be said for the next title.
Crisis – Unlimited Saga
Unlimited Saga took a lot of risks. While on the presentation front, everything was well-received – from the beautifully cel-shaded graphics to the bombastic score by Masashi Hamauzu – the game itself was extremely puzzling. Unlimited Saga takes more inspiration from a tabletop RPG than it does traditional video games. The majority of the game takes place on a playing board with characters represented as static game pieces and all actions requiring what appears to be a variation on dice rolls. It doesn’t help that the game has incredibly robust mechanics, but does very little to explain them.
Needless to say, many players felt cheated and confused. Though there might very well be a great game underneath it all and it could be received better nowadays as people come into it with a more informed view of its contents, the damage was done and chances that we’ll ever get to see a remaster are non-existence. It was so bad that Square Enix’s American branch issued a public apology to everyone who purchased the game. It was apparent that Unlimited Saga was a franchise killer.
An Upcoming Renaissance – SaGa Scarlet Grace
And yet the series persisted. With remakes of many of the previous games coming out left and right to introduce new players to this quirky series, interest in SaGa is now greater than ever. Thanks to this positive feedback, Akitoshi Kawazu got another shot at the series in the form of SaGa: Scarlet Grace which will hit Western shores this fall. In Japan, the game has been met with a lot of praise, so things are looking up for this particular franchise. Only time will tell whether Scarlet Grace will make a mark on the larger gaming scene or will remain purely as an oddity for the most hardcore JRPG fans.
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