Restoring cut content, breathing new life into pre-rendered background and old sprite, while even addressing the games infamous lack of direction, Saga Frontier Remasters draws a line in the sand, and sets a new standard in what I expect in seeing an old JRPG ported to the modern age.
Saga Frontier Remastered
Developer: Square Enix
Price: $24.99
Platforms: PC, Playstation, Xbox, Mobile
Wow, two things I never thought would come around. Saga Frontier not only gets a remaster, but also has a huge amount of its cut content restored? I have an affinity for PS1 JRPGs that lose a little on the cutting board due to budget constraints, time or otherwise, and Saga Frontier 1 is another one of those games, and here I am bringing a review to you, the people. Crazy how time works out, isn’t it? SaGa Frontier is a JRPG belonging to the SaGa series at large that was originally released in Japan on July 11th, 1997 for the Sony Playstation 1 and later on March 25th, 1998 it saw a North American release. It was, for the vast majority of us, the first exposure to mainline SaGa and its open-ended gameplay.
Saga Frontier has 7 main characters originally who all have their own stories set in this world we play in, who will meet different people, do different things and even have unique gameplay mechanics for a character. The remaster in question adds an 8th character who was cut originally, who kind of intersects with everyone’s story and provides some cool scenarios that play with the outcome of events we are familiar with. Fuse, the 8th character, requires you to beat someone’s story before you can play his take on it. I played countless hours of this game back in the day as well as MANY revisits over the years leading up to this, it’s one of my absolute favorite JRPGs of all time and I am happy to say it did an absolutely amazing justice with this remaster!
A little bit more about what was actually done here. The character sprites have had new life breathed into them, with the sprites cleaned up and crisped to a level that leads to me looking at characters, monsters, and more through a clean lens. There were more than a few sprites my mind thought were COMPLETELY different, and seeing them through a clean lens made me say aloud “OH THAT’S WHAT THAT WAS”, especially when it comes to the mechanical characters. The already pretty pre-rendered backgrounds have been run through some crazy AI upscaling robot and they are looking sharper than ever, even if I occasionally spot a few rough-looking spots, the overall quality of the upscale is fantastic.
The game (and most entries in the series) are famous for not having a TON of direction at times, and they have taken great care to give players a little bit more agency in finding out what comes next rather than leaving it up to a grand exploration of every location you can go to. It’s the kind of game that only gets better as you get more familiar with its system and world, but I am glad to say that the barrier for entry has been lowered quite a bit and it is FAR more welcoming than its PS1 counterpart for new players.
Combat and character building are some of my favorite systems around in this game. There are multiple races for you to build your party from. The versatile humans, powerful vampire mages, the Mystics, Sturdy and powerful Mecs, or even shapeshifting Monsters to add to your party. Each of these races both learns abilities in different ways and grows in different ways. We will get to humans last because they tie in with one of my favorite dopamine rushes in gaming. Mystics can learn magic naturally as well as level up their stats after battle but what really makes them shine are their special, monster absorbing weapons. A Sword, Gloves, and boots are all attacks that you can absorb a monster into, boosting your stats up and giving you access to a powerful monster technique. This leads to lots of fun setups as you can make attack-based powerhouses, speedy support units, and more with this race. Mecs have stats that are determined by the equipment you have them equipped with, with swords making them stronger, armor increasing defensive stats and HP as well as special circuit boards that unlock special attacks and varied stat bonuses. They are capable of absorbing special programs from enemy mecs as well that will help bring about machine superiority in your party. Considered a little more advanced to effectively build, Monsters absorb techniques from defeated foes, increasing their HP for every new ability learned, as well as changing the monster’s form depending on key techniques it has as well as HP thresholds for stronger monster forms. A strong monster can be a huge boon to the party, but it can also take a lot of time and dedication to get to their full potential.
The race I left for last, Humans is a perfect chance to talk about techniques as well as the updated translation of the remaster. A Human can attack something, and right before they actually attack, something happens. A pleasant noise dings off and your character has a lightbulb pop above their h d and then boom, a flashy new attack pops off, free of cost from resources. The community always referred to it as sparking a new technique back in the day, but now it has been updated with the term more often used now that more of the series has gotten translated, which is “Glimmer”. While not quite sounding quite as nice to me, this is a change that is in line with MOST technique names and terms to be put in line with the rest of the series, and it’s just something I will have to get used to. I never get tired of this mechanic, every time I hear that sound or see the lightbulb I can’t help but get excited about what is going to come after that. I’ve even had MANY occasions of a good glimmer changing the direction of a battle for me, it just is a great mechanic and always a joy to see. Humans will level up stats after battle, and in the case of guns or magic, they have a chance to learn a new technique in that class of abilities.
In battle, your characters can combine attacks into a combo that varies from level 2 all the way to 5, depending on how many characters are participating in the attack. This will make the technique in the combo FAR stronger as well, with a level 5 combo doing huge damage to your foes and making you feel like a strategic mastermind (even if it’s partly random) with a big flashy effect to signify the start of the combo. I also love the little effect the damage numbers do when you break 9,999 damage in a single attack or combo, it’s just another little feel-good visual effect that this game is full of.
The soundtrack is out-of-control good as well, Kenji Ito puts out another iconic soundtrack that fully takes advantage of the CD quality sound the PS1 brought to the series. You can find me listening to the entire soundtrack on the regular, but every single battle theme in this series is a bop and are the highlights of this varied soundtrack. Jazz, hard rock all the way to some good old country bumpkin sounding tunes are present here, and they are all done very well.
The Final Word
I can talk on and on about this game, but I truly believe this game only gets better when you go out, and start playing it. Find some places you shouldn’t be exploring yet, get a game over, find a special item you will revisit on every character and more. Just get out there and play Saga Frontier! This remaster has truly made this an easier job than ever, and as a dedicated fan of the series I honestly couldn’t be happier with the job done here. One of my favorites has been finally done justice, and there are rumors of Saga Frontier 2 getting a similar treatment (I hope there is some attention paid to balancing however in that one, it really needs it!). After seeing all of the love being paid to old catalogues of SquareSoft JRPG’s, I leave you with this. Please. Xenogears. I beg of you!
– MonsterVine Rating: 5 out of 5 – Excellent
