"Enix's unknown great."

This game can be a great getaway for anyone frustrated with easy games and are desperate for a real challenge. It can also be a mind boggling, impossible mess that you could never enjoy. From my score though the latter doesn't apply to me. It is difficult, but when you accomplish something the reward seems greater when you must work for it. Anyway on to the review.

Story 7
The front of the instruction manual tells of a story about a book being found in the mountains of Ticondera(the world of this game)telling a story of two people who have been fighting to control this world. The only other translatable part of this book(the last page)mysteriously tells of a person's work being futile and he has been trapped in some kind of loop. This persons only hope is to have someone find this journal and free him from this ''prison''. The person doesn't know how long he can keep this up. This to me sounds good, however when you start up the game it tells you about many battles that have taken place over this land and it lets you see all the characters, but nothing about a mystical journal, or the rest of the story. When you actually go to play the game it seems as if you are a power hungry, greedy mercenary that only desires the 7 runes to rule the world. One of the characters even wants to overthrow and kill the King! It seems kind of unfocused, but the story still draws me into it.

Characters 10
Spectacular!!! Any personality you want can be found here. The courageous knight like character. Demonic, evil character. The aging man trying to regain his youth. The independent woman. The religious fanatic. The alien who wants to prove his strength over anyone else. Also the robotic creature who is on a quest to discover who he is. You start off with only one of these characters, but you can recruit another later on. The characters in The 7th saga
are easily up in the class of Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 4.

Music/Sounds 7
The music is pleasing to the ears, but no to the point where I would seek out a soundtrack. It has its high points,
but with highs come lows, the battle themes for example just don't have the feeling of battle music. Towns have nice tracks to them especially the ones in Patrof and Bonro. The sound effects weren't amazing, but by no means were they bad especially for the time.

Graphics 9
Mode 7 was and still is a genuine beautiful thing to see. The battles are done in a rotating mode 7 and I love it! The detail leaves something to desire, but I haven't run across another SNES RPG with Mode 7 in the battles. Walking around in the towns and dungeons looks detailed and the towns all have something different to them. It seems like Enix went out of their way to make the towns look wonderful and I actually wanted to look all over town to see the life-like features such as cemeteries, fountains and run down parts of the ground, while I have seen this before, it just seems to be extremely well done here. Overall this might be the best RPG graphically, towering over the somewhat overrated Final Fantasy 3(6).

Battle System 9
Traditional turn based that is tried and true. You have Attack, Defense, Magic, Item, Status, and Escape. Repetitive, but a baby could master it.

Gameplay 9
Being a traditional RPG the control rarely presents a problem and The 7th Saga stays true to that notion. However the Enix curse is here in full strength you must do a LOT of training and there are vast gaps between later levels. One annoying, but manageable feature is that the game only lets you carry nine of the same items this can get to be very hard to work around in long dungeons if you are not strong enough in level.

Difficulty
Slightly Difficult to Nearly Impossible. When you first begin it is hard to get battling, but with the rhythm of a few battles and a rest at the inn you should be fine. Later on though you must devote yourself to fighting again and again to stand a chance against some of the bosses.

Overall 8
Released in 1993 and not being terribly popular you would think that I wouldn't still play this game often, but I do and it remains on of my favorites. With its near perfect arrangement of characters, good music, graphical beauty, and challenge to rival the best video game player this is a work of art. If you are an Enix fan, RPG fan, or just love a good challenge I recommend The 7th Saga to you. It is rare, but you can buy it complete from Ebay with-out totally gutting your wallet.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/28/03