SaGa Frontier 2

About SaGa Frontier 2

SaGa Frontier 2 (1999) is Square's watercolour-painted, non-linear RPG telling two intertwined stories, of an exiled prince and a young man investigating his parents' deaths, in a medieval Germanic world.

SaGa Frontier 2 in Depth

In the world of Sandail, whose plot, places and names draw heavily on medieval Germanic and Anglo-Saxon influences in a setting akin to the 13th century, players can follow Gustave XIII, an exiled would-be heir trying to reclaim his throne, or William Knights, a young man investigating his parents' deaths. The two scenarios eventually intertwine in a larger plot about the fate of the world. Hand-painted watercolour backgrounds and characters give it a storybook look unique in the series at the time. As in other SaGa games, progress is largely non-linear: within the story's basic flow, players complete missions, talk to characters and travel freely through the world and its harsh dungeons.

Battles are turn-based, with commands entered for each character at the start of a round and actions resolved by speed. Characters attack with weapons or cast magic to harm enemies or aid allies, and repeatedly fighting with weapons randomly teaches them special skills that hit harder and can combine with allies' attacks into combos. There are three kinds of battle, chosen by the player or set by the plot: one-on-one Duels, Team battles with up to four characters against an enemy group, and large Strategic battles. Each character can equip two kinds of weapon and specialise in particular fields. NextGen summed it up as: "If you thought FFVIII was unoriginal, this is the game for you. If you liked FFVIII, this is still the game for you."

Making SaGa Frontier 2

Series creator Akitoshi Kawazu headed development, with music by Masashi Hamauzu. Announced in September 1998, it deliberately abandoned the CG videos and computer-style graphics of the first SaGa Frontier for a traditional, hand-drawn look. Released in Japan in April 1999, then by Square Electronic Arts in North America in February 2000 and in PAL regions that March, it received mixed to average reviews in the West but was reissued three times in Japan. GameSpot praised its art as "a pleasant breeze of creativity" amid CG and polygons, declaring "there is still a place for two-dimensional graphics", though it felt the game might alienate fans of the first SaGa Frontier.