Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven has gone through several iterations over the years. It started its journey on the Super Famicom in 1993, where it had some success before moving to mobile in 2010. It also made pitstops on Android and iOS devices in 2016, the PlayStation Vita in the same year, and finally settling into the last generation on almost everything—lots of pitstops. And there is good reason for that – it’s damn good.
Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven is so good that the good folks at Square Enix have remade it, thrown it into a 3D world, and made some significant in-game changes that illuminate a new side of its gameplay, while maintaining everything that made it wonderful.
So, pick your crew of saviors, make sure the emperor stays alive, and let’s talk sword-swinging and turn-based shop.
The story behind the game
The game begins with King Leon of Avalon setting forth with a group of warriors, including his son, to find out what went wrong with seven warriors who saved their land eons ago and now have come back corrupted to scorch every living thing in sight—certainly, a simple story but a tall task that comes with it.
The story in Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven is a wonderful setup for how the rest of the gameplay functions. On a base level, the story has been told before, as legendary heroes who become infamous villains aren’t an old concept. Movies and games have done that trope before. That isn’t to say it isn’t entertaining for Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven. It’s incredibly entertaining because it still creates that impossible set of villains to overcome, especially if they were strong enough to take down monsters and free a land. Painting that type of challenge and making the characters meaningful for the journey is what creates that attention-grabbing storyline. You will feel like the task you have been given is monstrous (pun intended).
For my money, the big part of the story that will make you truly attach to the game is how the story is developed and treated, which is in a non-linear fashion. The journey you take isn’t guaranteed to be the same as someone else takes, and that is more about characters than the overall storyline. Much like the 1985 cartoon Robotech: The Macross Saga, a Saturday morning cartoon for kids, there is no guarantee that the character you’re playing with is going to survive. That is what makes the story interesting and engaging. And that bridges directly to the gameplay.
Don’t lose your head.
A non-linear path in a 1993 game wasn’t a concept that Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven began. The first game I remember playing that contained branching paths was Sega’s 1990 classic Phantasy Star III. In that Sega classic, you complete a quest, marry a queen, and then have a son. Who you marry is the branching choice, and who you marry equals what type of child you end up with, as well as their new adventure. While PSIII wasn’t quite as complicated as Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven and didn’t have quite as high stakes, it still proved the viability and value of offering players multiple paths and multiple generations of characters gamers could play as during their journey, which guaranteed multiple playthroughs.
Pretty freaking cool for a 1990 game, but sadly sucky as hell when compared to its predecessor.
Anyway, while playing this latest version of Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven, I found it positively fascinating that its gameplay took that PSIII concept and extended it further by allowing main characters to die and get replaced. You may not complete a journey with characters or create kids like PSIII, but the possibility of not completing a journey with a main character is very real. For example, once Leon’s son takes over as emperor for his fallen father, you might assume that if his son dies, then the game ends. Every RPG game generally works this way. You die, the game ends, and you load up the save point to try again. If you assumed this is how Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven works, then you would assume incorrectly.
The game opens the possibility that Leon’s son could fail and fall in the story, which means the game isn’t over, rather the throne becomes up for grabs. If Leon’s son falls, then the player must choose a new emperor, rebuild the team of warriors they had, and try again with a new leader at the helm. This also means that you must build up your team’s stats from scratch and grind the world. While it is a big world and there are plenty of enemies to take down to get those stats where they need to be, it’s still a lot of work to redo. While not everyone is going to fall in love with that concept or gameplay demand, you must respect the boldness of that gameplay structure. It certainly adds more stakes to the process of surviving the game and gives you the very real risk of losing all that effort and having to start again. Hate it or love it, it’s damn cool.
More unique attributes
Now, if that gameplay tidbit didn’t catch your fancy, then there are a few others that might. The first big one is how you can choose and build your team out. This version of the game comes with over 30 new classes to create a unique team to take down baddies. When I first started this game, I had a few teammates who didn’t live through some battles. People on your team can die and not come back again, so playing the game with caution and strategy is a must. I can’t tell you how terrible I was at this game from the start and how many teammates I lost along the way. If a teammate died, I usually replaced them at the local tavern, which generally produced a new character with different talents. The new teammates always felt different and brought their working ways with them. It’s neat that you can pick new people and feel like they are new. You can even pick new people if someone doesn’t die, and you can fire people from your team if they’re underperforming. There’s a lot of flexibility here with the game and it never feels like it’s empty with new options when it comes to new teammates. Each newbie brings their charm and set of powers.
It goes even deeper
If the threat of death and having to pick new teammates wasn’t enough, the game also has a very deep and customizable side to it. The game allows you to train your characters and assign attack/defense options to them. These are not just tiny options with no true strategy behind them. The game contains a bevy of different attacks/defense moves to assign to certain classes. For example, it could be brutish sword-swinging actions for the big brutes on the team, or it could be magical mages casting devastating spells on multiple monsters. Each type of character comes with the ability to perform multiple actions in battle. There are more actions than there are slots on characters, which means you will literally have to pick and choose how these warriors are built.
I have never in my life seen an RPG do this in my 40+ years of gaming, and I must admit it’s refreshing. It feels like I’m building a character and forming it to my strategic liking. The only comparable game I can imagine right now that does this is Elder Scrolls, but that is in an entirely different genre of its own. Anyway, you feel your strategic choices when you first go into battle. You can tell what moves work the most and which ones are weak. The latter of which you can retrain your characters and adjust as need be. There is a lot of trial and error with testing moves out, and it’s important for them to be just right, as it will dictate how difficult the journey might be.
Now, these moves come with an added layer of strategy with BP (battle points? Just guessing). The BP meter is akin to HP in the game, though the BP drives how powerful of an action you can pull off during battle. For example, if my brutish knight with a large sword wants to do a spinning sword move during battle, which might hit multiple enemies at once, it might cost six BP. Using BP at the right time helps to navigate enemies effectively and efficiently. If you run out of BP, then you either must go to an Inn and sleep it off or take on some liquor to revitalize it. The mere presence of those points adds battle strategy, as you must be choosy with how you approach enemies, and you must take into account the powerfulness of said enemies. You may not need to use BP on weaker enemies, so knowing when to activate it and when to withhold it adds another layer of strategy to the gameplay.
But wait, there’s more!
MORE
I never imagined a game like this, which is enormous and full of good turn-based fighting that takes up most of your time, would have a sim component in it. You can literally build up your kingdom with the coins and goods you find during battle. When I say literally, I mean literally. You actually build pieces for the kingdom. When this happened for the first time in the game, I was flabbergasted that it went this route in an already deep and rich RPG experience. Was it necessary? Nah. Was it cool and added more gameplay value to the overall package? Oh, yeah.
The first building you put together in your kingdom is for a blacksmith. You would think that once you build a structure for the blacksmith the game will automatically just put up new equipment out of the gate, but no. The game requires time to construct the building, a multi-adventure measured timeline. Once built, the blacksmith must develop new equipment for you that will, once again, require time. So, you could go on 3-4 quests before that new sword or armor is finished. It’s nuts, yet brilliant. It helps create a deeper experience for the player and makes it feel like the game is so much more than just a typical one-track RPG.
And we haven’t even talked about the complicated weapon/armor system where you can dress out your characters with specific items that adjust specific stats based on what type of character they might be. Character equipment is broken down into two weapons, shield, armor, greaves, helm, legs, and special items that have buffs. Each character has special types of gear they can wear, so there are a lot of possibilities/combinations to dress out and prepare your character for battle. It’s so impressive.
With all this armor and weapons at your disposal, with so many different types of characters, what in the world can you do with it all? Well, take care of enemies, silly. They need a-killing. And you will be doing a lot of that throughout the game. The enemy variety makes that constant battle cry manageable.
In true Square Enix fashion, many unique enemies come with abilities geared toward their design. You won’t have a shortage of nasty baddies and won’t be bored by the repetition of how they work in battles. While I’m not sure how the 1993 game worked, I can attest that the number of different enemies I ran into during my playthrough with this game was extensive and they changed from place to place. Rarely did I find the same enemy in a different location on the large map that you traverse during the game. There was always something different to fight when the battle moved from place to place. The game never felt like a chore because of this, and the enemy design was incredible. You won’t be bored with their animation and creativity.
Finally, if all this wasn’t enough to fetch your fancy, then just know that eventually, your characters will reach a point in the game where they become past characters. What this means is that you will complete the journey of a team, start a new journey with future generations, and continue the story of whatever emperor or empress you decide to play. It’s like reading a multi-book saga. Sometimes the older characters become legends, while the newer ones try to match the previous characters’ greatness. Eventually, you will be forced to start a new team, even though you won’t die, that just means you’re in for a new journey. This method of gameplay makes the game feel bigger than it probably is and deeper in its lore. It’s a neat way to handle things. Very PSIII.
In addition to this, there are also multiple quests you can take on and go on. If the 1993 game was like this, then kudos to Square for setting a new standard. Picking and choosing quests to take your team of legendary fighters on in a non-linear fashion is a forward-thinking design. It puts more control in the player’s hand, as this new game demonstrates. It makes it all the more fun.
Now, with all this said, the game isn’t perfect.
Imperfection
There are some noticeable hiccups during the adventure. The first one, and most annoying for me, was how you begin battles. Your characters can sneak up on enemies and hit them first to jumpstart a fight. By creeping up on an unsuspecting enemy and hitting the X button on the PS controller, you can make the first blow to the enemies before the turn-based fighting begins. If the enemy detects you first, then there is a possibility of a reversal. The annoying part of this process is that if the enemy turns around, then the X button pretty much deactivates, giving you no chance to start the battle first. It was more difficult to start a fight than for the enemy to do so, as some enemies don’t turn around readily. The fact that the X button shuts off upon enemy detection or even if they turn around is clunky. The player should be given a fighting chance to hit first, even if the enemy sets their sight on your team. The game just doesn’t allow this, and it can be frustrating at times.
The other issue I have is that the game ramps up the difficulty with bosses. While it does allow you to save and BP replenish before a boss fight, which is standard throughout the adventure, you are more than likely underpowered instantly before a boss fight happens. To alleviate this, you must grind the shit out of your characters before boss fights just to make sure. This sounds like a whiny complaint, but I’ve never been a huge fan of upping the difficulty of a game without just gradually getting there. Players should have some awareness of how powerful a boss could be during the journey to them, without having to experience the difficulty for the first time during the fight. Failure is never a fun lesson to learn repeatedly.
Anyway, these are my only hiccups about the experience. Beyond this, the game looks wonderful in 3D and is quite the upgrade from its original form. Square Enix put a lot of good effort into making one of their prized games something special. It’s worth a look.
On that note, let’s wrap this review up.
Conclusion
Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven is an amazing remake from developer and publisher Square Enix. It takes an already beautiful classic and properly retools it with a modern look and gameplay backbone. While not everything is perfect, it still maintains its charm and the structure that made it memorable back in the day.