The 7th Saga

"The other Magnificent Seven"

Introduction: When I started to play the 7th Saga by Enix, I found that I had bought an extremely difficult, but somewhat fun RPG. I loved the graphics of the game, but hated how rudimentary the plot was, and I felt that the game suffered on replayability because of this. The story starts out like this: You are one of seven apprentices under King Lemele. Your mission is to find the Seven Runes that are spread throughout Ticondera, and you are also to help people when you can, and believe me, you will face an evil sorceress, a bounty hunter, and a huge Dragon in your quest for the Runes.

Game play (7): Without an instruction manual, I figured out what buttons did what within five minutes. Within ten minutes, I figured out that this game would be very hard, as I got killed by a Wyvern outside the first town. Luckily, I didn¡¦t lose any experience, which would have happened in other Role Playing Games like the Final Fantasy series. Within fifteen minutes, I knew that I would have to spend more than half of the game just making sure my character wasn¡¦t under-leveled as the first boss wiped the floor with me. So if you hate spending a lot of time building up your character¡¦s levels, then you will loathe this game. Also I found out that the ¡§advanced¡¨ spells only did slightly more damage to the monsters than the most basic spell of its kind(for example Ice 1 is only slightly less effective than Ice 2 on those pain in the butt Mutants, and Ice 1 costs six times less MP).

Graphics (9): The pixels on the screen look very sharp. The enemies move as if they were real, and their sneers are a great touch. The Soldieks spears have a nice spinning effect, which is of cinematic quality Overall; the monsters look much more sharp and scary than most Final Fantasy monsters, which is an asset to this game. The towns are also bigger, and look more three-dimensional than the SNES Final Fantasy games. My only complaint is that your character¡¦s back is always facing the screen, but I guess the way the monsters are animated makes up for this.

Audio(4): After listening to the game¡¦s music for over five hours, I conclude the following: The Boss music sounds like a high stakes flamenco contest, or at times sounds as if the Death Star is coming to get you, and the Town music is way too saccharine The game has an annoying sound when you encounter monsters. It sounds much like you opened the wrong door in ¡§Let¡¦s Make a Deal.¡¨ The only great musical piece is the beginning music. That would rival any of Square¡¦s music.

Story (5): I almost immediately noticed that the game spent almost as much time on character development as a Harlequin romance novel. Seriously, you learn very little about your character¡¦s background, motivations, purpose in life, etc. A flat character in a role playing game is not a good thing. I also have to say that the ¡§gather seven runes so you can be Big Kahuna¡¨ is derivative. Other than that, it is a solid RPG, as there are some plot twists that will have you keep going in this game.

Replay Value (6): Spending hour upon hour building up your character¡¦s EXP. is not something you want to do over and over again, so this game does have limited replay value. If you like hack and slash games though, then this will be your cup of tea.

Final Summary: The 7th Saga is an average Role Playing game that will keep you occupied for hours at a time.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 02/19/03, Updated 02/19/03