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[Draugoth]

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A demo for Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven is now available for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Switch, and PC via Steam, Square Enix announced. Save data can be carried over to the full game when it launches.

Here is an overview of the demo and game, via its store pages:

About the Demo
In the demo, players can enjoy the opening part of the story, where Emperor Leon and his retinue take on Kzinssie of the Seven Heroes. Progress from the demo can be carried over to the full game.
About the Game
The fifth entry in the SaGa franchise returns as Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven a full 3D remake of the original 1993 RPG. Embark on an exciting adventure fit for both new players and long-time fans, highlighting classic and new SaGa franchise features, full Japanese and English voiceovers, rearranged compositions, and much more!

Story
In an age past, warriors known as the Seven Heroes fought to save humankind. Praise slowly turned to curses as their fellow Ancients came to fear their power and banished them to another dimension. Their good deeds lived on as legends passed down through the ages, foretelling that the Heroes would return when the world needed them most…
True to the legend, the Heroes have reappeared…but their long exile has corrupted their forms and they now seek vengeance on all who wronged them.
Take on the role of the Emperor of Avalon as legions of fiends spread across territories under the Heroes’ command. Defend your Empire across successive generations, expand your realm, and defeat the vengeful Seven Heroes one by one to save the world!
Key Features

• Characters and Imperial Succession – Join forces with characters from over 30 different classes featuring a wide variety of professions and races, each with their own favored weapons, unique abilities, and effective tactics. Choose the next Emperor from this wide pool of candidates, each eligible to inherit the throne and become the next protagonist. The knowledge and abilities of previous rulers are passed down to the next through the mystical art of inheritance magic, forging a lasting bond between you and your chosen characters.
• Free-Form Scenario – The game presents a unique story structure that offers a vast array of narrative experiences in response to your choices and which objectives you tackle first—from how you expand the Empire to what order you challenge the Seven Heroes. Your actions and decisions will dramatically alter the course of the Emperor’s journey.
• Combat – The strategic turn-based battle system of the original has been further enhanced to a timeline system. Enjoy all the classic SaGa mechanics like “Glimmers,” where you learn new abilities whilst in the heat of battle, and “Formations,” which provide unique benefits to the retinue based on composition. Furthermore, the remake welcomes the new “United Attack” feature to perform combination attacks with your retinue members to turn the tide of battle!
• Graphics – The original 2D pixel sprites are now modeled in full 3D while retaining their charming, familiar appearances based on the beautiful concept illustrations by Tomomi Kobayashi. All towns and dungeons are now also fully rendered with reworked terrains and layouts.
• Difficulty Settings – Select from one of three difficulty levels to match your preferred playstyle, from Casual, Normal, to Hard (Classic). Casual offers a story-focused experience with less emphasis on battle, while Normal is recommended for veteran RPG players looking for a balanced game. Hard (Classic) is perfect for players looking for the brutal but satisfying challenge of the original 1993 version.
• Music and Voices – Kenji Ito returns to present a beautiful soundtrack full of new arrangements! The music can be toggled between the original and new versions from the Options screen. Furthermore, all event scenes now feature full Japanese and English voice acting.

 

[West Texas CEO]

 

[digital_ghost]

 

[jshackles]

Played for the opening part, this is going to be great. Awesome to see such a classic remade this way.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one. Will give the demo a try later today.

Oh and it looks that they also released this TGS trailer:

 

[Cao Cao]

This stupid developers! They actually show you exactly where to go, in the OG you had to figure stuff out yourself, now they show you all the time with who to talk, where to go. How fuking boring. Not gonna buy this then unless I can disable this shit.

WTF??? I entered the cave and a HUGE Quest marker pops up showing me from the entrance where I need to go. I do not need to be babysit ffs.

 

[sigmaZ]

This stupid developers! They actually show you exactly where to go, in the OG you had to figure stuff out yourself, now they show you all the time with who to talk, where to go. How fuking boring. Not gonna buy this then unless I can disable this shit.

WTF??? I entered the cave and a HUGE Quest marker pops up showing me from the entrance where I need to go. I do not need to be babysit ffs.

FFS. This design philosophy is garbage. I hate that in Visions of Mana. If you can't design your levels to guide your player, you have failed as a dev.

 

[GHG]

This stupid developers! They actually show you exactly where to go, in the OG you had to figure stuff out yourself, now they show you all the time with who to talk, where to go. How fuking boring. Not gonna buy this then unless I can disable this shit.

WTF??? I entered the cave and a HUGE Quest marker pops up showing me from the entrance where I need to go. I do not need to be babysit ffs.

You can turn it all off, it's right there in the options (at least it is on PC).

Anyway, gave this a run on the Steam deck for about an hour and it's great. Runs fantastically well (locked 60fps @ max settings on the oled model) and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with it.

Day one without question.

 

[Variahunter]

You can turn it all off, it's right there in the options (at least it is on PC).

Anyway, gave this a run on the Steam deck for about an hour and it's great. Runs fantastically well (locked 60fps @ max settings on the oled model) and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with it.

Day one without question.

You cannot turn everything off, at least in Trials of Mana and Visions of mana, when you turn everything off the main objective is still marked on the map AND on the screen with a big yellow star.

Playing on PC too by the way.

If you know how to turn the main objective off too please share it with us !

 

[GHG]

You cannot turn everything off, at least in Trials of Mana and Visions of mana, when you turn everything off the main objective is still marked on the map AND on the screen with a big yellow star.

Playing on PC too by the way.

If you know how to turn the main objective off too please share it with us !

Quick and dirty off-screen photo from the Steam deck:

The options are there, maybe they aren't working properly?

 

[Cao Cao]

Quick and dirty off-screen photo from the Steam deck:

The options are there, maybe they aren't working properly?

No they are not working. Tried them.

 

[GHG]

No they are not working. Tried them.

Yeh it seemed to work initially but then it stopped working, maybe after I picked up a new quest objective or something.

Hopefully they fix it before release because I'd actually also prefer rto play without them on the screen.

 

[Madonis]

The game rules. I'll be playing it with Japanese voices, but the dub isn't too bad. Just not acted nearly as well.

I don't mind the markers because that saves time when life is fleeting and so are we (sorry, feeling down lately), but I'm sure you'll be able to turn them off for the full game.

 

[jshackles]

Now I just have to decide if I want to buy this on PC or Switch (so I can have the physical copy)

Spoiler

Or both

 

[kubricks]

The original character's pixal art showed during the loading screen is so cool!
Reminds me of the trauma this game gave me in my childhood!

Playing it on the LCD Steam deck right now, works flawlessly at 60fps.

 

[Shake Your Rump]

I read this was done by the Trials of Mana crew? Awesome. Trials is fun. Visions is not. I’m guessing it’s due to Trials having old game design, so maybe this will have the same quality.

demo downloading.

 

[Shake Your Rump]

I was wondering why they are doing the second game instead of the first. I found this interview with the producer where he says:

“The reason why we chose Romancing SaGa 2 is that we already created a remake of Romancing SaGa 1 called Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song, which was originally released in 2006 and received a recent remaster.”

Basically, we already got it on PS2 and it was later remastered on PS4. We also got PS4 remasters of 2 and 3, so I’m not sure why they are choosing 2 for the remake other than it was, apparently, the best selling in the series.

Anyway, looks like they are sticking closely to the original game design with some tweaks for newbies. Sounds good to me.

Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven Interview - Talking remaking a niche classic with Shinichi Tatsuke | RPG Site

Romancing SaGa 2 is one of the most unique RPGs of the Super Famicom era, but it is not well known in the West. We spoke to the game's producer about the approach to remaking this classic RPG to a modern worldwide audience.

www.rpgsite.net

 

[drganon]

Tried out the demo yesterday. Thought it was pretty good. Looking forward to it's release.

 

[GHG]

I was wondering why they are doing the second game instead of the first. I found this interview with the producer where he says:

“The reason why we chose Romancing SaGa 2 is that we already created a remake of Romancing SaGa 1 called Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song, which was originally released in 2006 and received a recent remaster.”

Basically, we already got it on PS2 and it was later remastered on PS4. We also got PS4 remasters of 2 and 3, so I’m not sure why they are choosing 2 for the remake other than it was, apparently, the best selling in the series.

Anyway, looks like they are sticking closely to the original game design with some tweaks for newbies. Sounds good to me.

Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven Interview - Talking remaking a niche classic with Shinichi Tatsuke | RPG Site

Romancing SaGa 2 is one of the most unique RPGs of the Super Famicom era, but it is not well known in the West. We spoke to the game's producer about the approach to remaking this classic RPG to a modern worldwide audience.

www.rpgsite.net

Doing a remaster of a remaster doesn't make too much sense. Minstrel Song remastered is available on all modern consoles and PC.

Personally I'm glad they decided to go with the second game for this big remake.

 

[Madonis]

I was wondering why they are doing the second game instead of the first. I found this interview with the producer where he says:

“The reason why we chose Romancing SaGa 2 is that we already created a remake of Romancing SaGa 1 called Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song, which was originally released in 2006 and received a recent remaster.”

Basically, we already got it on PS2 and it was later remastered on PS4. We also got PS4 remasters of 2 and 3, so I’m not sure why they are choosing 2 for the remake other than it was, apparently, the best selling in the series.

Anyway, looks like they are sticking closely to the original game design with some tweaks for newbies. Sounds good to me.

Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven Interview - Talking remaking a niche classic with Shinichi Tatsuke | RPG Site

Romancing SaGa 2 is one of the most unique RPGs of the Super Famicom era, but it is not well known in the West. We spoke to the game's producer about the approach to remaking this classic RPG to a modern worldwide audience.

www.rpgsite.net

Each Saga game is standalone.

Romancing Saga 2 is also relatively unique with its inheritance system, which is rather uncommon in games even today, and the game still remains popular in Japan.

 

[Shake Your Rump]

Doing a remaster of a remaster doesn't make too much sense. Minstrel Song remastered is available on all modern consoles and PC.

Personally I'm glad they decided to go with the second game for this big remake.

Romancing Saga 2 and 3 were already remastered as well, right? You can buy them on PS4 (as well as virtually any other platform from mobile to console). So, this is a remaster of a remaster.

I don't mind. It's a 3D remake of the game. If it is old school gameplay in a 3D engine like Trials, I'm all for it.

 

[GHG]

Romancing Saga 2 and 3 were already remastered as well, right? You can buy them on PS4 (as well as virtually any other platform from mobile to console). So, this is a remaster of a remaster.

I don't mind. It's a 3D remake of the game. If it is old school gameplay in a 3D engine like Trials, I'm all for it.

Remastered, not remade.

Mistrel song is a remake of the first game that has since been remastered.

Minstrel song (called romancing saga) original:

Minstrel Song:

So I think what he's trying to get at is the fact that the first game has already been remade in 3d, so doing it again would be a bit pointless when they can tread new ground and remake 2 in 3d for the first time.

 

[WaterOnix]

Finished the demo for this and I really enjoyed it. Never played the original so now I'm pretty tempted to pick this up

 

[Mercador]

Is it better than FFXVI, can't say I'm in love right now but I'll push forward.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

This stupid developers! They actually show you exactly where to go, in the OG you had to figure stuff out yourself, now they show you all the time with who to talk, where to go. How fuking boring. Not gonna buy this then unless I can disable this shit.

WTF??? I entered the cave and a HUGE Quest marker pops up showing me from the entrance where I need to go. I do not need to be babysit ffs.

THAT ^ is the type of thing that's ruining SO MANY games for me lately! GoW Ragnarok, Mario RPG remake, Mario Wonder were all so much worse thanks to all the baby mechanics and hints added. "Accessibility" is all the rage right now though so until the casuals realize a little challenge and thinking is a good thing we are stuck with this kind of garbage.

 

[sigmaZ]

THAT ^ is the type of thing that's ruining SO MANY games for me lately! GoW Ragnarok, Mario RPG remake, Mario Wonder were all so much worse thanks to all the baby mechanics and hints added. "Accessibility" is all the rage right now though so until the casuals realize a little challenge and thinking is a good thing we are stuck with this kind of garbage.

Visions of Mana is the worst about this. There is a giant star that is always in view pointing to where you should go.