Lufia: The Legend Returns

"The long-awaited follow-up to the classic SNES RPGs is here."

I've been anticipating the next chapter in the Lufia series for quite a while now, it's been thought to have been nixed a couple times and I believe it was originally slated to be released on the Playstation, but to the chagrin of a few people I can think of, it was finally released on the Game Boy Color. This is something I don't actually mind myself, I was hoping for a sprite-based follow up, and I suppose I got it. How does the small screen conversion go for the series? Well, I can tell you now, it's just not quite the same.

Graphics: 8/10. For the GBC, the graphics aren't actually all that bad. The world map looks quite good, and though most of the towns are rather small and unexciting, they could look a lot worse. Dungeons, for the most part, look rather similar to the other (even the one located in someone's basement), the standard rocky looking walls with the expected plantlife. The character design leaves things to the imagination, since, due to their size, they can look pretty similar at times. I'm sure if one of the characters left the party and came back later, you probably wouldn't know who they were until their name showed up over their text box. The noseless and mouthless avatars used in battles and the subscreen definitely grew on me, and adds all the personality missing from the tiny sprites. The enemy designs are usually more impressive than their surroundings, and they do feature the revolutionary battle animation; moving forward slightly, while the image quickly flips back and forth. Spell animations work well in the spaces that they are given.

Story: 5/10. The execution is lacking a little, you're Wain, some guy living alone in a small village, who knows how to use swords for whatever reason. A little character foreshadowing, after the first four hours, you're referred to as 'stupid and 'idiot' about ten times. I lost track after that, and yah, it gets pretty annoying, especially when your party starts arguing every time they're about to fight a boss, while he's standing there waiting for you to attack him. Anyways, you're off doing whatever you normally do when you're not training with the resident all-knowing sword-mentor guy, when you bump into Seena; some mysterious chick looking for a swordsman for whatever reason, who also knows how to use magic. She must've been scouring all the small towns all over the place, since that's apparently the only place you find these people. She insults you, and then comes quite close to testing your strength in a battle to the death. Surprisingly, a nearby house explodes into flames. Wain goes in and risks his life to rescue the small child inside. Seena is so impressed with his actions she decides to accompany him to the Tower of Death, from whence the flaming bolt originated. They'll soon discover that it is from Gades, the Sinstral of Destruction. You remember him, don't you?. Now where is this accursed tower? Oh, it's right there. Good (or bad?) thing they built this little town a cave-walk away from something called the Tower of Death. And thus begins our story, they'll pick up more cliché-ridden characters along the way, as they follow the path of destruction and beyond.

Sound/Music: 7/10. Again, for the GBC, it's not too bad. I enjoyed the theme played during the opening sequence reminiscent of Lufia 2, and it also has an identical victory theme. The other themes are a little catchy at times, but sometimes they can be repetitive, but it's not too big a problem since they're never really distracting. In battle, the swipes, zaps, bursts and so forth are rather mainstay.

Gameplay: 6/10. Okay, dungeons are completely randomized, though incredibly simplified. If you go back to a level you just came from, it's completely different, with replenished enemies, chests, shrubs, everything. This can be rather annoying at times, especially if you just fell through a hole or something. Anyways, yes, dungeons are randomized, but they maintain a basic structure. Almost always, it'll be 6-9 rooms, with paths leading to each that surround them, creating a square structure. Now, inside, they are very much like dungeons in Lufia 2. Each floor has one set of stairs going up and going down. There are shrubs to be cut and vines and torches and other things on the wall. Underneath the shrubs can be extra chests or traps. Occasionally, cutting down the vines will trigger a passage to open. These will almost certainly contain either one chest in a small room, or four chests in a larger room, usually containing a few enemies. It is better if you cut everything you can find, in case you want to avoid traps or get supplies in chests (which there are an abundance of, so you'll likely be carrying a lot of supplies around without going to stores). Sometimes all these shrubs everywhere can be annoying since your character cannot change direction while sitting in one spot without shooting a bolt across the room (which can freeze enemies for a moment, if you'd like), so if you want to cut something to your left, you have to move a space away to turn towards it.

There are no random encounters, the enemies are plain to see in each of the rooms (never the paths). They move when you move or swing your sword. There won't be too much variety in enemies for each dungeon, there're usually be just 4 or 5 different ones in each dungeon, ranging in difficulty as you go deeper (or higher). They'll usually attack in swarms or form more difficult combinations as you progress. Battles are slightly different than the usual fare. You can have up to 9 people in your party, in battle formation, there will be three rows of three. Not that you can have 9 people pounding away at enemies, you can only choose one character to act in each column per turn. Similar to the previous games, you'll be given several options in battle; fight, defend, use magic, use item or a special attack like the IP attacks in Lufia 2. You can learn these by using Ancient Texts (also found in chests in dungeons) when you meet the right specifications. Each text requires the right additional attributes. Each character has their own set of attributes, a numerical value assigned to one of four colours. Our hero is red, and Seena is blue. When set in a row together in battle, the attributes are leant to the rest of the row, so the total is now set to whatever values the colours have together and is shared between all characters in a row. When the values reach the necessary numbers specified in the Ancient Text screen, then they are activated.

Overall: 6/10. If you're not looking for a serious RPG, or just looking for something decent besides Pokémon for your handheld, then I'd suggest this one. Also, if you're a fan of the series, then you should pick it up. If you can ignore some of the annoying sections of the script, then you'll be fine. Strangely, I've noticed quite a few spelling mistakes in the game, including one in the opening sequence. I'm not quite sure whether this was written in English and translated to Japanese or vice versa (it was originally supposed to be released Stateside first), but I'd think the lack of a translation progress would avoid that, but oh well. Finishing off with a note, for those that wished this would come out on something besides the GBC, then you may or may not like the idea of the next game in the series (though quite possibly with a different name) coming out on the Game Boy Advance.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 10/07/01, Updated 10/07/01