So, I've been on a kick lately. First I talked about the NES games I enjoyed the most (sorry Adventures of Link and Mario 2 and 3!), after that I talked about the overall game I enjoy the most, and I thought today I'd talk about the games that I enjoyed the most on the SNES (CT fans, hush, I enjoyed that game too along with LTTP, Lufia, FFMQ, and several others): a trilogy which I'd like to call (since it was never really given a name...) the Ark Trilogy:
*Terranigma (Because the main character's name is Ark)
*Illusion of Gaia (Because there's a gigantic boat you're on at some point
)
Soul Blazer (Because...because shut up)
While these titles are very very
loosely related, they were, in fact, intended to be a trilogy. Two of which were released in the US, one of which was only released in every other area except the US.
Starting off the trilogy, we have:
OR...One of the most confusing games to play, yet still unimaginably entertaining and creative.In this game, you take on the hero with your choice of a name, like any good classic game. You're sent down from the heavens by the Master (shut up Doctor Who fans!) to restore the human cities and bring life back to Gaia. You'll go through many different areas, restoring towns, castles, and even someone's house (not even kidding) while defeating the bad guys.
The game starts you off with a slight tutorial of sorts. You step into the portal-device and are introduced to a room with a chest and your first spawning monsters. Congratulations! You learn how to swing a sword and open a chest! And when you succeed in those difficult tasks, you get your first companion (which equals to a ball of light that circles you and does stuff when you press a button) to help you out. As you go through the game, you'll get new companions (also known as just different things that happen when you press the button), as well as new weapons and the like.
That tutorial is where the game stops holding your hand. Once you go back to the main area and step into the next opened area, you're introduced with a completely empty area which used to be a village. Find your way to the only place you can access, and go beat some monsters.
Here's where the interesting part of the game kicks in. For every group of monsters (aka the group that comes out of their little portal) that you beat, their portal will be destroyed and leave behind a kind of green button like thing. Sometimes this will open a new area, reveal a treasure chest, or remove traps from your path. But the most interesting thing stepping on one of these things can do, is restore some part of the empty area...such as a person, a plant (which you can talk to), a pet, or even an entire house. Some of these restored NPCs are pretty useless, others will barter you items (or give them to you endlessly, such as a medical herb if you run out. But there's no currency in this game, so bartering/equipment quests are more common), and others are required to progress in the story...even if they may not seem like it. Your job is to restore every little bit you can in an area so that you can move on and accomplish your main goal.
Dungeon wise, I mentioned that the monsters come in groups, right? Here's some tricky bits:
*Some portals, the monsters will all come out at once, making them a quick kill
*Some portals, the monsters come out one at a time.
*Some portals will release monsters that you can't kill until you have the appropriate sword. But have it or not, they'll come out anyways and hurt you.
*Some portals will release monsters that can fly absolutely anywhere, and shoot you from far away, while others will release typical monsters that may be on the the ground and not move, or they'll come to you.
Your hero's life is shown in everyone's favorite style: a large bar:
As you level up, your HP will increase until it touches the end of the screen. From that point when you level up, it'll go into different colors (with I believe white being the highest amount of HP).
Bosses range from easy to tricky. The first boss in the game is absolutely no cakewalk. It requires exact timing to hit him before he goes into defensive/metal mode (which can only be broken by the right sword...which you don't get until the area right after you beat that boss, so you have to make due with just attacking it at the right time). But not all bosses in the game require as much strategics, though some do require much luck.
Overall, it's an interesting game that has a uniquely evolving story, as well as an interesting form of game play that I hadn't seen before on the SNES (though E.V.O still wins on one of the most creative). It's a little dated in ways now, especially with newer games that have similar concepts (Dark Cloud for PS2, for example), but it's still a wonderful game in its own right.
Oh, and as a segway into the next game: you DO get to learn the hero's true name when you're at the final boss in Illusion of Gaia. AND THAT BRINGS US TO THE NEXT GAME:
OR...The game of powerrrrrrs ZAP!.Like Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia DID see a US release, and I'm sure there's at least one other person on here who has played it. For those who haven't, WHY NOT?
It sounds silly to say this, but compared to Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia stepped up a little in the graphics:
Look at that nice polished health bar and everything. Doesn't it just make you smile? What? What's DP? Stop jumping ahead already and take your seat!
Ahem...
In Illusion of Gaia, you play the hero that DOES have a pre-set name (sorry all you name lovers) known as Will. Like most RPG's back in that day, you start out doing some fun stuff with your friends (including using a power that you have to move statues back and forth just by spinning your flute), and then a runaway princess visits your home, and before you know it, you're being thrown in prison for things and stuff. Of course, not being satisfied with being in prison, Will (with the help of the princess) makes to escape, propelling him into an adventure that, like most RPGs again, will have Will attempting to save the world with friends that he makes on the way.
Now, don't be fooled at another cut and dry sounding plotline. I haven't even mentioned the game's best features yet as to how Will learns about his adventure. During his prison escape, Will runs into something known as a "Dark Space" As the name states, it's a space where he meets a creature known as Gaia. Gaia gives Will extraordinary powers along his journey, most notably one that transforms young Will into this:
Meet Freedan. He has more reach than Will, and his sword swings more of a punch as well. He also gains attacks that give him better reach and even MORE power.
There's more powers and unlockable forms as well, but I don't want to spoil them for potential new players. There's also a revised life system in IoG. In SB, you had the Medical Herb which restored your life if you hit 0. In IoG, however, you have DP, also known as Dark Points. You remember collecting gems in SB for using magic? Well, you collect gems in IoG as well, though it has a different purpose. When you collect 100 Dark Gems, you'll gain a Dark Point, which is the equivalent of say, gaining an extra life after collecting 100 coins in Mario. So if you die, you'll redeem that Dark Point and come back to life. There's also Red Gems, which arguably IS a type of currency in a sense. Collect enough and give them to a Red Gem collector, and he'll give you a reward for hitting that number (and he'll keep it on record, so if you give him more, it'll add to your total and get you something when you hit the next required number).
Now...there are distinct differences between Soul Blazer and IoG. One of the earliest obvious differences is that you aren't recreating towns/areas. Instead, you're exploring fully created, some absolutely stunning, towns and other various areas of the world. Many are taken from historical context and myth (the hanging gardens of Babylon, Incan ruins (Remember the ship I mentioned? It's a Incan ship made of gold that you land on after the first dungeon), and even the fabled Tower of Babel. Essentially, your task is to find and make it to the Tower of Babel and stop an ancient weapon (used during the last Blazer War, *hint hint*) from destroying everything.
Another difference is that when you defeat all enemies in an area (IE all enemies in a portion of the dungeon), you'll gain a permanent stat boost to either health, attack, or defense. There is no other way of leveling up like you could in SB (but different forms will have different defense/attack stats). Locations are also for the most part unable to be revisited, also unlike SB (where you could jump back to any area you wanted at any point in time). So if you're moving on, you best be prepared to be there until you beat it 100%, unless you want to miss any stat boosts that could help you out later.
Enemies are more traditional in the sense that they're pre-set (rather than coming out of portals) in the dungeons. Bosses are also a bit easier to deal with as well, the first being difficult, but still much more manageable than SB's first boss.
Overall, it's a different feel than SB was, but it was a welcome change to the trilogy in many ways, still keeping that fun creative touch, while being much less confusing to get through.
But it wasn't until the 3rd game that they perfected the system, and that brings us to:
OR...The greatest SNES game that no one ever knew.
Until emulators.Ending the loosely tied together Ark Trilogy, we have the brilliantly made Terranigma. It was such a shame that the US had never heard of it, since I guarantee it would have pulled in a ton of extra money for the makers. But for the game's sake, it did earn quite a reputation once emulators were born.
Terranigma essentially is the lovely little savant child of Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia. It takes the best of both of the games, and mixes it together in a masterpiece that blew me away on the SNES even more than Chrono Trigger had done.
The story starts off with a young boy named Ark, waking up from a terrible nightmare. Ark is the town mischief maker, apparently sending in chickens to attack the weavers (aka people in the profession, not a family
) one night as the chickens made a huge mess. He's told by the elder to apologize to the weavers, as he goes out and does so. But when he comes back, he finds that the Elder has gone out, and that some of the folks are attempting to break into the room that's considered off limits to everyone. You can either choose to participate or not, but either way, you'll be breaking in (either to save the folks taken inside, or just breaking in). When you make it to the end of the room, you find a simple box floating there. As you touch it, a bat creature named Yomi comes out and says his howdy dos right before your childhood friend walks up, and shortly then turns to ice. Yomi then tells you that EVERYONE in the village has turned to ice (though not by his hand), and it's when you leave the room and run into the elder, who charges you with leaving the village (which was oddly unleavable before, but your actions made a gate appear!) and restoring the towers. But by restoring the towers, you learn your true quest: to leave the village and restore the world of men: Gaia. But along your journey of restoration, you learn some dark and horrible truths, ones that threaten to destroy the world itself.
I tried to make it as simple as possible story wise, because there's surprisingly a lot of detail in it, as well as some very surprising plot twists that happen as well. Out of the three, it definitely has the richest story, and in ways it compares with some of the really deep stories such as Chrono Trigger's as well as Lufia II's. But the story itself is only one part of what makes this game so interesting.
Right away when you start the game, you're introduced to the game's soundtrack that I felt was a step up from IoG's...although IoG actually had a pretty well made soundtrack as well. You're also introduced to the graphics that, while they may not SEEM like that big of a step up from IoG, in many ways they are:
Like the towns in SNES games with birds that fly overhead (or to use IoG as a example, the beautiful town with the petals flying), the very first town you're introduced to in Terranigma, named Crysta, has little bubbles (known as just crystal, or crystal blue) that will always be flowing across the screen. In many ways, this really sets the tone of the game because the moment you step out of that town, you're introduced to one of the bleakest, desolate looking maps ever:
Welcome to the Underworld! Population: 5 towers, 2 secret areas, and Crysta. That's right: that's not even the main game map you're seeing, that's the starting map.
Once you get out of the Underworld, you're introduced to a less desolate, but still much so, map of the overworld. If you need an idea of what the map looks like for that, just find a globe.
Now, let me backtrack a bit for you. I mentioned Pandora's Box (did I neglect to say that it was Pandora's box?) earlier, but I didn't mention what all was in Hotel Pandora. Once you open the box, you're stuck with it, and in an unusual game decision, you can somehow go INTO the somewhat small box and, it's pretty much the equivalent to the Penthouse suite inside the box (Harry Potter eat your heart out):
Main room
Weapon room
Item room
Armor room.
Now, as you look at the weapon and Armor rooms, you'll see a set number of slots in each where the armor/weapons would go. I'd like to note that that isn't the maximum number of weapons/armor that you get in this game. If you look right above Mr. purple orb in the weapon room picture, there's something called the Whole Hole. Pretty much when you want to get rid of something, you toss it into that hole. You'll be using it a couple of times once your weapons/armor gets full, although amusingly you won't really be using it for your items.
So that's where you'll be going to equip your weapons, armor, and item that you want to use.
That takes us to the battle part. Like the previous two games, it's basically a run up and hit them with your sword (well, spear in this game) kind of game. Though in this game, they decided to add a bit of variety in your attacks, (multiple stabs, jump slash, shield, etc...). Terranigma plays much more like a traditional RPG: You attack a set number of monsters and you gain levels, though unlike SB, you actually have regular stats that get leveled up instead of just your health. Like IoG, enemies are pre-set rather than coming at you in groups, again playing out like a traditional real-time RPG.
Like IoG, bosses come in various ranges from easy, to medium, to annoyingly difficult. Thankfully, it's much more of a progressive cycle this time around. They don't throw you a challenging first boss until the last tower in the starting area, and even then if you were smart, you'll have leveled up enough by then to where he won't be much of a challenge.
Taking a note from SB and IoG, crystals still play a part in Terranigma in the form of Magirock. When you visit a magic store, you can buy various types of spell rings with currency (Yes, this game ACTUALLY has currency as well!), and it will tell you how many Magirocks it will fill if you wish to use a spell. If your magic is spent, you can recharge the Magirocks with different spells, or the same if you wish. The same goes for "pins" that you'll get from certain characters as well.
Outside of battling is where the game really takes off. The purpose of your going through these levels and killing these bosses is restoring the world of Gaia. When you beat a tower, you're re-awakening a different continent of Gaia. When you're going through a level in Gaia, you're resurrecting something that has been long asleep (for instance, beating the first area in Gaia reawakens the spirits of Nature and brings life and greenery back to the world). But that's not even the best part of it.
You, as the player, will get to watch the world progress from practically no life, to caveman style life, to village life, all the way up to bustling modern-day metropolitan cities. And again, that's not even the best part. These changes aren't absolute, meaning they're not guaranteed. The choices you make in the game, the people you help and the quests you partake in will dictate whether or not the towns will grow and transform into something even better. In each town, you'll see this fellow:
Who will give you an idea of how the town is doing, and will give you an idea of what you need to do to make the town grow, whether it's supporting a specific candidate in elections, taking pictures and showing them to other locations, or something else of the like.
What also makes this interesting is...well, remember how you just need to look at a globe to get an idea of the overworld? Well they mimicked IoG on having the world be a sort of...parallel to ours. During your journey, you'll meet Columbus, Alexander Bell (just named Bell), Edison (named Eddy) and several other familiar historical names. So in a sense they're having you speed progress of these towns that are intentionally taking on historical context to a specific degree.
There's also other little tidbits that make this game entertaining, but I could go on for ages about it. What matters is that if you haven't played this game and are looking for a good RPG, then this is definitely the one for you. It's got many little sidequests that'll keep you going for hours, especially the quest of getting every town to it's peak (which the forecast guy, Keinz, will let you know as such, or it'll literally just look like a modern day city). But it's a game I strongly recommend to anyone who likes RPGs.
