"A nice hidden gem."

Illusion of Gaia was an Action/Role-Playing Game picked up by Enix that was released nearly a decade ago for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Along the lines of Final Fantasy IV, VI, and some other RPGs such as Breath of Fire, Illusion of Gaia found a way to keep pace with these huge hits, all from Square.

Illusion of Gaia really doesn't have the best plot in the world. We start off as a young boy named Will. The game starts off with Will and his friends in class. After some exploring, Will leaves town and heads for the nearby castle where he runs into Kara, and is eventually thrown into jail. After escaping from Jail, Will is set to embark on a journey, and while on this journey, he hopes to find his lost parents. Although it's nothing fancy and whatnot, the plot stays on track most of the time, and really doesn't sidetrack at all.

The graphics portion of the game was pretty nice for the Super Nintendo days. The sprites looked pretty nice. Both character and enemy sprites were done well, and the backgrounds for most of the places were also nicely done. Although things were a bit blocky since it was back in the Super Nintendo days, the graphics were pretty advanced back then. This game was a graphical powerhouse.

The sound portion of the game was lacking. The same themes would reoccur over and over again, and some of the pieces just were plain boring. Sure, there was some music that I liked, but for the most part, the music fell a bit short, although the sound effects made up for the poor soundtrack. The crashing and clanking sounded really well.

Now we come to the most important portion of any game, the gameplay portion. The battle system in Illusion of Gaia was a real time battle system, as in it's like an action game with roleplaying elements thrown in, such as Strength, Defense, HP, and so on. However, you don't level up like you would in any other RPG. In order to get stat boosts, you'd have to kill all the enemies in a room in order to get a Strength Boost, Defense Boost, HP Boost and so on. Doing this was a new thing, and I thought it was very well done. Some of the enemies were hidden pretty well, so you'd have to run around looking for them instead of them coming to you.

Speaking of enemy fights, the boss fights in this game were pretty hard, even though there were only about 4 or 5 of them. You'd have to utilize some kind of strategy if you wanted to win, and man did you need a good strategy. The bosses hit hard, attack fast, and are ruthless whenever they hit you. You'd have to be quick on your feet while being offensive and defensive. It would take several tries to take a few of these bosses down.

However, with the good, comes the bad. The huge thing lacking in Illusion of Gaia is the sidequests portion. There's only one sidequest to do in the game. And in order to activate it, you'd have to find 50 Red Gems scattered throughout the whole game. And then even after that, the hidden place isn't all that hard or long, so it's not really worth it unless you want everything done in the game. You also need Red Gems to get some stat boosts, so that's another reason to look for them.

All in all, Illusion of Gaia is a great hidden gem. Hard boss battles, a new way to level up, and even transforming into other creatures, this game was excellent back then, bringing in new elements to RPGs, and it's still excellent today. If you ever get the chance to play this game, don't pass it up. You'll enjoy it.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/25/05