Do you generally go to a restaurant and assume, “I actually like this place; I ought to come right here extra usually,” then overlook about it for the following six months? That’s The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered. It’s an OK recreation when you’re taking part in it, nevertheless it’s not prone to stick to you.
The issue begins with the title, actually. The Legend of Legacy may simply as simply be The Legacy of Legends, The Quest of Adventures, or The Battle of Fight. It’s too generic to hook you, and it considerably betrays the distinctive idea of the sport. A minimum of this time they’ve added HD Remastered to the title, as that is an up to date port of the unique Nintendo 3DS launch from 2015. The sport was developed by FuRyu that includes a workers with quite a few connections to Closing Fantasy and SaGa. As such, it’s not stunning the sport is intelligent and nicely made. It’s stunning that it didn’t hook me.
You start the sport by choosing one among seven heroes as your protagonist. You’ll finally meet and may recruit the others, however this does present some replay worth by altering the sport’s opening frames and conclusion. You’re then tasked with just about nothing greater than exploring the island of Avalon. A narrative concerning the historic historical past of Avalon is revealed via the gathering of “Singing Shards,” and these revelations have an effect on the way forward for the island and our seven heroes. Every will get a novel ending, none of that are grand adventures. It’s a small, tightly contained story that’s really a welcome reprieve from the everyday “village farmhand goes out to gather nuts and finally ends up preventing god” strategy to JRPGs.
The issue with a minimalist story, nonetheless, is that different components have to hold the sport. Is it the visuals with The Legacy of Legends? No, though they’re sort of enjoyable for a remastering of a nine-year-old recreation. The chibi characters have a properly textured, illustrative look that helps them come out from the surroundings. The backgrounds are a bit muddy, however their heavy shade saturation provides them loads of life. And I like how panorama components pop into place as you roam across the island. If exploration is half the sport, they’ve at the very least made that exploration nice to have a look at.
The soundtrack is equally enjoyable, however I’d count on that from Masashi Hamauzu, whose work you’ll know from quite a few Closing Fantasy video games, amongst others. It does job of meshing with the brisk tempo of the gameplay.
That gameplay includes turn-based fight that facilities round positioning. Earlier than a flip, you choose which place to place your get together in. These can deal with offense, protection, help, and so forth, and so they immediately have an effect on your skills throughout that flip. Progressing via the sport unlocks extra positions, thereby supplying you with extra weapon skills. And the extra you utilize these weapons, the more adept you change into with them. Utilizing them sufficient in battle releases Woke up expertise for extra highly effective assaults, so there’s loads of technique concerned with fight development.
The issue with that fight, nonetheless, is the issue spike with bosses. All of them have a specific approach to be defeated, and in the event you’re not adept with that methodology, they change into annoyingly troublesome. What’s pretty easy together with your group in a single playthrough can require a heavy quantity of grinding to beat with one other. I suppose this makes a number of playthroughs extra rewarding, nevertheless it doesn’t change the aggravation of discovering your self woefully unprepared for a boss whenever you’ve been cleansing home towards the enemies main as much as it.
I’ve seen this fight system in comparison with the SaGa collection, which I haven’t performed. I’ve, nonetheless, performed The Alliance Alive, an identical recreation from FuRyu launched two years after The Legend of Legacy on the 3DS. The Alliance Alive acquired an identical Change HD remaster again in 2019, and it’s attention-grabbing to check the 2. They share fight mechanics, however The Alliance Alive focuses extra on story and fewer on exploration. It’s a extra typical JRPG in that regard, however there, the overworld finally ends up interfering with the sport’s development. In The Legend of Legacy, exploring the setting is a core element of the gameplay. Finishing the maps is required for development, however the story provides you little purpose to take action.
Mix these two video games, and I feel FuRyu would undoubtedly have a winner. Separated, they’re extra like two halves of a complete. Going again to my opening restaurant analogy, it’s like one has good meals, the opposite has environment, and by no means the twain shall meet. Each of those video games have components that make them enjoyable to play, however lack the items to get full suggestions. Enjoying them aspect by aspect may very well be an attention-grabbing experiment for JRPG followers, however neither is a must-play by itself.
