Legend of Legaia

"High-quality RPG in a light dosage."

Let me level with you, to begin with: I consider RPGs good if they involve me with the characters, if they require mental acuity, and if my hard work pays off.

I have played many RPGs across many systems, and so I try to judge a game fairly-- graphics play a small part, and if they actually hinder or enhance the enjoyment of the game, they are given a actual score. Same with music.

MUSIC AND GRAPHICS:
For what the team was, I would say the game accomplished what could be expected-- a few memorable tunes with no strong melodies. Furthermore, graphics were reminiscent of the development in FF7-- some places would be detailed, and characters would be low-polygon changing upon entrance into battle.

However, I insist that the graphics and music in Legaia are not weak, but also not songs you may hum to yourself later. Let's continue onto the meat: Story and Characters, Mental Stimulation/Acuity, and Hard Work.

STORY: 9/10
Since the game has only 3 main characters and does not have much time to waste, it draws them in quickly. This is a boon, because the game's characters are sympathetic and realistic, and they interact with every event in the game. Sometimes while playing RPGs, you will encounter meaningless in-game quests that you must accomplish with little character involvement, or characters that seem to be present merely to fill out a character repertoire.

Legend of Legaia does not have the team of SquareSoft, but the developers accomplish much with what they have. There is a clear goal, and there are developed villains who stand in your way.

The only downside to this story is that the main character's complexity is only developed in a few important tragedies. By the end of the game, you don't even realize where the love interest the writers thought they had made apparent. This is a bit of a disappointment, as the characters in Legaia are particularly important to the player.

MENTAL STIMULATION: 9/10
The game has a few minor puzzles, but most of the game is maze navigation-- Luckily, this only makes up a part of the Mental Stimulation factor.
The game offers you a choice between working hard and making difficult choices-- Do you buy that expensive suit of armor, or do you save it for later? And if you do buy it, you can only afford one piece for one character-- who? Even further, spells have damage benefits against opponents, some characters are developed to have multiple benefits and advantages, and this all ends up mattering. Bosses usually can be unforgiving and challenging, which makes this game quite daring and engages your critical mind.

I must say that when a game makes you want to play it late at night, it's a good sign the game is quality. This game counted for emotional investment with the characters, and intellectual investment with difficult choices in battle.

HARD WORK: 6.5/10
Something about this game makes you say that either everything is too easy, or it's too hard. I feel like that they were unsure where to set the level of difficulty for the game's bosses/enemies, and so wavered with it throughout. Some bosses are radically difficult, and require you to level up many times and fight the same boss until you succeed-- sometimes this is good, but many times the difficulty seems to be more than you can take without significant time-spending.
Furthermore, this is also counterweighted by the fact that many bosses can be easy-- if you bothered to level up for one, you may not do so again for the next easy bosses, only until you find another roadblock.

Furthermore, though there is not much equipment in the game, spending time accumulating it is nigh-pointless-- it is usually obsoleted by the next town, and by then you would normally be able to afford only two pieces of armor out of 9, 3 for each character. Furthermore, many of the magic spells do the same effects as each other, but with a different elemental damage... this would be good if most enemies had a clear elemental disadvantage/strength, but much of the normal enemies throughout the game do not have an elemental inclination.

What this means is that you will spend a lot of time to get a lot of meaningless magic and equipment, and if you spend the time to level up the magic, only a few specific spells will be incredibly useful: namely Kemaro, Horn, and all of the healing spells. Other spells could have been made more useful if they gave stat advantages/boosts that were much more than items in-game.

OVERALL: 8

My reasoning is that though I had to work hard at times for a few pointless objects, I enjoyed it because not all of those pointless objects were mere drone-work to get-- you would have to change equipment, change fighting order, change battle tactics, etcetera.

Furthermore, though the game is short by most modern-day RPGs (about 20 hours?), I am certain to remember the story and characters-- in essence, "getting more bang for your buck".

If you come across this game at a price you deem fair, I recommend you get it.

~SoreThumb

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/30/07