Ryushikaze
Deus Admiral Parsimonious, PHD, DDS, MD, JD, OBE
- AKA
- Tim, Ryu
Alright, let's get this Turkey cookin'.
We're going to play a game I've loved for well over a decade, ever since I picked it up at the local game store. And not Lunar, Lunar 2, or
Xenogears, though this game is in good company with the last one, because it's notoriously unfinished.
Yes, it's time for SaGa Fontier!
Coming out in the same development era as Xenogears and FFVII, but without ever being revisited for fixes and additional content, this game- like much of the early SaGa games- is still damn fun to play, and one of my favorite Square RPGs.
The game stars 7 heroes, as mention, without about 5 stories worth of total plot, as also mentioned.
When the game starts, all 7 heroes are displayed. We're going to start with Emelia. Remember, CIRCLE is yes, X is no.
For a less SD idea of what she looks like, here's a picture of her character concept art.
Next we need to let the game know where our system data is. If we don't have any- we don't- we make one.
Naturally, we want to keep our system data around like the game suggests. We also might want to keep at least one save file per character.
Naturally, you're going to want at least one whole memory card for this game. For those of you NOT playing on PS1 or PS2, this is less of an issue, but this game will eat a memory card or more if you let it.
Anyways, next we can rename Emelia. I won't be renaming heroes- since it's just the heroes and that's boring- but you can feel free.
In any case, We start with our heroine in prison. Now, Emelia's a former supermodel, and as we all know, pretty famous people never go to jail. Not for long anyways. So why's she here?
The reason is revealed over the course of the intro, so just keep watching. For now, just know she and her fiancee just had a fight, and that Emelia was going to showherhim the wedding dress. Now she's in jail.
And now she's being hit on by women in prison. If you were bummed we didn't start with Assellus and her leztastic exploits, take heart!
This is Annie. I'll show her concept art off later.
Also, we learn her boyfriend was shot by a guy in a joker mask...
..And the cops blame her for it. That's Fuse, BTW, he's a member of IRPO. They're the INTERPOL of this game. Fuse was the eight main character. Obviously, he's not anymore. He's also recruitable in pretty much every single quest.
Including Emelia's.
Like I said, the game's very unfinished in places.
Anyways, into this sexy softcore setup comes the Prison Warden, with his bizarre and hilarious pasttime.
Yes, horrific serial murderer, touch this shiny rock and get a FULL PARDON!
Yeah, that's a lie. Both parts, really.
So, after meeting Lisa, our third part member, learning there is a ready made escape tunnel underneath her cot, and changing INTO OUR CIVILIAN CLOTHES, we get control for the first time.
So we get into our first fight. As you can see, we have a party display with some basic party switch functionality. When we have six or more characters, this lets us choose which party to fight with, though the number of times I've used that feature can be counted on one hand.
Anyways, in battle, there are four important stats that you need to keep track of. There's HP, which is restored at the end of each fight, and LP, or life points, which are your life. If someone loses all their LP, they can't be used again til you restore it, usually by resting at an inn. If your hero loses all their LP, it's game over.
WP is weapon points, used for higher power physical techniques. JP is Jutsu points, used for magic.
And get our first stat up.
I should explain here. You never level up in SaGa frontier. Your stats just improve. Try and hit someone? The relevant stat might go up? Get hit? You might gain HP, vit, or both. Sometimes you do nothing and get bonuses at the end of level. Generally though, the better enemies you fight and the more you do, the better your stat gains.
How do you get new moves? We'll cover that as it comes up.
For the record, these are our starting stats, more or less. Emelia got a few bonuses, but she's still far behind the other two. She'll level up quickly, though.
As you can see, Annie's equipped with a sword, and Lisa's going unarmed. Lisa is the first or second best sword user in the game, and Lisa is DEFINITELY the best martial artist in the game.
So, see this hole in the ceiling up at the top there? You have to run at it using X so you jump down. You then hide in the locker. You can get a HEAT bazooka from the locker to the right, but you HAVE to hide in the rightmost lockers to do so and not get caught.
Oh yeah, if you get caught, it's an immediate game over. Make sure to save here if for no other reason. It's not like the fights are a challenge here.
Excellent. I learned- and screenshotted- a new move, one of three Lisa learned in quick succession. This is commonly called 'sparking' and has been the method of learning new techniques in SaGa for a few games now- did I mention Frontier is the 7th SaGa game? There were 3 for the GB, and 3 for the SNES before this.
Also FFII, but it doesn't count, despite having the same growth mechanic. I do consider it the spiritual father of the series, though.
So, after me deliberately wasting time and exploring the rest of Despair- that's the prison we're in- I make it to the boss fight.
How do I know it's the boss fight? Well, apart from being the 10th or so time I've done her quest, Annie says this
And then this guy shows up.
Here's our first boss, and a new game mechanic
Combo attacks. If two or more characters have compatible attacks with the right initiative order, they'll link attacks and start doing more damage. At two man combos, it's merely something like double damage, but it gets exponential if you get a five man combo. We'll get into combos and broken things you do with them later.
For now, just know that we beat the boss- okay, he ran away, still- and won our freedom from the crazy Warden.
And see Emelia in that wedding dress, in one of the more spoilery splash images if you know what it's depicting.
Anyways, Emelia heads back to her Boyfriend's house, that crazy man attacks her, and another crazy man comes to save her.
Roufas here then takes Emelia to a restuarant.
And behind that foodly facade...
A Resistance Cell!
After that, and lots and lots of words about something called Cube and no idea what it is, you get control again. And that's where we'll stop today.
But first...
A resistance cell run from behind a restaraunt, vaguely defined goals, crazy man at the helm, the star members are a Blonde who's really good with swords who's just in it for the money and a woman who can piledrive several story monsters without batting an eye.
You gotta wonder, were they trying to go for AVALANCHE 2.0, or did it just come about naturally?
Anyways, try and get to the end of her first quest by Friday-ish. I'll try and have the next leg done by then.
We're going to play a game I've loved for well over a decade, ever since I picked it up at the local game store. And not Lunar, Lunar 2, or
Xenogears, though this game is in good company with the last one, because it's notoriously unfinished.
Yes, it's time for SaGa Fontier!
Coming out in the same development era as Xenogears and FFVII, but without ever being revisited for fixes and additional content, this game- like much of the early SaGa games- is still damn fun to play, and one of my favorite Square RPGs.
The game stars 7 heroes, as mention, without about 5 stories worth of total plot, as also mentioned.
When the game starts, all 7 heroes are displayed. We're going to start with Emelia. Remember, CIRCLE is yes, X is no.
For a less SD idea of what she looks like, here's a picture of her character concept art.
Next we need to let the game know where our system data is. If we don't have any- we don't- we make one.
Naturally, we want to keep our system data around like the game suggests. We also might want to keep at least one save file per character.
Naturally, you're going to want at least one whole memory card for this game. For those of you NOT playing on PS1 or PS2, this is less of an issue, but this game will eat a memory card or more if you let it.
Anyways, next we can rename Emelia. I won't be renaming heroes- since it's just the heroes and that's boring- but you can feel free.
In any case, We start with our heroine in prison. Now, Emelia's a former supermodel, and as we all know, pretty famous people never go to jail. Not for long anyways. So why's she here?
The reason is revealed over the course of the intro, so just keep watching. For now, just know she and her fiancee just had a fight, and that Emelia was going to show
And now she's being hit on by women in prison. If you were bummed we didn't start with Assellus and her leztastic exploits, take heart!
This is Annie. I'll show her concept art off later.
Also, we learn her boyfriend was shot by a guy in a joker mask...
..And the cops blame her for it. That's Fuse, BTW, he's a member of IRPO. They're the INTERPOL of this game. Fuse was the eight main character. Obviously, he's not anymore. He's also recruitable in pretty much every single quest.
Including Emelia's.
Like I said, the game's very unfinished in places.
Anyways, into this sexy softcore setup comes the Prison Warden, with his bizarre and hilarious pasttime.
Yes, horrific serial murderer, touch this shiny rock and get a FULL PARDON!
Yeah, that's a lie. Both parts, really.
So, after meeting Lisa, our third part member, learning there is a ready made escape tunnel underneath her cot, and changing INTO OUR CIVILIAN CLOTHES, we get control for the first time.
So we get into our first fight. As you can see, we have a party display with some basic party switch functionality. When we have six or more characters, this lets us choose which party to fight with, though the number of times I've used that feature can be counted on one hand.
Anyways, in battle, there are four important stats that you need to keep track of. There's HP, which is restored at the end of each fight, and LP, or life points, which are your life. If someone loses all their LP, they can't be used again til you restore it, usually by resting at an inn. If your hero loses all their LP, it's game over.
WP is weapon points, used for higher power physical techniques. JP is Jutsu points, used for magic.
And get our first stat up.
I should explain here. You never level up in SaGa frontier. Your stats just improve. Try and hit someone? The relevant stat might go up? Get hit? You might gain HP, vit, or both. Sometimes you do nothing and get bonuses at the end of level. Generally though, the better enemies you fight and the more you do, the better your stat gains.
How do you get new moves? We'll cover that as it comes up.
For the record, these are our starting stats, more or less. Emelia got a few bonuses, but she's still far behind the other two. She'll level up quickly, though.
As you can see, Annie's equipped with a sword, and Lisa's going unarmed. Lisa is the first or second best sword user in the game, and Lisa is DEFINITELY the best martial artist in the game.
So, see this hole in the ceiling up at the top there? You have to run at it using X so you jump down. You then hide in the locker. You can get a HEAT bazooka from the locker to the right, but you HAVE to hide in the rightmost lockers to do so and not get caught.
Oh yeah, if you get caught, it's an immediate game over. Make sure to save here if for no other reason. It's not like the fights are a challenge here.
Excellent. I learned- and screenshotted- a new move, one of three Lisa learned in quick succession. This is commonly called 'sparking' and has been the method of learning new techniques in SaGa for a few games now- did I mention Frontier is the 7th SaGa game? There were 3 for the GB, and 3 for the SNES before this.
Also FFII, but it doesn't count, despite having the same growth mechanic. I do consider it the spiritual father of the series, though.
So, after me deliberately wasting time and exploring the rest of Despair- that's the prison we're in- I make it to the boss fight.
How do I know it's the boss fight? Well, apart from being the 10th or so time I've done her quest, Annie says this
And then this guy shows up.
Here's our first boss, and a new game mechanic
Combo attacks. If two or more characters have compatible attacks with the right initiative order, they'll link attacks and start doing more damage. At two man combos, it's merely something like double damage, but it gets exponential if you get a five man combo. We'll get into combos and broken things you do with them later.
For now, just know that we beat the boss- okay, he ran away, still- and won our freedom from the crazy Warden.
And see Emelia in that wedding dress, in one of the more spoilery splash images if you know what it's depicting.
Anyways, Emelia heads back to her Boyfriend's house, that crazy man attacks her, and another crazy man comes to save her.
Roufas here then takes Emelia to a restuarant.
And behind that foodly facade...
A Resistance Cell!
After that, and lots and lots of words about something called Cube and no idea what it is, you get control again. And that's where we'll stop today.
But first...
A resistance cell run from behind a restaraunt, vaguely defined goals, crazy man at the helm, the star members are a Blonde who's really good with swords who's just in it for the money and a woman who can piledrive several story monsters without batting an eye.
You gotta wonder, were they trying to go for AVALANCHE 2.0, or did it just come about naturally?
Anyways, try and get to the end of her first quest by Friday-ish. I'll try and have the next leg done by then.
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