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So, this was one of those games that escaped my attention when it first came out.  Usually I have a thing for spotting, playing, and finding enjoyment with games with the world "Legend" in the title, but I think around the PS1 days, I was so much more focused with games like Chrono Cross, Legend of Dragoon, and Final Fantasy 9 as well as Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, and several others.  This was also around the time that I'd discovered Emulation, and was searching endlessly for a game that I'd played and fell in deep love with on the SNES ages ago but couldn't remember the name of (It was Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest, which I'll review another time).

I guess now that I think about it, it also never got that much, if really any, advertising whatsoever and just sort of popped on shelves when it came out...so that's also probably why it flew under the radar.

But cut to some years later, I'd gotten into emulating Playstation games (keep in mind, this was when there was always justification on sites of "If you delete the game after 24 hours, you're fine," and things like that), and this was after I'd played Legaia Dual Saga on the PS2 (which I'd rented and was...eh, it was okay) and decided to give this one a shot.

I'm actually glad I did, because compared to its sequel (which again suffered Parasite Eve 2 syndrome in my personal opinion), Legend of Legaia was actually a fairly decent game.  Not a gaming or even PS1 best, but still a damn good game nonetheless with some interesting elements.

Story
"God created the heavens, the earth, and the seas. After creating all things in the universe, god created humans to rule over the world. Yet, while possessing the wisdom of god, humans were physically weaker than the wild beasts, and impulsive in spirit. Many times did the humans come close to dying out forever. Concerned about the humans' future, god gave them a mighty force with which to aid them. It was the Seru. Since the dawn of human memory, known as history, humans lived together with creatures known as Seru. The Seru lived together with humans, always obeying them, and making the humans many times stronger than before. When not worn by a human, a Seru looks much like a stone figure. However... Upon touching a human, a Seru changes form and gives that human secret abilities. With a Seru, a human can lift objects heavier than itself and even fly in the air at will. However, that era came to an end. Appearing from out of nowhere, the Mist covered the land, bringing to an end prosperous symbiosis between humans and Seru. After the thick Mist came, the Seru, who once obeyed humans, rebelled against them. The Seru began attacking humans at will. Seru that attached themselves to humans controlled their minds and turned them into evil beasts. As if forsaken by god, human civilization collapsed. It was the twilight of humanity. Those who escaped the Mist inhabited the desolate areas and protected each other. Now, their faint hope is their only source of inspiration."
—Prologue

Legend of Legaia takes place some time after the Mist has already enveloped the world, you living in one of the last known settlements to avoid the mist (by building a really big wall apparently).  The village itself survives by having a group of hunters go out before the mist picks up, scavenging nearby.  One day during a hunt, however, a being known as Zeto uses a powerful monster known as Juggernaut to destroy the wall to let the mist inside.  Making your way to the safe haven in the center of town, a dying tree known as a Genesis Tree, you meet a Ra-Seru (more powerful Seru that are immune to being corrupted by the mist) named Meta who agrees to help you.  After restoring the Genesis Tree and thus pushing the mist away from your village, you and Meta go on a quest to push the mist out of Legaia for good, finding help along the way.

Already, I kinda liked Legaia's plot.  It's not a plot about "saving the girl" and more about "saving the world," but it's just such an interesting concept.  You're saving the world from mist that corrupt these "Seru" to where they'll either possess you and make you into a beast, or just turn into straight up beasts themselves.  It's a lovely explanation as to why a number of unusual monsters exist instead of the usual "Oh they just exist in high numbers" bit you normally get.

At the same time, so much happens within that plot that keeps the game continuously interesting.  There's a twist that you, the players, learn very early on when it comes to how the mist is powered...yet the game is absolutely content in shrouding the Ra-Seru in secrecy until the heroes come to the conclusion themselves.
 There's also two twists regarding the female hero, and one of the later twists is actually pretty messed up when you really think about it.  Characters you think may be a random nuisance actually serve a purpose further in the story, and the lore regarding Legaia and the Seru is just overall pretty interesting.

Finally, I liked how it was basically a mixture of time periods, something like Ni No Kuni or even Final Fantasy 6 or 9.  You had these really backwater looking places like your main village and castle towns like Drake Kingdom...but then you also had a Monastery that used underfoot fans to keep the mist from entering the temple, or modern-like Windmills that were powered by the underground magma for the same purpose, or even a colossal tower that held an entire bustling town with even a theater and jazz club inside of it.  It was just little details like that that had me really interested in the world itself.  Overall, I was shocked at how immense the story and lore for this world was, especially since the previous Legaia game I'd played (aka the sequel) was almost severely lacking in anything incredibly interesting.  It was really just a pleasant surprise that I was grateful for.  There ARE flaws, usually when it comes to the antagonists including the one introduced early on after Zeto...but in all honesty the game tries really hard to explain their backstory and actually does it decently, they were just lacking a certain something that would make them more of an imposing threat and less amusingly pathetic.

Gameplay
Now I'll knock Legaia Dual Saga for its absolutely basic story and almost uninteresting world, but I absolutely loved the battle system with just how unique it was.

Thankfully, Legend of Legaia had the same battle system since it basically invented it, although I will admit that LDS did refine it a bit better in its variety (instead of the usual commands just sending someone up to smack with their weapons, they could also be used to have the character send flurries of spells and whatnot at the enemy...which was pretty cool).

But overall, it's a cool system.  During battle, it gives you 2 options: To fight, or escape.  Once you select fight, you're given 4 more options: Attack, Spirit, Magic, and Item.  Item is pretty self explanatory, as is magic (although you can't use magic until you acquire your Ra Seru and basically absorb a magic power by defeating a Seru on the field at a certain moment).  Spirit lets you build up your AP (and also opens an attack option slot temporarily), which can be used for Hyper Arts, Super Arts, and Miracle Arts.  Attack will give you 2 options: Auto and Command.  Auto will choose attack options for you, usually hitting randomly while sometimes on occasion producing an Art (especially if you've learned it already).  Command, you'll get to choose your own attack options.  Your options are Up (high kick), Down (low kick), Left (left punch) and right (right punch).  Starting up, characters can only do 3 actions at once, though after a certain amount of levels it will continually open up another slot until you hit...I wanna say 9 actions.  This means that once you've hit a high enough level, you'll be able to get 9 hits in easily, or 6 hits and 3 Arts in.

And you keep hearing all this talk about "arts" and are probably wondering what I mean.  Arts are skills that you learn by doing different attack option combinations.  They don't really require a certain level to learn, although some enemies will make it surprisingly difficult to learn one on occasion.  Arts will do a little extra damage, and can always be useful when you chain them together, giving even more added damage.

Hyper Arts are basically more powerful Arts that cost AP to use.  You can gain AP by doing regular Arts or using the Spirit Command.  Super Arts are an even more powerful type of art, normally using 7 of your Attack option slots, so obviously you won't be able to learn them without either getting a higher level, or using Spirit to open up the 7th slot temporarily.  Miracle Arts are basically a character's Limit Break (since it's a super immense attack using that character's name in the title of it) that use up all 9 slots.  Miracle Arts basically cost a whopping 99 AP to use, but they're the most powerful of Arts out there.

Outside of battle UI wise, it's basically the random battle system.  Run for long enough on the map, you'll hit a battle.  Run long enough in a non-town/mist town area, you'll hit a battle.  It thankfully has never felt tedious being hit battle after battle...except sometimes on the map.

World map travel can be a chore before you get access to this game's fast travel: Doors of Wind (which a quarter point you'll get, and then can buy quickly after).  Before this though, map traveling is particularly slow feeling, and you'll probably hit a couple of battles before your destination, depending on how long it is.
 Also for as useful as Doors of Wind can be, they'll only take you to towns that you've already been to, not ones you've yet to visit nor non-town areas (or basically areas that will never not have monsters).  Walking is also the only way of map travel, as the game never introduces any type of ship or faster way outside of the Doors of Wind...so it can feel a bit slow and tedious sometimes.

Place wise, the areas aren't super immense, but usually interesting enough to where they never felt too short.
 Random battles also of course help make the place feel a little bigger, as do random twists and turns that may take you to treasure chests.

Overall, it felt like playing a normal RPG with some unique fighting elements, which was actually overall enjoyable for the most part.

Graphics
This is where the game...fluctuates.  There's moments when it's gorgeous, moment when it's downright creepy (in a good way) like Conkram, and moments where it's "Eh" like a normal par-for-the-course PS1 game.
 This is especially true in the monsters themselves, or more specifically the bosses.  I don't know what it is, but when you're introduced to a character or boss monster, they always look incredibly bland to downright ugly in cutscenes (which with character bosses I'm usually willing to forgive).  But then when you see them in battle, it's almost astounding how much detail went into making them a bit intimidating or even downright threatening.  I remember one antagonist, Songi, always looking incredibly silly with his in-game sprite because he's always got this goofy looking smile and slanted obvious-evil looking gaze, so it was hard to take him seriously.



But then you fight him in battle and it's almost like "Holy shit, that's what he looks like?" And can see him as a more credible villain.

Spoiler

The same goes for the main antagonist Cort, who looks slightly more intimidating in battle.

It's just another one of those games like FF7 to where it's hard to take chibi looking characters seriously, and then when you see what they're actually supposed to look like it's more like "Okay yeah, now I see it."

Outside of that, as I said, the graphics ranged in this one.  Overall, I enjoyed the various locations more because of their variety, but there were a couple of pretty looking or pretty creepy looking areas (and battle scenes looked pretty good).  But this one was an overall mixed bag.





Music/Sound/Voices
This is one of those games where the soundtrack was not bad at all, but nothing was entirely memorable that I'm still humming today.  Well, okay, I take that back, there's one song that comes to mind, although I just can't fathom why.

Seriously though, that was just lazy.  Other than that, yeah, nothing comes to mind here that makes it one that I'd put it on my great PS1 OST list.

Sound wise, all good there...nothing intrusive or annoying.

Voice wise, it's kept to battles when you're performing actions and arts.  Thankfully, you get a total of 3 people the entire game, and they kept the voices to their Japanese originals even in the English release.  Again, they were fine here.  Noa's voice was mildly annoying because of how squeaky/high pitched it sounded...but given her character it actually made sense that she'd have that kind of voice, and it never got entirely grating either.

Replayability
So this one has a few sidequests, some of them worthwhile, some of them minimal.  There's the Muscle Dome which has multiple difficulties as you'd expect in a Colosseum type of sidequest.  There's also a Dance Contest in the same town that you can take on as well.  There's also fishing as well as a game called Baka fighter that you can take part in as well.  There's also side boss battles including a battle to obtain a powerful evil Seru that you can summon, though this is post game and probably not the most worth it since you'll basically want to be level 99 to get it.

On top of that, you can always be a 100% and learn all the possible skills and magic for each character.
 So yeah, there's some replayability involved, and truth be told it's not a bad game, so it's really not a chore to comb through the game to hit that 100% completion.

Overall
Overall I think Legend of Legaia was one of those underrated games that had the bad misfortune of coming out when there were bigger titles out around the same time.  Looking at the date, it came out on March 17th of 1999 in the US.  Around that time, games such as Gex III, Heroes of Might and Magic III, Pokemon Snap, Rollercoaster Tycoon, and most notably Everquest were released.  On top of that, you had Final Fantasy 8 and Mario Party a month before, and games like Ehrgeiz, Pokemon Stadium, and the expansion pack for Baldur's Gate coming out the month after (and Pokemon Snap came out 4 days after Legend of Legaia, with Roller Coaster Tycoon coming out 5 days after, and Everquest coming out the day before).

In short, it was basically doomed to be forgotten because of the big titles coming out before and afterward.

But despite all of that, it had to have done well enough because it garnered a "sequel" (I use that lightly because it's basically a sequel in name and character design only) almost 2 years later, despite the sequel being a somewhat poor imitation of its predecessor.

Overall though, I recommend it to people to try.  The graphics may be a bit dated and sometimes unintentionally silly, but overall I think it's still a pretty entertaining game that's worth at least one playthrough.

It looks to me like the game's best feature is its story...the mist concept is intriguing, and I imagine that as you progress through the game you feel like you're recovering the world one bit at a time (I personally love that feeling when playing a game), and who doesn't want to play the character that's tasked with saving the world? I also thought the last screenshot that you posted of what looks like a town or a village was rather charming, in an old-style graphics sort of way.

Not sure I would ever get around to playing it (*looks at all the Steam games he hasn't even started yet*), but it was fun to read about the game. Thanks for posting the review.

That's actually a great way to put it.  Yes, you're going around recovering parts of the world at a time, which is always nicer than the overall quest to save the world all at once.  Being able to go to a town that's kept safe for so long only for it to get fucked up when you arrive is also pretty neat as well...seeing the sort of reverse flipside consequence to being that good hero...especially when your own actions in doing that "good" is what causes that consequence.

And I always enjoy that little twist too, the consequence of doing good and how it can affect the world outside of your little zone.

There's even a city that you encounter later on that you find the people are angry with you for clearing the nearby mist, because the town holds a diabolical secret that the mist surprisingly put a halt on.

I just love details like that.  You think you're on this good holy mission, and the game surprises you with things like that.

That kind of reminds me of a quest in Dragon Age: Inquisition, where you're going around saving a town and the mayor isn't happy with it because he's hiding a secret. And that's kinda the point...these sorts of elements are common in modern games, but they were unusual and new in games at that time.