Romancing SaGa 3 has now made its way to the West! Its initial release was on the Super Famicom in Japan on November 11, 1995. After 24 years, the world is now able to experience the classic RPG on almost any device that can run games. Square Enix not only brought Romancing SaGa 3 back, but they did so with full force. Players can now play the game on the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation Vita, Xbox One, Windows 10, Steam, the App Store, the Google Play Store, and the PlayStation 4.

Check out the trailer for the remaster here:

The Design

I had never been too keen on turn-based RPGs (other than Pokémon and The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age) before stepping into Romancing SaGa 3. Moreso, I had never really played games that came before the Nintendo GameCube. Needless to say, I was a little out of my depth.

However, I was pleasantly surprised by Romancing SaGa 3. The game is so pretty in all its pixel-art glory and the soundtrack is just as wonderful. I thoroughly enjoyed exploring the world in Romancing SaGa 3 to see each new environment and hear each accompanying melody.

The design of Romancing SaGa 3 gives the game a wonderful charm. The remaster of the game highlights the pixel-style in the best way and brings Romancing SaGa 3 to a 16:9 aspect ratio. The quality of the graphics reminds me of Stardew Valley, which came out only three years ago. Being able to relate a remaster’s quality to such a newer game is wonderful and shows the care that went into recreating the game.

The music in Romancing SaGa 3 is phenomenal. The feelings evoked are exactly what I think of when I think of old RPGs, even though I’ve never actually played any. Kenji Ito, the composer, works masterfully to set the tone with music alone. Since there is no spoken dialogue, the music plays such an important role as the main audio the player hears. Ito has also composed music for popular games in the Final Fantasy, Mana, and Puzzles & Dragons series of games.

The overall feeling of this game is phenomenal. It reminds me of weekends lost playing games on my Game Boy advance just from graphics and music alone. Not having any spoken dialogue is nice because the writing is so well done and it is easier to comprehend what is being said. The game evokes quite a bit of nostalgia and I grew up on the back-end of games always looking and sounding like Romancing SaGa 3.

The Gameplay

This is where things get a little hairy for me. I love how Romancing SaGa 3 plays. I enjoy the combat system and how the overworld works. What I don’t like is how much the game just drops you in with no help. Romancing SaGa 3 reminds me a lot of playing Dungeons & Dragons, and that isn’t entirely a good thing.

When booting the game, the character selection process feels a lot like working with mostly premade D&D character sheets. The player selects their character from one of either four males or four females. The player then selects a role and a weapon. After doing so, a bunch of stats appear based on the character, role, and weapon the player selected. At first glance, these stats can be extremely confusing to look at. Having played D&D already, I was able to interpret them. However, for those new to RPGs, these stats mean nothing.

This is a major issue throughout playing the game. When the player pauses, there are a bunch of stats with abbreviations like “MP,” “HP,” and “LP.” Like I mentioned before, I’ve played RPGs before and knew what most of these meant. What threw me off the most was the “LP,” which I now know is “Life Points.” Each character has a number of “Hit Points,” which are used to track how many points of damage the character can take before being knocked out. Once the HP hits 0, then the character loses one LP. If they are hit again after they are knocked out they lose another LP. When a character loses all LP, they are dead. For good.

I do like the idea of perma-death in an RPG such as this. It makes decision-making that much more crucial. Knowing when to stay and fight and when to flee may be a life or death decision. The combat is more intense because of this and helps set Romancing SaGa 3 apart.

As the player progresses, the character level up based on their involvement in combat. Sometimes, “Inspiration” will strike a character and they will learn a new ability. I like that players are never privy to when a character will increase in a skill or have their health increase. This seems to reward the player for playing the game instead of watching a progress bar fill and feeling the need to grind to get to the next level.

Romancing SaGa 3 is full of customizability options. There are a plethora of weapons, armor, and shields in the world. Knowing how and when to equip what is crucial. Will you equip a shield and take up a spot for a healing Balm or another weapon? Or, do you equip two weapons to maximize your damage options? The number of options is incredible given that this game was released in 1995.

One major leg up that Romancing SaGa 3 has on other Super Famicom/ SNES games I’ve seen is that selecting different characters leads to a different game experience. While the main storyline is consistent through all playthroughs, each character will give different options for opening gameplay and other responsibilities. For example, if you select Katarina, you must help the sister of the Marquis to escape before the Marquis is usurped. If you select Thomas, the game begins when the Marquis’s sister arrives at a small tavern and asks for aid in alerting the Marquis of the coupe. And those are just options right out of the gate. The way the narrative can branch depending on your character selection, as well as your choices, makes this game one-of-a-kind.

Overall, Romancing SaGa 3 was a fantastically wonderful game. Aside from the few issues I had learning the game, I found myself thoroughly immersed in the story. Since the player has such control over how they play the game, every player will have a unique experience. The remaster offers added content as well as a New Game+.

I would recommend Romancing SaGa 3 to anyone looking for a fantastic older game that has such high replay value. For anyone considering getting this game, it is on sale from the time of its release to December 3 on the PlayStation store. If you’re interested, I’d recommend taking a look at it here.