![]() ![]() The soundtrack is robust and goes from serene to somber to intense during big battles, and it all plays a part in setting the tone and establishing the mood of each story. Hopefully a firmware update across platforms will enable this to be added later, as it does allow for a more complete way for a game with a robust soundtrack to be enjoyed by a player with a hearing impairment.įrom a fine-motor perspective, SaGa Frontier Remastered finds itself in an interesting position thanks to both its genre and remake being fairly user friendly in that regard. However, there is still some room for improvement, as there’s no description of the game’s soundtrack. The end result is an accessible game for those with hearing impairments, as there isn’t any lost audible dialogue. Instead, like a lot of RPGs of its time, it uses text to tell its tale. On the auditory side of things, SaGa Frontier is very dialogue-heavy but doesn’t use voice work. ![]() Plus, players can still change the text font and backgrounds to suit their preferences, so it’s a win-win there as well. Because the text is so large, there’s no real need for a text size adjustment, and it’s easy to read across all campaigns. This works wonderfully on both the Switch and PC but is especially beneficial for Switch users, since most JRPGs feature smaller text with no size options and are thus a tough genre to fully recommend on the console. ![]() One big upside to this being a cross-platform release, including mobile devices, is that the user interface has been revamped to include larger icons and text for menus and dialogue. SaGa Frontier Remastered is a fantastic game from an accessibility point of view when compared to the original release. That one featured minimal documentation in its manual when compared to the new version, which features more in-depth explanations of the battle mechanics and in-game story threads to help keep things clear. This is good in the long run, as it forces the player to improve their skills, and this remastered version is a lot easier to learn than the original release. There’s no grinding here, and trying to stack the deck in one’s favor works against them. There’s a lot of depth to combat, and it makes each campaign feel different, even with the same basic turn-based combat system. Monsters don’t gain stat boosts but can gain another monster’s abilities by defeating it.Ĭombat also features a combo system where ability-based attacks chain into one another. Mechs don’t gain stat boosts from battles but can learn new skills from defeating other mechs. They can gain weapon techniques, which mystics can’t do, but they can’t learn magic attacks from enemies. Humans are the jack-of-all-trades group and can be spell casters, offense-based, or healers. Each of the eight playable characters can craft a party, with over 30 side characters added to the tale and the party. There are several races that all learn things differently. The lack of random battles allows the game’s flow to be more organic, so if the player wants to focus on the story, they can and just avoid combat.Īlso, unlike a lot of games from this time, there are no character classes, and the cast is quite diverse. This is a small feature but one that helps make combat feel like it all takes place in the same in-game world, since they can see the environment all around them. Unlike a lot of JRPGs of its time, SaGa only engages the player in combat when they hit an on-field enemy. The combat system is turn-based and uses a behind-the-back perspective, a bit like the Mother series but with classic Square Enix features like summons, elaborate spells, and a roving camera. This resulted in an incomplete but still fantastic experience due to the unfortunate stifling of some of the story arcs. At the time, most JRPGs featured a single large-scale tale being told, and it’s still the preferred method of storytelling for the genre. The original release featured seven different stories, but it was rushed out the door early so it could meet its release date. In 1998, when it was first released in North America, SaGa Frontier was the kind of game that stood out right away. ![]()
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