The 7th Saga/ Elnard Differences

U.S. Version title screen

Now, I know exactly what you're all thinking: "Jestan™, didn't you already write a review on The 7th Saga? Why are you writing on this game again?" Well, the answer is simple: it's a well-known fact by now that the Japanese version (Elnard) of the game is much easier than the U.S. version (The 7th Saga), but the differences go so much deeper than that! I thought it'd be fun if we took a look at some of the changes, both major and minor.

Japanese version title screen.

Well, as you can see from these two screenshots, the first major difference is the title screen, although the U.S. version's is actually blocked by a transparency effect. If you disable it, then it looks exactly the same as the Japanese version's title screen.

U.S. version

Japanese version

For one, in the U.S. version, the colors are brighter and more vivid in most locations, in the Japanese version they're washed-out and muted. You can also gather from the above screenshots that Wilme and Lejes (Willme and Lejees in the Japanese version) also had their sprites altered. In the Japanese version, Lejes looks like a demon on the map screens, but in battles, at least from the front, he looks like a male Twi'lek from Star Wars, to quote TCRF.net. Wilme got censored and forced to wear underwear and had his unicorn horn removed, and he also went nude in the Japanese version.

Wilme's Japanese battle sprite.

Lejes' Japanese battle sprite.

Of course, those two weren't the only characters to get overhauls to their sprites in the international versions.

The four screenshots above are the U.S. sprites for certain monsters. In the Japanese version, however...

They were either nude, or in the Sword's case, looking a bit too much like religious symbols. Or at least, that's the theory. You have to remember that this game came out at a time when Nintendo was draconian with its censorship policies. Oh, yeah? Even the final boss' sprite got altered for the U.S. release!

In the U.S. version, Gorsia is blue and has a much wider lower-body, while in the Japanese version, he's yellow and has a smaller lower-body.

Probably the most significant difference is the fact that every ten levels you gain in the Japanese version, all of your stat growths will get a +1 to them, so if you have, say, 3-5 points for a stat growth, then levels 1-9 will be 3-5 points gained for that stat, 10-19 will be 4-6, 20-29 will be 5-7, 30-39 will be 6-8, etc. In the U.S. version, however, you keep the same stat growths all throughout. This is what makes The 7th Saga so hard. You see, in Elnard, your main character's stats grow at the same rate the other apprentices do, meaning that everything is mostly fair and square in combat. In the U.S. version, however, your stats grow at a very slowed down pace while the apprentices not under your control retain their Japanese stat growths, and chances are, the one who gets the Sky Rune will obliterate you. They also have access to equipment none of them should have yet. Of course, that goes for both versions of the game, U.S. and Japanese. 

EDIT: Thanks to Reddit user, stripes_by_proxy, I forgot to put this in, but the enemies also got boosts to some of their stats, for example, in Elnard Romus only has about 130 HP. In The 7th Saga, his HP got boosted up to about 300.

The localization team wasn't totally without their mercy, however. Certain items in the U.S. version weren't there in the Japanese version, case in point, the mirror you can find at the beginning of the game near the bed.

You find a mirror here in the U.S. version...

...but in the Japanese version, there's nothing
there at all!

To give you a comparison for how different your stats will be in each version.

U.S. version

U.S. Version

Japanese version

Japanese version

As you can see, in both versions, I had Wilme go it alone. In the U.S. version, he turned out mostly okay, except in Magic, but in the Japanese version, he was a beast! Seriously, compare the stats between the two versions, and I think it's pretty clear which version is the easier version.

EDIT: One last change between the versions that I forgot to mention is that the menu selection sound is different in the Japanese version, and so is the sound doors make when you open them.

If you want to see all of the bosses fighting in-game, then go here.

This article, including all text and screenshots, is © 2019 Jestan Diams. The 7th Saga and Elnard belong to Enix (technically Square Enix now, but whatever) and Gameplan 21. All 7th Saga and Elnard characters © Square Enix and Gameplan 21. All original characters, names, etc., are © and ™ Jestan Diams. All rights reserved.

Secret of Mana Review

MY CHILDHOOD, MAN! Or at least one part
of it.

Just by looking at the screenshot above I can recall several things happening to me during my eighth year of life: I was about to start 2nd Grade, the childhood friend of mine (who is still friends with me today) would spend the night with me or I with him, and we'd rush into our bedroom just to play this game, and that's about all I can remember happening in 2nd Grade and it's all I care to remember, because you're not here to listen to me reminisce about the past, you're here to read up on my review of Secret of Mana, see what ol' Jestan has to say about it.

Well, while it's mostly good things to say, and this is a game that I have to go back and play at least once a year now, it seems like, it got me to thinking that maybe nostalgia has blinded me to some of the problems the game has? Well, let's find out.

There's no overworld travel in Secret of Mana,
instead the player travels through the game's
countrysides.

Secret of Mana was the first, I do mean the VERY FIRST Action Role-Playing Game (Action RPG from here on in this review) that I ever played, period. Remember, as someone who came from poor parents who themselves came from poor parents, I didn't have a lot of money. Even worse, where I live even today, there's not an awful lot to do outside, and so my Aunt gave me her copy of Secret of Mana. Originally, I hated the game, but over time it's become my favorite Super Nintendo game of all time. Not my favorite game overall, but my favorite game on the Super Nintendo. Anyway, the gameplay. For a Japanese RPG, this game was unique in that, instead of by traveling on an overworld map like most other JRPGs at the time, you instead traveled through the countrysides of the game's world. Now, you might think that this makes the game worse, but not really. It allowed for Square to make these beautiful landscapes that they just wouldn't be able to create, or for the player to see, by using the standard method of traveling on an overworld map. It really helps you to feel that you're actually traveling in the game's world and not just on a fantasy map. Of course, this means that for you to actually feel like you're in the game's world, the monsters are also roaming in these countrysides, visible to you, and they will come and attack you. This means that there's no need to load up a seperate map for the battle. This was unique at the time, and the only other games that I could think of that did something similar to the same travel map as the battle map would be games like The 7th Saga, Final Fantasy Adventure, and Seiken Densetsu 3. Okay there were others, but they were games like Eye of the Beholder, Dungeon Master, and Chrono Trigger. Whatever. Now, I like this. However, fighting in this game still works in a somewhat similar fashion to the Final Fantasy games in that whenever you make an attack, your characters have a cooldown timer where their attacks won't do full damage until it reaches 100% again, meaning that it still has a bit of a turn-based feel to it. So the easiest way to do it is to still play the game like an Action RPG version of Final Fantasy. Run up, attack the monster, run away until your cooldown time reaches 100%, and then rinse and repeat.

The Weapon Proficiency table...

 Something else that I really liked about Secret of Mana was the Weapon/Magic proficiency system. Yep, in this game, you didn't just gain experience points, you also had a certain level of skill with weapons and the elements of Mana, and the more you fought with weapons, or the more times you summoned a particular Element of Mana, then your characters would get better with that weapon or Element. When a character gained a skill level with a weapon, then they would learn a new special attack for that weapon which, shock of all shocks, in stronger than the standard attack. The problem is, is that you can easily clear out an entire room full of mooks with regular attacks faster than you can with the special attacks because the special attacks require you to charge them up, and it takes a while to do so, as well. I'm not saying that they aren't useful, it's just that they're slower, but hey, you have to keep power like that in check, right? It'd go to the players' heads, otherwise!

...and the Magic Proficiency table!

You then also have a Magic Proficiency table which, just like the Weapon Proficiency table, shows how skilled a character is with magic. Only Primm (the girl) and the Popoi (the sprite) have access to this table, as Randi (the boy) is too stupid to know how to use magic, but then again, Randi doesn't need it as he's physically the strongest of the three characters. This brings up something else that differentiate the characters from each other. Since Randi is physically the strongest of the bunch and can't use magic, he makes up for this by being able to master weapons the fastest. Primm is the healer of the group and uses healing magic and she's also the most well-rounded of the three, meaning that she hits harder with weapons than Popoi does, but not as hard as Randi. She also won't master weapons as fast as Randi does, but she'll master them faster than Popoi will, and Popoi is the group's mage, in that his strength comes from damaging enemies with magic rather than weapons. However, this means that physically, he's the weakest of the bunch, but what he lacks in physical strength, he'll more than make up for in magical strength, as he's going to be the one downing a lot of your enemies later on in the game. However, to make up for this, he'll also master weapons slowest of all three characters. Again, balance is everything.

Your characters sleeping at an inn.

This is just a minor point, but I love how the developers took the time to show the characters in the game sleeping in the inn. Most other games, even today, don't seem to do that, and even if they do, Secret of Mana was the first game that I ever saw do that. There's no point in this, I just think that's a really cool thing to show.









The music of Secret of Mana was composed by Hiroki Kikuta, and instead of having someone else create the music samples for the instruments used (or rather, imitated through a synthesizer) he decided to create his own music samples, leading to one of the SNES' (Super Nintendo Entertainment System) greatest soundtracks ever! The music runs the gamut from really cheerful to really moody, from Rock to Pop, and everything in between. There's some music in the game that I'm personally not a fan of, but it still fits the game and the mood that it's trying to convey at the time.

As for graphics... well, for a Super Nintendo game, they're very decent. You can tell what everything is, it's bright and colorful, and it really helps giving off something cheerful instead of something that would likely depress you, which is something I'm seeing more and more of these days in video games, it seems.

Now, as I've covered everything else, it's story time.

According to the opening scroll of the game, darkness is coming because Mana's power is fading, and the swords spoken of through the legends that mankind has created, all of those swords, including Excalibur, Kusanagi, Masamune, all of them speak to just one sword: the Sword of Mana.

Before the story starts, you gotta input your name, first.

After you've watched the opening scroll to see just what it is you're getting into, you get thrown into the game's main menu, where you have a slew of options, so much so that only two of them are available: New Game and Continue. If you're just starting the game for the first time, then you'll be forced to choose New Game, where you must input a name for Randi. Afterwards, you see an opening cutscene that shows the backstory of the game, and then you get to see the World Map in Mode 7, and after that, you get to see Randi and two other village boys goofing off somewhere they shouldn't be. They begin talking about how a ghost is around and that the Elder of the village told them to stay well-enough way, but of course, they just had to go exploring. Randi, of course, being the clumsy little oaf that he is, falls off the log they were walking on, and falls into a shallow stream just below, where he finds a sword imbedded in a rock. Getting the sword, as he needs it to chop down some bushes blocking the path back to his village, he discovers that a rabite is in the forest and it attacks him.

Blaming the rail-roaded player character.

Back at the ranch, it doesn't take too long for everyone to get royally pissed at Randi, because that sword he found in the rock in the stream? Turns out that it's none other than the legendary Mana Sword, and it's been protecting Potos Village from disaster for who-knows how long, and Elliott starts beating the crap out of Randi, telling him to GTFO the village, pronto. Randi asks him to stop, but he doesn't, and then an earthquake hits and Randi and Elliott fall into the pit, and inside the pit is a Mantis Ant, the first boss of the game. Now, this boss is painfully easy because you simply can't die. Even if you do die, you just get revived and the fight continues until you win. Needless to say, the game won't always be this forgiving, but just this once, the dev team has some mercy on the player, probably because of how long the opening is. Anyway, after beating the Mantis Ant, Randi is told that he's too young to wield the Mana Sword and that something must have happened to the sword, but Randi is told to come to the Water Palace if he wants answers. The man gives his name as Jema and leaves. In the Elder's house, Randi is told that monsters are attacking the village because he removed the Sword of Mana from it's resting place and that they're in danger as long as he's there, and so he is banished from the only place he's ever been able to call home. Left with little choice, he sets off to fulfill his destiny as the Mana Knight.

Primm has daddy issues.

Needless to say, Randi meets some traveling companions along the way, which would be Primm and Popi. Now, Popoi will always be met in the exact same way every single playthrough, but the game has some leeway when it comes to recruiting Primm. You can get captured by goblins and have Primm save you and then meet her in Pandora, or you can rescue her from Werewolves in the Haunted Forest. Either way you slice it, you'll have to recruit both Primm and Popoi eventually, and the way in which you do it is totally up to the player.

Secret of Mana is still a fantastic game, and it's one I easily recommend that you play. It does, however, have it's problems. For starters, only about 60-67% of the game is here, because Squaresoft was planning on releasing for the SNES Play Station add-on, but when that fell through, they were pressured into just releasing it on a standard SNES cartridge, meaning that a lot of the game had to be cut or reworked to fit on a Super Nintendo Cartridge. Now, though I have read stuff that says this, I can't back it up, but a lot of Secret of Mana's unused content went into the creation of another Squaresoft game, Chrono Trigger, maybe you've heard of it? Another problem I have is the game's pathfinding system for the AI party members. They'll get stuck on everything, and I do mean everything, even things you didn't know the AI could get stuck on, one of which can actually force the player to reset near the very beginning of the game! Thankfully it's rare to happen, but be careful, especially if you haven't saved in a while. I also don't like how long it takes to grind weapon and magic skill levels later on in the game, but that's really just a minor nitpick.

If you want Secret of Mana, well, there's plenty of ways of playing it. You can track down the SNES original cartridge if you have a working Super Nintendo Entertainment System and you have the money for it, or you can go out and purchase a SNES Classic (good luck finding one of those, eh!?) You can also purchase a port on your iOS or Android devices, or purchase it in 3D for PS4, PS Vita, or Steam. I'd say go with the 3D remake. It's very close to the original game, several bugs are fixed, voice acting was added, and the pathfinding system was also fixed. It was also fixed on the iOS and Android ports, but those have crappier control schemes, although I do think controller support was added for the iOS port, but you should avoid the Android port, as it has a very serious game-breaking bug for Undine's magic, which renders the game unplayable. Apart from the Android port, any one of these versions are fine.

I give Secret of Mana a 9.0/10. Go out and play it at least once before you die!!!

This review, including all text and screenshots, are copyright by Jestan Diams™. Secret of Mana belongs to Square Enix. Jestan Diams, Jestan Diams Magical Tome of Games, and any other original characters are © and ™ of Jestan Diams. All Rights Reserved.

The 7th Saga Review

The Dark Souls of the Super Nintendo!

If you've ever heard anyone talk about The 7th Saga, or if you've ever read or watched someone's review of the game, then chances are that they're going to be extremely negative about the game. To be honest, they're right. This game does suck. Even to me, who likes it based on nostalgia alone, I think it sucks, too. But why does it suck so much, you ask? Well, I'm going to tell you.

Released all the way back in the U.S.A. in 1993 (one year after I was born, God I feel old), The 7th Saga sees the player pick one of seven apprentices, each with their own goals, personalities, strengths, and weaknesses, to recover seven runes to become the ruler of the world. That's pretty much the story in a nutshell right there, but I'll come back to it eventually.

The seven apprentices you can choose
from.

Anyway, onto the apprentices, since you're going to have to choose one of them to even play the game anyway, you may as well know more about them. From top to bottom, left row first, we have Kamil Dowonna, your basic Dragon Quest JRPG protagonist who is good at everything but is a master of nothing. He has no stat on which he truly excels, but he isn't weak at anything, either. He says that he's the best outfitted for the mission or quest or whatever, but I honestly think that honor would go to Lux.

Olvan is similar to Kamil, only he focuses more on HP, Power, and Guard instead of MP, Magic, and Speed. He plays like a Paladin-sort-of character instead of the typical Dragon Quest hero. He can equip most weapons and armor and is the only one who can take a second route to get to an area later in the game, whereas everyone else must include him to unlock that second route for them or go their own route to that area. Olvan is also the only character to have access to a password that will allow him to access a room in a hidden cave with a hoard of treasure.

Esuna Busy is an Elven mage,the only one who is a female, and she specializes in Ice elemental magic. She also starts off as the fastest of the group (not so in the Japanese version) but later on, her weaknesses start to show more and more as the game goes on. She can't equip much in the way of weapons and armor, but again, her speed and magic mitigate this... somewhat.

Wilme is an Alien, and he is all about sheer physical power. Seriously, he can easily solo the game all by himself and is probably one of the easier characters to do that with. However, to make up for his brute strength, he can't learn much in the way of spells, most of which are Fire-based and he can't equip any armor at all. There is one single weapon that Wilme can equip, and that is the Sword Sword. No, I'm not making that up, that is literally what is best, and indeed only, weapon is called.

Lux is a Tetujin (Tetujin being a form of 'Tetsujin' which is Japanese for 'iron person'.) and he starts the game off pretty well, being able to take only 1 HP damage from enemies physical attacks throughout most of the game. Just like Wilme, though, Lux doesn't get much in the way of equipment, and he only learns five spells in the game: Laser and Thunder. However, he's the only apprentice to learn those spells, and unlike Wilme, he can actually equip other weapons and pieces of armor, although his equipment comes fairly late in the game.

Valsu is, just like Kamil, a Human, only Valsu's strength comes from the magic power of healing. Just like Esuna, Valsu can only equip mage weapons and armor, and he only learns one attack spell, Ice 1, but the rest of his magical repertoire comes from healing and buffing himself and his allies. He also has a pretty good defense growth for a mage.

Last but not least is Lejes, a Demon and the most hot-headed and cold-blooded member of the group. He and Valsu are the antithesis to one another. Valsu only learns one attack spell and apart from that, he learns only healing and defensive magic. Lejes only learns spells fit for battle, such as conjuring shields, and he learns every attack spell in the game, except for Lux's Laser and Thunder magic. Also, yes, you can indeed get Valsu and Lejes in the same party, it's just very hard and tedious to do so.

King Lemele has trained you for the
past five years.

Now, for this review, I'm going to be playing as Olvan, as I consider him to be the game's canonical main character. Anyway, King Lemele tells you that you have trained well in the past half decade and that it's now time to put that training and the skills you developed then to the test. Seven runes (arks in the Japanese version) are scattered around Ticondera (Elnard in the Japanese version, same as the Japanese title for The 7th Saga) and if you can gather all seven runes, then you become the leader of the planet. This is about the only story you're going to get in the game, unfortunately, but at least it gets you out there exploring, but I'll come back to this later. For now, just remember it. You can talk to the other apprentices if you want to, and they'll tell you what their strengths and weaknesses are and why they're going after the runes.

After leaving the castle, you can speak to the people in the town of Lemele and they'll give you useful pieces of information, such as always carry jewels with you. Yeah, this game has jewels that you can purchase so that if you die in combat, the enemies will steal half your money, but they're uninterested in jewels, and they'll leave them alone. Now, I honestly think that you lose half of your money for other reasons, but this isn't bad, either. At least it gives you a reason as to why you lose half your money should you die in combat. Basically, to make a long story short, jewels in this game function as portable banks, should you ever need to get some cash, and they'll get you the buying price back. For example, if you buy an Opal at the store for 100 GP, then you can sell that Opal back and get your 100 GP back at another store. Basic bank programming.

Anyway, talking to other people reveals that the Gate of Earth, to the south, has been shut and won't open because the King of Aran won't open it for the evulz. At least, I'm pretty sure that's why he did it. Anyway, you later learn that a man had a valuable stone that the King of Aran wanted, but the man wouldn't give it to the King, so he was executed. The man had a dog named Romus who also died eventually, having mourned day and night, which I believe is based on a Japanese legend, but I'm not sure. Anyway, you have to go and fight Romus, and after beating him you get the Key of Earth.

Pison, a bounty hunter.

Going through the Cave of Earth, you unlock the Gate of Earth with the Key of Earth, and going through said cave, you meet with a bounty hunter named Pison (I'm pretty sure it was supposed to be "Python" acording to the Japanese version) and he says that one of your fellow travelers hired him to get rid of you. Now, it's never mentioned why one of the others hired a bounty hunter to get rid of you and not the others, maybe he thought that getting all of the runes would have been a bad thing, maybe you were just the first apprentice Pison came across, the game never tells you. This is my first real gripe with this game, the story or at least the characters' backstories feel rushed and unfinished. Seriously, you never actually find out who the traitor apprentice is, all you know is that Pison wants you dead, and he comes back again twice just to make sure! It wouldn't be so bad if I just knew why or even who it was that hired him to kill me, but I just wanna know, you know?

Anyway, after traveling a bit more to the south after exiting the Cave of Earth you come to the port town of Bonro, where a man lives that you promised to help back in Rablesk by opening the Gate of Earth. You have to go into several different buildings and talk to certain people just to learn where he is, and after finally talking to people, you go back into his house and he gives you the map like he promised.

Going westward, you then come upon the desert town of Zellis, where a man named Brantu wants to get back to his hometown of Brush so that he can report on what he learned, and take some of the forgotten civilization Melenam's technology back with him, but he can't get back because of all the monsters. You take him through Melenam and find that Pison has come back as Red Pison. Needless to say, you beat him again and continue on your merry little way.

Watch out for that woman on the right. She
will constantly block the entrance to the
town.

You also find the Wind Rune in the ruins of Melenam and show them to the Elder, which determines which apprentice will start with the Star Rune and what level you're at when you do this determines that apprentice's level. Nothing in the game tells you this or even hints at it, so good luck figuring that out without a guide or a walkthrough or what-have-you.

Anyway, in Guntz you find that the people there are having water problems and that the Water Rune is held by the elder, and he agrees to give you the Water Rune if you can get water for their crops without rain. You go back to Pell and you get the Digger Quose to join your group. Taking him back to Guntz causes him to dig and dig and dig until he finally finds some water, which causes water to raise way up, meaning that now they won't have to worry about water again for a long time, or at least until a drought happens. The elder stays true to his word and gives you the Water Rune and even tells you about another rune that's in a city to the east, in Patrof.

You know, I haven't really mentioned the gameplay yet. See, this game is basically Dragon Warrior, if Dragon Warrior tried to have what is commonly known as the Dark Souls mentality nowadays back then. This game is hard. That's the only thing that The 7th Saga is known for is it's difficulty. Even worse, it doesn't really matter what apprentice you choose to be your main, every other apprentice will be better than you. You picked Esuna to be your main character? Then Wilme will turn out to be a better mage. You picked Wilme to be your main? Valsu becomes a better tank. See, the enemy apprentices in the game retain their Japanese stat growths, but because the dev team asked for a way to artificially extend the game's length, they lowered the player's stats considerably and made the monsters stronger. Now that's not to say that the translation team wasn't totally without their mercy. There are a ton of items in the game that you can find in the international version that aren't in the Japanese version of the game. Not that it really matters. Even if you managed to find every stat boosting seed in the game, the other apprentices will still run circles around you in terms of stats and even equipment, eventually winding up with equipment that they shouldn't have at that point. Another thing that the localization team did was increase how much experience and gold you get for winning battles against certain monsters, but every time you level up, so too do the enemy apprentices, and remember, they retain their Japanese stat growths, where every ten levels they gain +1 to each stat growth, which is why you should wait to hire one of the other apprentices, so they can get the Elnard bonuses. Makes the game somewhat easier. Another way to make the game easier is to hire one of the other apprentices, kill off your main for a while, and then go through a good portion of the game, because the other apprentices only scale with your main character, not the ally apprentice.

You will have to fight certain apprentices
throughout the game, although since one
is forced, his level won't scale.

You continue onto Patrof and find that everyone is fearing for their lives because one of the apprentices has killed the King and all his soldiers because he was so cold-blooded. You decide to find out who it is because your crystal ball, not to mention the Elder of Guntz, said that a rune was in Patrof. Unfortunately, the game doesn't give you a break here (well, not totally a break) but the gate is locked, meaning you have to find a way to get into the castle. You reach the throne room, only to find that the one who killed the King is one of your fellow apprentices who now holds the Star Rune. Also, the apprentice is random, although for me it was Lejes. Also, the apprentice here is killed off for real after this, so make sure that you have an ally that you don't want to become the Patrof apprentice in your party. Killing that apprentice gets you the Star Rune which increases your defense in battle, and the people suggest that you go north to a city called Bone.

In Bone, you find people talking about a dinosaur and you meet a child who says that his uncle is waiting for him in Bonro. You tell him that he's in Bone, not Bonro, and depending on who you're main character is, he'll either give you a remote control or he'll ask you to take him to Bonro. Now, if you're Olvan, you don't have to talk to that kid at all, and can instead get a key from someone in town who will give you a key to the Tower of Grime, where you can find a teleportal to take you to the North, but only if you have Olvan somewhere in your party. It doesn't matter where he is, all that matters is that he's in the party.

After reaching the Northern side of the continent, the game becomes somewhat non-linear, and you can acquire the next three runes in any order you want. There are also a few small things you can do that don't have an effect on anything at all in the game.

Talking to the people in Telaine gets you information that the Sky Rune is in the town of Luze and a dragon still lives there. Going through a cave to the east of Telaine, you find Luze is in ruins and a dragon does indeed still live there. You kill it and find that the Sky Rune has been stolen from it's resting place and you have to track the thief down. That means you have to search through every single available city in the game, and they can even be in towns that you haven't been to yet. Have fun!

He is a powerful wizard indeed!

The Light Rune is in a city called Bilthem, where the people are obsessed with their ruler, Doros. You decide to kill this man, as he has the Light Rune. However, to beat him, you'll need an object called the Star, which can destroy his illusions and force him to fight fair. Killing him nets you the aforementioned Light Rune and causes the people, or most of them anyway, to come to their senses.

The Moon Rune is held by a man by the name of Prosa. To get it, you have to kill a woman named Serpent whose child was unfairly taken away from her, so she kidnapped the children of other people so she could give her love to them. Such a sad way to go. Now, I'm not exactly sure what determines what causes Prosa to just fork over the Moon Rune, but I do know that if you don't ask for any rewards from anyone for defeating Serpent, then it'll be stolen from him by a man who was imprisoned long before the events of the game who you'll then have to bail out if you want to. You can just tell him you're going to pay the fine, but then ignore it entirely. Sadistic, isn't it?

Anyways, after getting those three runes, you go to the town of Brush and meet with the fortune teller Rarsha, who says that the last rune is on the continent to the West, but that a terrible power is in that land. Well, you have to get all the runes to beat the game, so you meet with Brantu again and he gives you Mecha-Glider to fly to the Western Continent to get the rune. Unfortunately, it isn't very stable and it crashes.

Going south, you enter a cave and just before exiting, you get cursed and can't use your magic anymore. You find a healer in the next town of Bugask who tells you to go to the town to the north, Guanta, and see if anything happens.

Reaching Guanta doesn't do squat, by the way. The Elder of the town says that he's one who placed the curse, but he can't remove it because he doesn't trust you. Going to the Western cave to get the Moonlight that Saro used to defeat Gorsia is a good test, the Elder says, and so you go there, and guess who you meet there!

Let it go already, man!

Yep, none other than Pison, who has come back from the "Dark World" has Metal Pison, and he says that this time, he will win! Well, no he won't. Needless to say, he's a bit harder this time, considering that you have to fight him without your magical ability, and if you should have a party of nothing but spellcasters, then this battle is going to be a pain. Then again, what battle in this game isn't a pain? Beating him has him spout a bunch of bullplop about how he can't wait to see how badly you've effed everyone, everywhere, and everything really good. He then finally passes away. I mean, the gall of this guy to come back not once, but twice after I killed him back near the start of the game! The nerve of some people!!

Anyway, you get the Moonlight and take it back to Guanta and show it to him and he removes the curse. Going north, you find a cave that leads to a castle and is being guarded by a dragon. Beating him, you go into the castle and go through several repeating hallways until you've reached the third floor, where a demon named Gariso is waiting for you, and he has the Wizard Rune (God Ark in the Japanese version). Beating him gets you the Wizard Rune, but then Lemele shows up, breaks all the Arks and absorbs his power, stating that Lemele has been dead for five years and that he, Gorsia, was the one who trained you those five years. He then zaps you with lightning and says that he's coming for Saro.

You wake up in a village where you've apparently been asleep for an entire week straight. You then head out and find you're in a village you've never seen, been to, or heard of before. Going outside, the battle music has changed, which can only mean one thing: that you've been hurled into the distant past, which a character in a town that comes later confirms.

It's at this point of the game where a bit more of something actually resembling a story starts coming together, but it's still so bare-bones that it's not worth mentioning. You go through a bunch of towns, eventually getting to see Melenam in all it's original glory instead of the ruins you explored it as earlier in the game. Anyway, you deliver a message to a scientist from his mother, and then one of the Tetujins, Foma, goes crazy and tries to kill everyone in Melenam. Beating it shows that all of Melenam's energy was drained, causing it to sink into the sea.

Saro, we meet at last.

You are told on the airship that Saro is a dark cavern someplace on this continent, but that his lifeforce is weakening. The higher-ups sent Tetujins out to look for Saro, but they're worried that the Tetujins might have trouble so they ask you to go and check on them. Reaching the town where Saro's disciples are staying, they tell you that Saro went to fight Gorsia alone, knowing full well that he wouldn't win this time, and that they were instructed to remain behind. Indeed, you find Saro in a cave where he says that he did indeed lose the fight, and asks you to finish what he started. He removes the curse on the runes and his disciples tell you how to use them, and in what order. Yeah, you have to use two of the runes in a specific order. Could've been worse, though.

After you've got the runes, you head to Gorsia's Castle, which is a strange building where if you take the wrong door, you're randomly placed back on one of the lower floors, or you just end up right back on the floor you were on to begin with. I hate buildings like this in video games. They don't add anything and it's pretty clear here that the only reason it's in the game to begin with is to pad out the game time.

You're going to pay for tricking us the way
you did, Gorsia!!

To beat Gorsia, you must first use the Wizard Rune to force him to show up. Now, in the international versions of The 7th Saga, as you can see from the screenshot on the left, he's blue. In the Japanese version, however, he's yellow. Afterwards, you must use the Light Rune on Gorsia to lower the magical barrier he has so that the other runes can affect him. Now, you don't have to use the other runes to beat him, but it's a lot harder without them. You can use the other five runes in any order you please, if you should choose to do so, just so long as you used the Wizard Rune first and the Light Rune second.

After beating Gorsia, he says that if he's going down, then he's taking you with him! He kills your main character on the spot with your ally, if you had one, still standing there. Gorsia says that he'll Saro again and goes into the future, whereas your character is given Saro's flesh and becomes King Lemele. That's right. You beat The 7th Saga, the hardest RPG on the Super Nintendo just to find out that Lemele is your character reincarnated. And then, credits. Super brief credits that show each of the apprentices battle stances as though you, the player, were fighting them.

I never mentioned the music. It has a few good songs, but not many, and it's especially odd when you consider it's the same guy who composed the soundtrack to Chrono Trigger, Yasunori Mitsuda! Well, he's one of the guys who composed Chrono Trigger's soundtrack, anyway, the other being Final Fantasy veteran composer Nobuo Uematsu.

Graphics-wise, the game looks decent, and all the movement animations in the game move rather fluidly. You can tell what everything is, and the battles can go blazingly fast, at least once you're characters have hit a high-enough level, which you're going to have to do and even then, the monsters can still beat you in just one or two attacks.

Even back then, even as a child, I knew something was off about The 7th Saga. I knew there was a serious problem with the game's difficulty, and it wasn't until later, much later that I discovered why the game's difficulty was so off-putting. You see, the game's dev team asked the translation/localization team to try to find a way to artificially extend the game's length. Their solution? Lower the stat gains the main character gets at level up and strengthen enemies, but leave the other apprentices alone. Couldn't they have found a better way to pad out the game time than that? I mean, I know they had limited cartridge space, but still, man! As ProJared said about Drake of the 99 Dragons, if you should see this game in a store somewhere, I urge you, don't pick it up, don't go near it, don't even look at it out of morbid curiousity. If you absolutely must play The 7th Saga, then get a ROM and an Emulator, because the speed up button will be your best friend. It can also help by allowing you to use Game Genie Codes. And no, I won't help you find the ROM, either. It's illegal. Or better yet, get a ROM Hack of the game to patch over the ROM that gives the enemy apprentices the same growth rates the player has, that takes away the Elnard stat boosts.

It sucks that this game sucks so much, because when you really get down and examine it, it has a serious Dungeons & Dragons feel to it, or at least the player characters do, and I even played Dungeons & Dragons video games with these characters names in them, but that doesn't mean I'm excusing this game for God-awful design decisions. The game's concepts could've worked, and even the dev team knew this, as depending on which character you choose, you have to take a slight detour in the game, and Olvan is the only character who gets his own little path in the game at one point.

I give this game a 1/10. Avoid at all costs!!

This review, along with all text and screenshots, is © 2019 Jestan Diams™. Jestan Diams, Jestan Diams' Magical Tome of Games, and all other associated names are trademarks of Jestan Diams. All other rights are copyright or trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. All rights reserved.