Romancing SaGa 2

tl;dr
A blast from the past Romancing SaGa 2 feels almost like an alternate evolutionary route for the JRPG genre. One where story takes a backseat and character drama is far less important than mastering the glimmer system so you add more skills to your repertoire as well as take over territories to recruit more characters. At its core a turn-based affair operating on “you are what you do” progression system, you step into the shoes of ephemeral emperors facing inevitable succession. Will you defeat the returning Seven Heroes? Answer depends on a single question – is your head thicker than the metaphorical wall you're trying to smash through? Mild concussion was the price I was eventually strong-armed into paying and I'd probably do it again. Reading the manual is HIGHLY recommended.
Full Review
Having practically no experience with SaGa franchise at large I was shocked by just how abruptly story is dispensed to the player. In fact, if you skip the opening you'll have no idea who the Seven Heroes even are. What we see is good king Leon and his scholarly son Gerard embarking on a quest to cleanse the nearby ruin of monsters. Not long after disaster strikes – while the pair was outside with their retinue, castle Avalon, safe kept by the king's other son Victor, is laid siege to by monstrous Kzinssie who slays Victor for opposing him. Except... wasn't Kzinssie one of the Seven Heroes according to legends? Receiving council from a mysterious seer our king Leon and prince Gerad track down the fiend only for king to fall in mortal combat. Emboldened by revenge and effects of mysterious “inheritance magic” it now falls to Gerard to settle the score, expand the empire of Varennese and set straight this mad world where monsters are on the rise once more.
More than few hours further into the game we're introduced to the actual central mechanic of Romancing SaGa 2 – succession. With Gerard it happens after three “fade to black” screens, something to keep in mind for the future as well since it indicates passage of time, as he accomplishes milestone tasks available, but can also be forced if your party dies for real real aka they run out of LP in combat. So what exactly happens then? You get to choose from four not-so-randomly picked emperor candidates drawing from a pool of unlocked classes. Something worth pointing out is only Gerard and the Last Emperor, individual you got to name when you started the game, have something resembling story relevance. Aforementioned inheritance magic means your emperors have a continual line of inheriting skills, spells and proficiency from their predecessors giving them advantage by default.
Since I've started name dropping classes I might as well get into what the game's actual content is. You'll be annexing other regions and kingdoms, usually by resolving whatever issue is present there. Putting aside that you're raising your empire's income, very useful for projects that cost hundreds of thousands and even millions, the real reason why you want every region is for further missions it may offer generations down the line AND class unlocks. Almost every region seems to directly or indirectly add a class to your roster. If there's story in Romancing SaGa 2 it's found in these localized arcs which are created wildly uneven. Much to my surprise there are bad decisions to made which will result in screwing yourself over. Keep multiple saves which could be a problem since you have four slots + autosave.
I can imagine fear some of my readers may be experiencing upon reading “timed” in context of any RPG, but there is no ticking real-time clock here. You essentially get to perform three big events in every generation. Annex a region, defeat one of the Seven Heroes, resolve a quest, etc.
What Romancing SaGa 2 taketh away in the story department it more than made up for in combat and systems in general.
I don't like repeating myself, but if I was more experienced with the franchise at large I would've already been familiar with its glimmer system. Level ups are neat and yet inadequate next to the glorious light bulb effect when your character learns a brand new skill, doubly so when you know it's now stored in the Dojo and you can train it to all future characters. It's also exceedingly rare in JRPGs to see character advancement running on “you are what you do” akin to The Elder Scrolls. There are formulae involved here you can look up online if you want to, but you should know there are no character levels with which to easily gauge progress or difficulty. Get hit a lot? Your HP goes up. Want to get better at Hydrology? Cast water spells. Want to glimmer a specific skill you've looked up in a guide? Recruit a Saigo Clansman inclined towards the Mace category, find a tough enemy and start pray.
But what of combaaaat?
Elegant deli platter of turn-based offering where your chosen formation, as taught by certain classes-turned-emperor, can make a notable difference. Since you have FIVE characters to play with and shuffle around your choice of current emperor is very important as that is the only spot which cannot be moved. Wouldn't want to put your squishy Strategist autocrat on the front line, now would you? I'm struggling to put into words exactly how combat plays as there is this constant “will my party setup get me more glimmers?” high overriding everything else. I did notice reliance on gimmicks and having faith in the player to figure it out. I've lost count how many bosses have overpowered attacks that will quickly wipe you unless you're A) tackling them later so you're the overpowered one, or B) capable of exploiting their undisclosed weakness.
Add to that no random encounters, albeit some very tight corridors with enemy placement aplenty, and the ball seems to be in your corner. There were a few instances I got frustrated enough to quit the game due to enemy density. Fight more = get more stats = get more glimmers, right? Well yes, but Battle Rank exists for a reason. The more you engage in combat, fight or flee, the more enemies get upgraded to deadlier variants with advancing generations. A cynical man would call this level scaling, but that's not entirely accurate. Presumably this is in place to prevent you from grinding a single spot for hours on end.
I've used some acronyms earlier and Romancing SaGa 2 brings its peculiarities. HP is automatically recovered after every battle, your SP/MP require manual curatives and are used to power skills/magic respectively, but LP is where things get interesting. Life Points vary on by-character basis, even within the same class, are extremely difficult to restore and once they hit 0 it's permadeath time. If it happens to your emperor it's time to pick a new one. Don't be alarmed because your recruits are not lifelong companions and assembling a new party with each new ascendance quickly becomes second nature. Or point of annoyance depending how you feel about it.
Do I sound somewhat bitter? Maybe, but that's the sort of obtuseness you, well, learn to live with. At the end of the day this is a SNES title with a slight facelift. Checking out the manual is highly recommended lest you completely miss out on some concepts like global magic level or research order. Mind you, the SNES comment is not meant to be derogatory in any way. I was taken aback by aspects of the game playing it now so it may be difficult to grasp what reactions were like back in 1993. Despite there being the Imperial Log which tracks the state of the world, rumors and everything you've done so far, very nature of the game feels so far ahead of its time you can feel it buckling under pressure. Speaking from first hand experience it takes a while for the game to click and there's an extended sweet spot between early and late game when you get to bask in your own ignorance exploring this unrestricted world before the hammer falls on you.

"A rough start, but a legendary journey awaits."

This was my first time playing Romancing SaGa, and as a fan of classic JRPGs—especially the Final Fantasy series—I was curious to try this often-overlooked gem from Square Enix’s golden era.

At first, it felt a bit overwhelming. The game doesn't hold your hand. The non-linear progression, lack of clear directions, and tough combat might frustrate newcomers. But give it time. Once I got used to the mechanics and embraced the freedom, it slowly transformed into one of the best JRPG experiences I've had.

Romancing SaGa is like a puzzle you learn to love piece by piece—strategic battles, unique characters, branching stories, and a world that changes based on your actions. It rewards exploration and experimentation in a way most RPGs today don't dare to.

Definitely not an easy game to jump into, but if you're patient, it becomes something truly special.
A Final Fantasy spinoff that dared to be different—and succeeded.

A remarkable piece of gaming history that is definitely worth your time, if you can get past some of the funky stuff. The remake is an improvement in every way, but there will always be a soft spot in my heart for the SNES RPGs of yesteryear.
+Excellent party customization
+Superb soundtrack
+Lots of freedom in when/how to tackle various events
+Breezy battles with decent difficulty
+Grinding is mostly unnecessary
+Generous New Game+ system
+One of the most epic and brutal final bosses, ever
-Menus for equipment and skills are lacking a lot of information (the menus in general are pretty unwieldy)
-Party members can't be removed unless they die an LP death, which is annoying if you find somebody else you'd prefer to recruit
-SaGa hallmarks of zero explanations and tutorials for various systems fully on board here - don't be afraid to look up any guide just for some basics. I'm embarrassed to admit how many generations it took before I figured out I could sit on the throne to have the chancellor bring back offers for building upgrades
-A few late game bosses can be quite spongy
Even if you were lukewarm (or less enthused) on the first Romancing SaGa game, give this one a shot. I found it to be a much more satisfying experience that didn't punish me for...everything. This also runs perfectly on Steam Deck with zero adjustments needing to be made.

Fantastic game. Mediocre to poor remaster. Currently the only way to play anything resembling the original 2D version of the game in English.
The original sprites are (mostly) used here with (mostly) tastefully redone backgrounds. Unlike some of the other Square remasters, the sprites and the backgrounds use matching perspective, so the characters don't even look like they are walking around tilted at a weird angle or anything like that.
Unfortunately, the sprites and the backgrounds are in mismatched resolutions, and neither are scaled correctly in HD. You can force the sprites to scale correctly by running the game at 426x240, but that cause some nasty issues with the backgrounds and text.
For some unfathomable reason, it also runs at (badly framepaced) 30 fps, despite the original being 60 fps.
I ultimately settled on using Nvidia DSR to run the game at oversampled 8K, with Special K to force somewhat tolerable framepacing, and a CRT shader (Megatron specifically) in ReShade using BUFFER_WIDTH/18 and BUFFER_HEIGHT/18 for the resolution params. It still looked worse than the original in some regards, but at least it didn't look completely broken anymore.
Should such an option present itself, i would *strongly* recommend playing the original with a translation hack instead, but this remaster is an enjoyable enough alternative in the meantime.

The reviews being mixed here may be bit of a turn-off to an unknowing reader, but, even considering the remake, this is still a great way to experience this game, especially if you prefer the 2D visuals and sound of the 16-bit era. Yes, this version isn't optimized the best, however it's still 100% playable, and the problems experienced are very minor. Unfortunately, these days, people will review bomb anything that has even the slightest issue, so don't be a dummy and fall for that stuff. Romancing SaGa 2 is difficult, but very rewarding and unique JRPG, that you do not want to miss out on. Choose this version if you want the best 2D edition of the game.

This was my first SaGa game and I absolutely enjoyed it! Nowadays it's easier to recommend the remake, however. This was also their first SaGa remaster, so it's not as fully featured as the later ones. Still, if you want an open-ended SNES era JRPG with a unique structure and mechanics, I can definitely recommend this!

This game having mixed reviews is a crime. romancing saga 2 is one of the most unique rpgs i have ever played. i highly recommend it