Romancing SaGa 3: a cult classic game, whose recent — and first — arrival on our shores was rightfully celebrated. It's the last, and supposedly most polished instalment, of one of Squaresoft's most cutting-edge subseries (i.e. Romancing), itself part of a mythical experimental series (i.e. SaGa). It's a game that, by all accounts, I should absolutely love: and yet I don't.
Not to love a game I fully expected to love is already vexing enough; and to add insult to injury, the things I dislike in RSG3 are aplenty. It starts with the 'revamped' graphics, which erase the original's loveable 16-bit-ness and replace it by an ugly phone game look; it goes on with the unbearably slow battle system, which transforms each fight into an drawn-out chore; it ends with the confusing in medias res story, which is too hard to follow for its own good — and for a choral RPG.
And since I'm mentioning this, let me say that I'm also bothered by RSG3's similarities to Octopath Traveler, starting with the Recruitable Party Members system. I know that technically, RSG3 was the pioneer here, and the game that first introduced that system; yet Octopath Traveler was the one I did play first, and it seriously casts a shadow over my experience of RSG3. The gaming historian in me would like to explore RSG3 and uncover what was a groundbreaking novelty at the time; yet the gamer in me isn't having any of it and grumbles that if I really want to play a choral RPG, Octopath Traveler and its quality-of-play improvements would be a much better pick.
That being said, I'm not writing off RSG3 just yet. I acutely remember that my first experience of OT was pretty lacklustre as well, and that I needed a good number of tweaks and hours of play before I started enjoying it in earnest. Changing my MC in OT really did the trick, and maybe it could change my fortunes as well in RSG3. The general consensus seems to be that Katarina is the best MC for a beginner; so I'll try rolling with her, all the more so as she was one of the characters I seriously considered — my other picks being Mikhail and Harid, which I tried to no avail. The battle speed and ugly graphics cannot be alleviated, but I can probably get used to them over time. In brief: I'll try again, and if it still doesn't gel, then I'll give up with my conscience clean. And so, back to da grind!
Oh my god, the graphics are truly fugly! Considering Kemco's games all start as phone games, calling it "phone game look" is an insult to mobile RPGs. The heck was SE thinking?
ReplyDeleteHmm, there's a romancing saga game for the PS2 with 3D graphics, so if I have to pick a game to start the series with, I think I'll go with that, thank you very much.
"Oh my god, the graphics are truly fugly": I know, right? I was honestly shocked, especially since Squeenix usually pride themselves on their games' stellar graphics. That design choice really puzzles me, and I'd like to know the rationale beyond it (if there is any beyond wanting to save money and time, that is :P)
DeleteKnowing SE, and given this games' (apparent, haven't played either) similarities to Octopath Traveler, I'm guessing it was to copy OT's style, as much as they could using the original sprites of course.
DeleteYou'd think with them being so prideful over graphics, they'd know doing a graphics change like this without reworking every sprite from the ground up is a terrible, terrible idea.
At least give people an option to use the original graphics! This looks like an amateur, and I mean amateur, RPG Maker game, not a beloved cult classic.
Amateur is the word indeed. Heck, maybe I'll just emulate the original instead of bothering with that remake. I doubt combat can be any slower in the original; as for graphics, they look ten times better, with that lovely 16-bit look.
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