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Enix SNES/SFC RPGs

U

urfe

Member
I've decided I'm going to use my New Year's Holidays (29th-5th mornings to play the shit out of 16-bit Enix RPGs. Nothing Dragon Quest. I have some questions that I hope someone will be able to answer!

Illusion of Gaia and Terranigma seem well worth it, but is Soul Blazer too? Should I start there? Does it matter? If I have time for only one, should I play Terranigma? Never played any of them.

For the above games, how are the localizations? As someone who reads Japanese, would it be better to play in Japanese? The English font in Terranigma seems really ugly.

Are there any less known games out there that never got translated into English and are worth playing? These would be much easier to pick up, and hopefully very cheap.

I've already played 7th Saga to death, and started Brain Lord about 5 times, so those are probably off the table.

I'm not planning on playing Mystik Ark or however it's spelled. I picked it up for 200 yen many years back and couldn't get into it. Does it deserve another chance?

Any advice appreciated.
 
The Soul Blazer saga are not related to each other besides a few references.
Soul Blazer is the weakest one.
Illusion of Gaia& Terranigma are on the same level.
I like Illusion of Time more than Terranigma, but both are Master Pieces.

I don't know much about the localization to be honest.

If I have to recommend one would be Illusion of Gaia:

-Three main characters
-The settings is better
-Fucking Freedan
 
Illusion of time/gaia os the easiest to get into. Terranigma is also fantastic. Soul blazer was the worst of the three for me. But if you wanna try one for the first time gaia/time is the most accessible.
 
Play Brainlord for sure. Amazing soundtrack that no one knows about, really detailed boss monsters, and dungeons that will really make you think.

Edit: that's what I get for not reading the whole op lol.

Well if you haven't beaten Brainlord, then you should.

Also play Actraiser 1.
 
PassiveObserver said:
Don't forget Star Ocean. Lennus II looks awesome but I can't vouch for it. Wonder Project J deserves a look for its spritework alone.
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I had completely forgotten about this!

Is it better to play the original over the PSP remake? I'm still waiting for that to be on PSN. I honestly may even already own the SFC cart of Star Ocean. I'll have a look for it.

So far, it looks like I should start with Illusion of Gaia.
 
Terranigma has font improvement and ntsc hacks if you want to play it in english. And Soul Blazer is definitely worth playing, it might actually be my favorite of the three in terms of how satisfying the progression and town building is.

Wonder Project J is delightful and very worth playing even if it's not an RPG. Ditto for E.V.O. The Search for Eden. And Wonder Project J2 if you ever feel like delving into N64.

I haven't played Dark Half yet but it got a translation pretty recently and looks super interesting. Like a Westone made Diablo or something.

For something more jrpg-y Robotrek might be good.
 
I really like Paladin's Quest (aka Lennus). Weird pastel world, lots of interesting gameplay ideas (magic costs HP & gains in power the more you use it, heal with reusable bottles), and some cool dungeon designs. Like most Enix SNES games, the translation isn't the best though.
 
Don't miss out on EVO! You start the game as a purple fish and you get stronger by evolving.

Illusion of Gaia and Terranigma are both top quality.
 
Robert at Zeboyd Games said:
I really like Paladin's Quest (aka Lennus). Weird pastel world, lots of interesting gameplay ideas (magic costs HP & gains in power the more you use it, heal with reusable bottles), and some cool dungeon designs. Like most Enix SNES games, the translation isn't the best though.
Click to expand...

I was going to mention Paladins Quest as well.

Definitely a mid tier RPG, but its unique enough to justify checking out.
 
Robert at Zeboyd Games said:
I really like Paladin's Quest (aka Lennus). Weird pastel world, lots of interesting gameplay ideas (magic costs HP & gains in power the more you use it, heal with reusable bottles), and some cool dungeon designs. Like most Enix SNES games, the translation isn't the best though.
Click to expand...
I was going to recommend this, too! It's a super hard, pretty terrible game, but it definitely makes you better at JRPGs in general if you slog through it.
 
Robert at Zeboyd Games said:
I really like Paladin's Quest (aka Lennus). Weird pastel world, lots of interesting gameplay ideas (magic costs HP & gains in power the more you use it, heal with reusable bottles), and some cool dungeon designs. Like most Enix SNES games, the translation isn't the best though.
Click to expand...

I forgot about this game. Is this the game where lava slowly devours a town?

I remember that there is a sequel too. Definitely something to check out.

Never even heard of EVO. Look forward to looking into it.
 
Also don't forget to look into Robotrek. It's another mid-tier SNES RPG that has some charm but ultimately falls short.

The one positive however, is that there is nothing else like it on the system.
 
Worldshaker said:
Also don't forget to look into Robotrek. It's another mid-tier SNES RPG that has some charm but ultimately falls short.

The one positive however, is that there is nothing else like it on the system.
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I loved robotrek. The design elements to your robots can def screw you later on and the story flags were a little tough to find but I had a great time.
 
urfe said:
I forgot about this game. Is this the game where lava slowly devours a town?
Click to expand...

Yep! One of the more memorable RPG dungeons.

I remember that there is a sequel too. Definitely something to check out.
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Even has a translation patch now.

Never even heard of EVO. Look forward to looking into it.
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E.V.O. is really good although a little short (about 10 hrs). Main issue with the game is that it's super expensive these days - we're talking a couple hundred dollars for just the cart.
 
urfe said:
Are there any less known games out there that never got translated into English and are worth playing? These would be much easier to pick up, and hopefully very cheap.
Click to expand...

I made a thread awhile ago about how much I love Bahamut Lagoon. It's an SRPG/JRPG hybrid that's totally worth checking out, imo.
 
urfe said:
I had completely forgotten about this!

Is it better to play the original over the PSP remake? I'm still waiting for that to be on PSN. I honestly may even already own the SFC cart of Star Ocean. I'll have a look for it.

So far, it looks like I should start with Illusion of Gaia.
Click to expand...

Personally I liked the PSP version more due to its similarity to SO2 (favorite SO game). The SFC version is beautiful, kinda like mixing Tales of Phantasia play style with Seiken Densetsu 3 graphics.

Though I do hear that the PSP version is easier than the SFC one.
 
Soul Blazer is one of these games that I think, and thought back then too, wasn't very good, and yet it's one of the game I've completed the most times. I don't know what it was about it, I just liked playing it over and over.
 
If you have the time, go for the entire Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma trilogy.
If not, stick to Terranigma, because it's by far the best (they're all good games though).

And yeah, definitely stick to the Japanese if you can read it, because the localizations aren't great.
 
I'm not sure that it fits exactly what you're looking for, but a Square SNES RPG that WAS translated that you should check out is Live A Live. No grinding, a unique battle system, and a great story with memorable characters. Its impressive how much it gets you to care about the characters too, as each story in it is only about 3 hours long at most. Not to mention a Yoko Shimomura soundtrack makes it strong.

EDIT: Oh wait, scratch all that. I forgot that Enix and Square used to be two separate entities and you're looking at Enix works.
 
Terranigma if you can only play one (Soul Blazer is amazing too, yes).

The English translations are terrible. So if you can go with Japanese, do that.
 
Terranigma is one of the greatest games of all time. If you play any of these games, play that one. I say this as someone who only played it for the first time this year.
 
Loving all the opinions. Thanks to everyone!

The two Square games mentioned (Live a Live and Bahamit Lagoon) I own on Wii U VC, and am slowly tinkering through.

I think I will skip right to Terranigma and do it in Japanese.

I want to make sure I actually finish the game I want to play, so I'll do Illusion of Gaia after if there is time.

I definitely need to try EVO and Robotek sometime.
 
Man, Terranigma... one of the goats for sure.... Illusion of Gaia is pretty good too. Even Soul Blazer have great moments though it's repetitive.
 
I LOVE Soul Blazer. It's my favorite game of all time. I have the music soundtrack on my phone so I can listen to it anywhere.
 
Robert at Zeboyd Games said:
E.V.O. is really good although a little short (about 10 hrs). Main issue with the game is that it's super expensive these days - we're talking a couple hundred dollars for just the cart.
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I wonder if the Japanese SFC version is cheaper, since the OP mentioned that they can read Japanese.

I love E.V.O. (hence the avatar), but I agree that the asking price for a used cart is too much these days. It's too bad that S-E has no real interest in sticking their lesser known titles on the virtual console, since E.V.O. is the perfect candidate. Something that is never getting a remake, and is currently making them zero dollars.

I guess I should be thankful that I got my copy for $10 back in 99 or 2000.
 
Pyros_Eien said:
Soul Blazer is one of these games that I think, and thought back then too, wasn't very good, and yet it's one of the game I've completed the most times. I don't know what it was about it, I just liked playing it over and over.
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It's because Soul Blazer is simple and fun and sad and it has the best music. I've played through it so many times, but I've never been able to make it through Illusion of Gaia a second time.
 
punkmaggit said:
Terranigma if you only have time for one. Add Illusion of Gaia (and play that one first) if you have time for both.
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This.

Terranigma was recommended to me this year in the snes collectors thread. BEST RECOMMENDATION EVER.

It's up there with ff3(ffvi), chrono trigger and Mario rpg.
 
In lieu of playing Soul Blazer, you could just watch this GIF. It's basically the same as playing it.

fOBJvT8.gif
 
Star Ocean is pretty great. Multiple routes, decent amount of characters, solid OST. It's pretty fun messing around with all the skills. The graphics are amazing, and some scenes in particular still stand out to me, but a lot of the dungeons and fields look almost exactly the same.

The fully voiced opening cutscene blew me away when I first saw it. The whole game seems way ahead of it's time compared to many others on the SFC. The fast, actiony battle system was a god-send compared to the absolutely massive amount of turn-based games on the system. It isn't very deep and the AI can be bad (at least it lets you switch characters quickly IIRC), but at least it doesn't feel like a chore.

EVO is pretty bad IMO, no where near worth the asking price. Interesting concept but very repetitive.
 
urfe said:
I had completely forgotten about this!

Is it better to play the original over the PSP remake? I'm still waiting for that to be on PSN. I honestly may even already own the SFC cart of Star Ocean. I'll have a look for it.

So far, it looks like I should start with Illusion of Gaia.
Click to expand...

Play the original. The remake just molds it into SO2 and removes everything unique and interesting about the game.
 
I am currently on a quest to play all the unlocalized square and enix games from the SFC era.

In my opinion, always play Japanese games in Japanese. Even if the writing or whatever is better in English, which is rare, its never quite the same as what the creators actually intended.
 
Aeana said:
In lieu of playing Soul Blazer, you could just watch this GIF. It's basically the same as playing it.

fOBJvT8.gif
Click to expand...

This is rather uncharitable. It's not any worse than the early Ys games. Besides, if you don't play it you don't get to hear the really quite decent soundtrack or visit the weird and varied zones, enjoy the enjoyably morose story or see the towns rebuild piecemeal through your actions.
 
I loved Soul Blazer but I played it back in the days so it probably didn't age well .. I still remember the music .. it's haunting :P and yes play EVO !!
 
Pyrrhus said:
This is rather uncharitable. It's not any worse than the early Ys games. Besides, if you don't play it you don't get to hear the really quite decent soundtrack or visit the weird and varied zones, enjoy the enjoyably morose story or see the towns rebuild piecemeal through your actions.
Click to expand...

At least in the Ys games you can just dash through, rather than standing in one spot and slashing until the enemies stop coming. I get a bit of satisfaction from running through a string of enemies in Ys without taking damage that is completely absent in Soul Blazer. I'm glad the subsequent games changed it up.

As far as towns rebuilding through your actions, it's not like that's unique to Soul Blazer. All of Quintet's games have a theme of rebuilding the world in one way or another. Even Granstream Saga, a game made by Quintet people under a different company name, ended up having something similar as a theme (restoring the continents' ability to float).
 
soul blazer is great... better than Illusion of Gaia and terrinigma in some ways. Obviously dated though
 
If you had to choose one then choose Terranigma. Soul Blazer's my personal favorite of that series. Really interesting lore behind that world and the characters in it. As for Illusion... eh, the story is really hamfisted and overly sappy to me.
 
Man, this thread reminds me about just how much better things were for console adventure and RPG developers and fans in the time before Squenix was born. Shit went downhill so fast, in terms of raw output and willingness to try new ideas.
 
Soul Blazer is the best one!

I can't enjoy actually playing Earthbound or Chrono Trigger anymore (though I still like the soundtracks), but I still love replaying Soul Blazer.
 
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