Review: The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered Makes You Grind

I’ve cherished The Legend of Legacy since I first performed it on the Nintendo 3DS again in 2016. Though I by no means managed to beat it again then, I keep in mind having loads of enjoyable with it. Nevertheless, it wasn’t till replaying The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered that I remembered why I struggled to complete it within the first place. Whereas the sport stays enjoyable and FuRyu applied loads of attention-grabbing concepts, the programs current are very obtuse. This new remaster is a missed alternative to course right a few of these selections and make the sport a bit extra accessible.

The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered is about within the island of Avalon, a land inhabited by monsters that was found 10 years earlier than the beginning of the sport. On the outset, gamers select one in every of 7 protagonists. Every one has their very own causes to journey to Avalon which are tied to the traditional civilization that inhabited the island, together with mysterious legends of the Star Graal. Likewise, each character has their very own ending. So if you wish to see all of them, you’ll need to play the sport a number of occasions. When you positively don’t want to do that to know the plot, it’s a pleasant contact for these eager to replay the sport.

Whereas the story is attention-grabbing, the plot in The Legend of Legacy is moderately sparse, and many of the playtime is concentrated in exploring Avalon and combating. Every protagonist begins the sport with 2 different characters, however you possibly can change your celebration within the city of Initium after speaking and recruiting the 4 celebration members. Characters in your celebration provide shade commentary throughout all necessary scenes. This element helps retains a constant feeling of camaraderie inside the celebration, and helps show their personalities.

Exploration and fight is the place the majority of the expertise lies. Fight is fought in a turn-based system utilizing a workforce of three celebration members. First, gamers choose one in every of their ready Formations, after which choose every character’s motion. The roles in every Formation decide how efficient sure actions are, and which stat they will degree up. Formations are an attention-grabbing means of encouraging character development and creating your individual “courses,” by making every character develop of their respective roles the extra you utilize them. For those who’ve performed or find out about The Alliance Alive this method is a considerably stripped-down model of it.

Whereas fight itself is fairly simple, leveling is complicated and unintuitive. Characters have 5 most important stats: HP, SP, Assault, Guard, and Assist. HP and SP have an opportunity of randomly leveling up after each combat. In the meantime, Assault, Guard and Assist can improve relying on the stance and actions every character utilized in a combat. To make issues worse, every transfer has its personal impartial Assault, Guard, and Assist stats tied to them that may degree up if you use them within the respective stance. What the Assault and Guard stats do is self-explanatory, whereas Assist influences flip order. Having varied balanced formation for various eventualities is necessary not just for succeeding in fights, however for maintaining your character’s stance and transfer ranges balanced correctly. As you possibly can think about, the just about random nature of leveling can inflate the period of the sport by including some grinding. Whereas combating stronger enemies normally makes degree ups immediate simpler, it’s nonetheless a roll of the die.

Weapons and strikes work much like expertise within the SaGa sequence. Particular strikes and Spells might be solid spending SP. Strikes are discovered randomly by Awakening when utilizing a selected transfer, and every weapon has a number of totally different strikes. Equipping your characters with balanced tools is necessary to keep away from getting walled by an enemy which may resist a selected sort of injury. Water, Air, and Hearth Singing Shards and charms present elemental contracts that enable characters to solid spells of the corresponding factor, together with passive buffs like HP and SP regen. These might be outfitted and utilized by each character.

Spells can be discovered the identical was as strikes, besides it’s important to solid spells till Awakening them, though this isn’t evident nor defined at any level. Moreover, some characters can solely study some parts, which might show difficult when deciding who to present charms. Whereas there’s an in-game guide, it barely touches on how these programs work, and retains the participant at the hours of darkness on some particulars that I contemplate to be important with the intention to succeed within the sport. The remaster was the possibility to enhance on these points and the general expertise, however because it stands it stays a considerably cussed sport.

For my playthrough, I picked Owen as protagonist, as he’s highly effective shut quarters fighter that excels in attacking and guarding. He was accompanied by Garnet, one other robust attacker with defensive capabilities, and Filmia, a assist attacker with respectable velocity. When you can change celebration members in Initium, I made a decision to stay with this group all through my total playthrough, as altering it might have put me again a couple of hours with the intention to catch as much as the remainder of the celebration. I might advocate doing the identical for anybody stepping into the sport, after which attempting different groups in New Sport+ in the event that they’re curious to see different character tales and attempting new combos.

The visuals in The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered are actually stunning. Whereas it’s fairly apparent that it initially was a Nintendo 3DS sport, the chibi fashion of the character fashions appears actually good, and completely fits the artwork fashion and environments. There are some very uncommon moments the place the decision in some backgrounds is a bit low, however aside from that the sport maintains a really robust aesthetic. If I’ve any criticism of the presentation is that the stylized pop-in of the environments stays a bit jarring, much more so when taking part in on a giant display. The music in The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered is flawless. Remaining Fantasy XIII Composer Masashi Hamauzu supplied his signature fashion for the soundtrack, and it’s evident all through the rating. The principle battle theme specifically may be very harking back to FFXIII, and it by no means will get previous. For a music that you just get to listen to rather a lot, this is essential.

I nonetheless love The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered. I wanted this new launch may have mounted a few of my gripes with the unique sport. Whereas it may be an obtuse and cussed sport to study, when you get previous this you might be met with a reasonably and charming world, in addition to a strategic fight system with some attention-grabbing concepts. One of the best factor happening for the remaster is that it makes accessible an 8-year-old sport that was trapped on the Nintendo 3DS. For followers of the SaGa sequence it is a should.

The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered will come out on March 22, 2024 for the Nintendo Swap, PS4, PS5, and PC through Steam.