I remember seeing that in Fry’s a few years back and thinking how the cover artwork looked really great. Then I read the reviews. The terrible, merciless reviews…
I’m going to tell you now: this is the worst idea you’ve ever had.
This Penny Arcade strip (check the URL below) summed up how I felt going to the store back then. The first few panels, anyway.
Why would you do this to yourself?
It’s not worth it! It’s never worth it!
You should play the superior games SaGa Frontier 1 and 2 (which also look beautiful).
Good luck! You’ll need it.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask. I’ve beaten Laura’s quest.
Guys, you do know I’m taking you with me, right? And I’ve played a bunch of the SaGa games already, having put the most time (20 hours) into the first Frontier.
I have no illusions about liking this game, but I do want to understand it.
So I have this big bowl of broken glass and I want to see how it tastes. Let’s blog about our respective experiments and compare results.
Sorry, Persona 3, but I have to put you on hold because I’m supposed to play a really crappy game that’s impossibly popular in Japan. I will admit, though, that I’ve been fascinated by this game since its release and really do want to understand it. First I need to find the game, though. How long ’til this ‘Fun’ Club starts?
The challenge of every SaGa game is the same: figure out how to win. In that respect, U-Saga is an exceptionally difficult Saga game. Incidentally, if you ever do figure it all out, it’s actually pretty easy to beat.
Don’t do it! You have so much to live for!
Sounds good, Bob.
…you go first.
At least the box looks nice.
Hahah – this is rad. I Always wanted to like the Saga Games, but they always end up pissing me off. Love the art in Saga 2 on psx. Hey, werent you looking for Final Fantasy Legend 3 on game boy? I have that kicking around somewhere. Eat meat to become beast…
Unfortunately the box art is where the good stops on this one.
I applaud your effort to understanding things that the average person has the sense to leave well enough alone.
Indeed, there’s a bit of Lovecraftian horror to such a selection in games.
Yeah, that’s a seriously classy box. I like it a lot.
Who designed the box art for this game? The limited edition one also looks really nice, as seen in my URL.
Graphics 0/10
2D yuck!
Gameplay 0/10
Casino roullette with a fantasy theme (read it from other review which also plagiarized that other review, all my FAQs are copyurighted, yo)
Sound 10/10
AWESOME
Box 10/10 Overall 10/10 (not at gunpoint, totally :P)
You’re never supposed to invite it into your house!
You know when you have someone you really care about, and they do something that makes you shake your head in disappointment, but you still love them anyway??
That was kind of like my reaction to seeing Unlimited Saga on Parish’s main page today.
You know, I’ve tried to understand this game too. I never succeeded, but here’s where I left off.
1. Obviously, a lot more focus is put on art than gameplay. This includes graphics, music, and outright ingenuity (regardless of what’s actually fun).
2. The level-building system basically requires you to progress through the game just to gain stats, which turns into a problem if you level-build improperly. The only way you can make any progress without actually finishing quests, as far as I can tell, is to repeat sidequests over and over by failing them, just for the sake of finding treasures or unlocking new moves with your weapons.
3. Rather than looking at the skill system as a distorted mess, look at it as an elaborate mind puzzle. You have to recognize which few of the hundreds of skills are actually useful to you, and you have to plan ahead on how to place them on the grid for maximum points, without having any idea at all about which skills the game is actually going to give to you!
4. The seven stories probably intersect in some meaningful way, but hell if I know how.
Who was looking for Final Fantasy Legend III? I think I just blasted off in a rocket to the moon or something…”just” meaning approximately ten years ago.
Bring it, Parish. I’ve got my copy too.
Oh no, who’s this lady that stepped into Jeremy’s house?
Dun, dun, duunnnnnn…
That box art is frightfully vague. I generally avoid games I have no idea about with box art like that. They’re like Venus Flytraps. They attract you with pretty colors and a cool looking logo then, when it has you, it snaps shut, introducing you to world of painful horror and insanity and the loss of fifty dollars.
I wish you the best of luck Jeremy in your venture to try and understand this game. I hope it makes for some interesting reading, and that the experience doesn’t totally kill you.
I’m hanging onto the next to impossible hope that you actually like the game.
I got to the end of Laura’s quest, to the very stinkin’ end. Never beat the boss because it kept using attacks that took of life points. How’d you ever do it, Legion?
It wasn’t easy. I made sure everyone had equipment with Life Protection, had two healers, and basically rotated everyone out in groups of 2 fighters and 1 healer at a time. Damascus weapons helped, too.
The most difficult part of the fight is, of course, the last phase. Over the previous phases, you should generally be using your heavy HP hitters, since the boss doesn’t have very HP and therefore they do more LP damage than usual. For the last part, use spears, bows, and/or daggers until you think its HP is down.
Oh, and don’t bring out anyone who doesn’t have some HP of their own. That’s why you should rotate the characters in and out.
Wait, if LP stands for Life Points, what does HP stand for? What do the two do anyway?
Atleast in the UK we got Unlimited Saga in a very nice fold out presentation case & a bonus disc
“Wait, if LP stands for Life Points, what does HP stand for? What do the two do anyway?”
When a guy runs out of HP, he KO’d but can still be attacked, at which point he starts losing LP. If he runs out of LP, he’s dead FOREVER.
That sounds like a GREAT idea!
Is there any way to restore lost LP before the perma-death?
Actually, Unlimited Saga doesn’t even KO people if they lose their HP. You’re just more likely to lose LP if you don’t have any. Also your actions become slower and don’t do as much damage.
This also applies to enemies. Enemies with lots of HP will go early and not lose as many LP; enemies with few or no HP will go late and shed lots of LP. If you can figure out how much HP your opponent has, you can build better combos.
There are seven herbs that can restore LP. Yes, seven.
Also, you regain some LP in between the next-to-last boss fight and the last boss fight. And it’s not perma-death – at least, not in this particular Saga.
Well, I ordered my copy. It should be here in… a long, long time, since I did Free Value Shipping. Whatever. I might look over the Game Mechanics FAQ on GameFAQs, which is over 500kb, and just goes on and on and on…
There has to be something to this game. It looks so frickin’ complex.
I’m always up for a challenge. And this is going to be a challenge on many, many levels. So, what is this going to be? The January RPG? Or is it its own beast entirely? Seems dubious to run this under the Fun Club label. Are you actually going to go for completion, or is it just an experiment to see how long you can look into the void before it looks into you?
I think there should be a fourth Fun Club portion created in honor of Unlimited Saga, set aside for games nobody’s actually going to want to play. The Not Fun Club.
I forgot about the LP system. It sort of made sense in SaGa Frontier, since people had full HP restored at the end of every battle. But that’s not the case in Unlimited Saga. Then there’s also the bit about how you can lose LP at any time, it’s just that you’re more likely to lose it with low HP (supposedly). Although, if I recall correctly, it didn’t really matter in the long run, since party members could lose all their HP in about two hits anyway.
Yes, perhaps the a Not Fun Club should periodically be in place, focusing on something we should all play for self-betterment despite our desires? Dub it the “Finnegan’s Wake Club”?
But who am I to color people’s opinions so?
The owner of the site, of course.
A Not-Fun Club for this game would be a grand idea, since I couldn’t justify buying and suffering through this game otherwise.
Also, if the HP/LP idea sounds as bad as I think it is, then I think I’m beginning to understand the level of vitriol directed at this game. Yeouch.
the-Bavis: Finnegans Wake is quite fun, especially if you are reading it aloud to a bunch of people and they are staring at you wondering if you are insane (I quite like that book regardless of its borderline incomprehensibility, have only ever read about the first third of it, but its hilarious, like a book length long version of the jabberwocky with lots of silly puns).
“self-betterment despite our desires…”
I refuse to believe Finnegan’s Wake bettered anything. REFUSE, I SAY!
But I agree with Parish. There are people out there who consider US their favorite PS2 game (on GameFAQs, of course, but still), so I wouldn’t want to brand it the “Un-Fun Club” selection. But, then again, this IS an opinion site… I mostly just want to wait for Fun Club Alternate or whatever to open up rather than create a new category right now since I don’t have my copy yet.
I was a bit of a wimp; I intentionally threw the “decisive” one-on-one battle in Laura’s scenario (which was harder to lose than it would’ve been to win, actually) so I could get the easier version of her final boss. I’m not too ashamed; other scenarios gave me a chance to atone for the early cowardice.
I have a million better ways to spend my time than taking part in an “Un-Fun Club.” Like anything.
You know, I would have thought the man behind Contra 4 would be more into masochism than this. I am disappointed.
OK, I suppose nobody likes Finnegan’s Wake (except people at ravinoff’s parties). Maybe the “Infinite Jest” Club (David Foster Wallace) would be better. Everybody struggles to finish it. Many won’t make it through. Then at then end some will love it, some will hate it, and some will appreciate it even though they certainly did not enjoy it.
Some of us will even start over a second time, convinced that THAT will bring everything together!
Well obviously the answer is BIZARRO Fun Club — only in another dimension could this be considered ‘fun’. With that said however, I very much do like the Romancing SaGa games, even if their difficulty still terrifies me.
The “Moby Dick” club? Something comprehensible but nevertheless utterly incomprehensible to everyone, including the author?
“I love this game.”
Re: 1up Yours
Hey Parish, Morrowind’s been on the 360 BC list for about 4 months now. Just lettin’ you know.
“My name is Indalecio, and I approve of this purchase.”
What rebibetall wants to say Parish, is that you could have tried playing Morrowind or maybe even a crappy one like Ultima IX if you wanted to play a different type of RPG. Personally, I recommend you play Wizardy 8, the Wizardry series explains a lot why and how the japanese love RPG games. As amazing as it sounds the japanese hardcore RPG gamers prefer the western type of RPG (Wizardry is HUGE in japan, where it has more sequels than in the US where it was created).
I don’t think the object of this excursion is to “play a different type of RPG.” I believe it’s to try to understand a nearly universally maligned title which nonetheless appears to be a labor of love for its creator. How many video games have their creator’s names in the title? Katamari Damacy, um… Daikatana? I don’t remember.
Well, the name in the title thing may be a result of Kawazu being a senior executive at Square Enix, but I think your point stands.
Actually, to the other guy who forgot to sign his name, if you didn’t notice, I put
“Re: 1up yours,” in which, Parish asked if Morrowind was BC yet.
It had nothing to do with Unlimited Saga, which I am pushing him towards playing.
I still say FF Legend III was a supremely competent RPG for the Game Boy.
I’m a big fan of the SaGa games, especially U-Saga, but I acknowledge that they’re an aquired taste. They’re often badly written and have fucking unnecessarily obtuse gameply systems, but once you figure them out, you can really “pimp the system”. And it’s pretty fun.
But no, U-Saga is worth playing just for the music. Masashi Hamauzu is a genius, and this game’s soundtrack is ridiculously amazing.
Hang your head in shame!
I remember seeing that in Fry’s a few years back and thinking how the cover artwork looked really great. Then I read the reviews. The terrible, merciless reviews…
I’m going to tell you now: this is the worst idea you’ve ever had.
This Penny Arcade strip (check the URL below) summed up how I felt going to the store back then. The first few panels, anyway.
Why would you do this to yourself?
It’s not worth it! It’s never worth it!
You should play the superior games SaGa Frontier 1 and 2 (which also look beautiful).
Good luck! You’ll need it.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask. I’ve beaten Laura’s quest.
Guys, you do know I’m taking you with me, right? And I’ve played a bunch of the SaGa games already, having put the most time (20 hours) into the first Frontier.
I have no illusions about liking this game, but I do want to understand it.
So I have this big bowl of broken glass and I want to see how it tastes. Let’s blog about our respective experiments and compare results.
Sorry, Persona 3, but I have to put you on hold because I’m supposed to play a really crappy game that’s impossibly popular in Japan. I will admit, though, that I’ve been fascinated by this game since its release and really do want to understand it. First I need to find the game, though. How long ’til this ‘Fun’ Club starts?
The challenge of every SaGa game is the same: figure out how to win. In that respect, U-Saga is an exceptionally difficult Saga game. Incidentally, if you ever do figure it all out, it’s actually pretty easy to beat.
Don’t do it! You have so much to live for!
Sounds good, Bob.
…you go first.
At least the box looks nice.
Hahah – this is rad. I Always wanted to like the Saga Games, but they always end up pissing me off. Love the art in Saga 2 on psx. Hey, werent you looking for Final Fantasy Legend 3 on game boy? I have that kicking around somewhere. Eat meat to become beast…
Unfortunately the box art is where the good stops on this one.
I applaud your effort to understanding things that the average person has the sense to leave well enough alone.
Indeed, there’s a bit of Lovecraftian horror to such a selection in games.
Yeah, that’s a seriously classy box. I like it a lot.
Who designed the box art for this game? The limited edition one also looks really nice, as seen in my URL.
Graphics 0/10
2D yuck!
Gameplay 0/10
Casino roullette with a fantasy theme (read it from other review which also plagiarized that other review, all my FAQs are copyurighted, yo)
Sound 10/10
AWESOME
Box 10/10 Overall 10/10 (not at gunpoint, totally :P)
You’re never supposed to invite it into your house!
You know when you have someone you really care about, and they do something that makes you shake your head in disappointment, but you still love them anyway??
That was kind of like my reaction to seeing Unlimited Saga on Parish’s main page today.
You know, I’ve tried to understand this game too. I never succeeded, but here’s where I left off.
1. Obviously, a lot more focus is put on art than gameplay. This includes graphics, music, and outright ingenuity (regardless of what’s actually fun).
2. The level-building system basically requires you to progress through the game just to gain stats, which turns into a problem if you level-build improperly. The only way you can make any progress without actually finishing quests, as far as I can tell, is to repeat sidequests over and over by failing them, just for the sake of finding treasures or unlocking new moves with your weapons.
3. Rather than looking at the skill system as a distorted mess, look at it as an elaborate mind puzzle. You have to recognize which few of the hundreds of skills are actually useful to you, and you have to plan ahead on how to place them on the grid for maximum points, without having any idea at all about which skills the game is actually going to give to you!
4. The seven stories probably intersect in some meaningful way, but hell if I know how.
Who was looking for Final Fantasy Legend III? I think I just blasted off in a rocket to the moon or something…”just” meaning approximately ten years ago.
Bring it, Parish. I’ve got my copy too.
Oh no, who’s this lady that stepped into Jeremy’s house?
Dun, dun, duunnnnnn…
That box art is frightfully vague. I generally avoid games I have no idea about with box art like that. They’re like Venus Flytraps. They attract you with pretty colors and a cool looking logo then, when it has you, it snaps shut, introducing you to world of painful horror and insanity and the loss of fifty dollars.
I wish you the best of luck Jeremy in your venture to try and understand this game. I hope it makes for some interesting reading, and that the experience doesn’t totally kill you.
I’m hanging onto the next to impossible hope that you actually like the game.
I got to the end of Laura’s quest, to the very stinkin’ end. Never beat the boss because it kept using attacks that took of life points. How’d you ever do it, Legion?
It wasn’t easy. I made sure everyone had equipment with Life Protection, had two healers, and basically rotated everyone out in groups of 2 fighters and 1 healer at a time. Damascus weapons helped, too.
The most difficult part of the fight is, of course, the last phase. Over the previous phases, you should generally be using your heavy HP hitters, since the boss doesn’t have very HP and therefore they do more LP damage than usual. For the last part, use spears, bows, and/or daggers until you think its HP is down.
Oh, and don’t bring out anyone who doesn’t have some HP of their own. That’s why you should rotate the characters in and out.
Wait, if LP stands for Life Points, what does HP stand for? What do the two do anyway?
Atleast in the UK we got Unlimited Saga in a very nice fold out presentation case & a bonus disc
“Wait, if LP stands for Life Points, what does HP stand for? What do the two do anyway?”
When a guy runs out of HP, he KO’d but can still be attacked, at which point he starts losing LP. If he runs out of LP, he’s dead FOREVER.
That sounds like a GREAT idea!
Is there any way to restore lost LP before the perma-death?
Actually, Unlimited Saga doesn’t even KO people if they lose their HP. You’re just more likely to lose LP if you don’t have any. Also your actions become slower and don’t do as much damage.
This also applies to enemies. Enemies with lots of HP will go early and not lose as many LP; enemies with few or no HP will go late and shed lots of LP. If you can figure out how much HP your opponent has, you can build better combos.
There are seven herbs that can restore LP. Yes, seven.
Also, you regain some LP in between the next-to-last boss fight and the last boss fight. And it’s not perma-death – at least, not in this particular Saga.
Well, I ordered my copy. It should be here in… a long, long time, since I did Free Value Shipping. Whatever. I might look over the Game Mechanics FAQ on GameFAQs, which is over 500kb, and just goes on and on and on…
There has to be something to this game. It looks so frickin’ complex.
I’m always up for a challenge. And this is going to be a challenge on many, many levels. So, what is this going to be? The January RPG? Or is it its own beast entirely? Seems dubious to run this under the Fun Club label. Are you actually going to go for completion, or is it just an experiment to see how long you can look into the void before it looks into you?
I think there should be a fourth Fun Club portion created in honor of Unlimited Saga, set aside for games nobody’s actually going to want to play. The Not Fun Club.
I forgot about the LP system. It sort of made sense in SaGa Frontier, since people had full HP restored at the end of every battle. But that’s not the case in Unlimited Saga. Then there’s also the bit about how you can lose LP at any time, it’s just that you’re more likely to lose it with low HP (supposedly). Although, if I recall correctly, it didn’t really matter in the long run, since party members could lose all their HP in about two hits anyway.
Yes, perhaps the a Not Fun Club should periodically be in place, focusing on something we should all play for self-betterment despite our desires? Dub it the “Finnegan’s Wake Club”?
But who am I to color people’s opinions so?
The owner of the site, of course.
A Not-Fun Club for this game would be a grand idea, since I couldn’t justify buying and suffering through this game otherwise.
Also, if the HP/LP idea sounds as bad as I think it is, then I think I’m beginning to understand the level of vitriol directed at this game. Yeouch.
the-Bavis: Finnegans Wake is quite fun, especially if you are reading it aloud to a bunch of people and they are staring at you wondering if you are insane (I quite like that book regardless of its borderline incomprehensibility, have only ever read about the first third of it, but its hilarious, like a book length long version of the jabberwocky with lots of silly puns).
“self-betterment despite our desires…”
I refuse to believe Finnegan’s Wake bettered anything. REFUSE, I SAY!
But I agree with Parish. There are people out there who consider US their favorite PS2 game (on GameFAQs, of course, but still), so I wouldn’t want to brand it the “Un-Fun Club” selection. But, then again, this IS an opinion site… I mostly just want to wait for Fun Club Alternate or whatever to open up rather than create a new category right now since I don’t have my copy yet.
I was a bit of a wimp; I intentionally threw the “decisive” one-on-one battle in Laura’s scenario (which was harder to lose than it would’ve been to win, actually) so I could get the easier version of her final boss. I’m not too ashamed; other scenarios gave me a chance to atone for the early cowardice.
I have a million better ways to spend my time than taking part in an “Un-Fun Club.” Like anything.
You know, I would have thought the man behind Contra 4 would be more into masochism than this. I am disappointed.
OK, I suppose nobody likes Finnegan’s Wake (except people at ravinoff’s parties). Maybe the “Infinite Jest” Club (David Foster Wallace) would be better. Everybody struggles to finish it. Many won’t make it through. Then at then end some will love it, some will hate it, and some will appreciate it even though they certainly did not enjoy it.
Some of us will even start over a second time, convinced that THAT will bring everything together!
Well obviously the answer is BIZARRO Fun Club — only in another dimension could this be considered ‘fun’. With that said however, I very much do like the Romancing SaGa games, even if their difficulty still terrifies me.
The “Moby Dick” club? Something comprehensible but nevertheless utterly incomprehensible to everyone, including the author?
“I love this game.”
Re: 1up Yours
Hey Parish, Morrowind’s been on the 360 BC list for about 4 months now. Just lettin’ you know.
“My name is Indalecio, and I approve of this purchase.”
What rebibetall wants to say Parish, is that you could have tried playing Morrowind or maybe even a crappy one like Ultima IX if you wanted to play a different type of RPG. Personally, I recommend you play Wizardy 8, the Wizardry series explains a lot why and how the japanese love RPG games. As amazing as it sounds the japanese hardcore RPG gamers prefer the western type of RPG (Wizardry is HUGE in japan, where it has more sequels than in the US where it was created).
I don’t think the object of this excursion is to “play a different type of RPG.” I believe it’s to try to understand a nearly universally maligned title which nonetheless appears to be a labor of love for its creator. How many video games have their creator’s names in the title? Katamari Damacy, um… Daikatana? I don’t remember.
Well, the name in the title thing may be a result of Kawazu being a senior executive at Square Enix, but I think your point stands.
Actually, to the other guy who forgot to sign his name, if you didn’t notice, I put
“Re: 1up yours,” in which, Parish asked if Morrowind was BC yet.
It had nothing to do with Unlimited Saga, which I am pushing him towards playing.
I still say FF Legend III was a supremely competent RPG for the Game Boy.
I’m a big fan of the SaGa games, especially U-Saga, but I acknowledge that they’re an aquired taste. They’re often badly written and have fucking unnecessarily obtuse gameply systems, but once you figure them out, you can really “pimp the system”. And it’s pretty fun.
But no, U-Saga is worth playing just for the music. Masashi Hamauzu is a genius, and this game’s soundtrack is ridiculously amazing.