Final Fantasy Legend II (1990)

This game has issues that, sadly, evolved out of an attempt to fix the prior game's issues.

It's much more of a traditional RPG, going the way of Final Fantasy 2 where now the core characters, Humans and Mutants, both advance through combat directly rather than just Mutants (in Saga 1, Humans bought their upgrades). They also introduce robots, whose growth is naturally limited, but that are incredibly flexible, allowing you to just buy your way out of problems through changing equipment.

The key branch behind most of the issues here? Lack of communication. Level-ups are effectively random, relying on you having done a specific task in the combat and then giving you a chance to get that level up, or a smaller chance at some other level up (Strength, HP from taking hits, Mana from casting spells). You don't have an actual exp system that can be tracked to help you realize you're doing something correct.

Additionally, this game is far, far more equipment dependent than the first games. Weapons operate in radically different methods, impacting the leveling system and having numerous hidden bonuses and traits. This puts you in a bind where utilizing outside resources beyond the game and manual are effectively required, as both leveling and gaining the money to modify your loadouts are now enormous time sinks that are real gut punches to do slightly wrong and lose an hour or more of grinding.

In an attempt to fix the first game's grinding (which can from having to manually feed humans stat boosters one at a time, after having grinded for them), the game has now more evenly split grinding behind leveling and money, which has the advantage of at least requiring you to play the game, but it feels like they've doubled or tripled the effective time needed. Getting powerful items early in Saga 1 required enough grinding to make it obvious the game was discouraging that approach, but in the late game the income ramped up throughout the areas, less so in this game where there are only a few decent grinding spots, and no GOOD grinding spots. Once again, atleast with the stat feeding system, as slow and menu-y as it was, you could atleast see yourself making consistent progress.

This game is also far, far more difficult. Leveling your Defense is far more difficult (impossible for robots and nearly for humans), which could be seen as a key rebalancing element, but the end game bosses all ignore defense anyway, leaving you with either leveling magic (for healing) on everyone, or, once again, looking online for a more efficient solution that relies on those unknown item qualities I mentioned. And that boss damage is just immensely ridiculous and completely out of nowhere compared to the first 2/3s of the game.

The story is also just a mess. Most of the areas are very plot light and lack a lot of the fantastical multi-world theming the first game had (and while I won't hold it against it, the chinese folklore theming made the first game stand out more than the Greek-light flavoring of just a few NPCs). Only one sub world had a real deal episodic plot the way multiple of them were set up in the first game.

I'm very disappointed. The first game was not good. It felt like you were being asked to work a 9-5 shift just to be given a fun ration at the end, but instead, Saga 2 is a blander, 'normal' fantasy rpg that is just plain not fun.

Preliminary: I know I gave this a full 5 star and Favorite status when I first played this way back, but we shall see how it holds up. The first FFL was preferred then, and likely will be again but we shall see. I'm nervous to read that now both Mutant and Humans have the random level up factor? That was, imo, the worst part of FFL1 (the Mutant leveling system). But I remember all the Legends being well-loved feeling in how they were designed: the usual flaws of early JRPGs were there, but it felt like they truly tried to balance everything to allow for many types of playthroughs. Here goes nothing!

Early Game

Like always, I will be playing the original Japanese release (which was actually late 1990, not 1991, so I fixed the entry). For the sake of a full-feeling playthrough, I'm thinking I will have a party of 1 of each class. Even tho I really didn't like the Mutant leveling system in the first one hmmm, so maybe I shouldn't do a Mutant. I think they act as the Mage/Wizard of the party, so seems I should do 1 of each. (Welp, scratch that. Appears to be no fan translation of the game. So the Nov 1991 NA release it is. Boo. Apparently the biggest difference is instead of catching criminals selling illegal opium, the NA version says uh illegal bananas lol. So I got an improved version that reverts that :-p and a couple other minor changes for the official NA release)

Right off the bat, the familiar yet seemingly slightly different tune is great. Love it. Nostalgic for me at this point of how many times playing these early SaGa games. And that Gameboy coloring. Love it.

Thank goodness for Mr. S being on the team at the start... my team has been being brutalized! And random battles seem very frequent! I like the tunes, but so far they haven't hit me as hard as some other tunes, so I may eventually mute it when grinding in areas I've always heard the tune etc.

I wonder if there's a way to increase the text speed, cuz gosh it's slow. Pretty disappointing to see it has the "if the enemy you targeted dies, your character isn't smart enough to hit a different one" archaic flaw

I like how, like in the first one, when you have a Monster as your first character, your sprite becomes a little sprite of the Monster :-p super cute. Not in love with the randomness of Humans/Mutants leveling up. I've been grinding for so long, and have thousands of gold already in my first grind, yet my Human still only has 70 HP (my Monster is a Zombie and already more powerful...). Meh. FF2 style stuff heh. Whatever I'm just gonna move on. And omg I morphed into an Octopus and the sprite is so funny lol .

I don't mind that it has the ol "move south 3 times then east 4 times" type stuff but like... the random battle frequency is too high for that.

Dang I should've made most my team Robots! I'm able to level mine up much faster than this randomized Human/Mutant silliness. And like the first one, the Monster evolution will always at least match where you are at (a mechanic I liked in the first one too).

Nice my Human and Mutant are finally getting stronger. Tho my Monster seems to have downgraded from the Desert areas' enemies? Hm. Yeah, the Monster evolution system is not as enjoyably straightforward as the former game. I will have to do some deeper research. Ok yea that's really lame how it keeps devolving me despite being in a new, stronger area.

Mid Game

The music continues to be quite lame. The tune while in the vine pillar thingy place is pretty good. And okay the Giants Town music was pretty good too I guess I was just a little crabby lol. The Old Giants Town concept was cute and neat (literally huge houses, so big they are on the overworld map)

I'm getting really irritated with how strong some of these random enemies are and yet the Monster meat is making me weak as hell...

It may be ugly in here but the idea of going into Ki's body is neat.

Some of the music was good and reminded me of Links Awakening and other classic GB games. A lot of the dungeons also reminded me of Links Awakening too. Cute having the jukeboxes at the Cafes.

Finalllly one of the minibosses gave me some decent meat and a decent upgrade! (And then the next night I got a great upgrade from a chest of monsters/demibosses)

So far the dungeons have been quite straightforward. I haven't needed a map at all. (currently at the Volcano dungeon). I am grateful for the simple dungeons, but it only exacerbates the meh overall feeling I'm getting so far. It's still a great RPG and I'm hooked to the grind-for-GP-upgrade-move-on JRPG formula , but just meh compared to my love for the first FFL (which also "did it first" and that may play a role in my feeling).

Like the first FFL I wish it were clearer which weapons are stronger etc. It's unclear (unless you're a Robot). Since I haven't taken a screenshot yet, uh this is what it looks like

I hope RPGs start to have faster movement soon, I know it's not only this game, but this norm of trudgingly slow movement is not it.

Late Game

As much as I'm whining about this game, I can't help but notice I'm thoroughly hooked to it. And hours go by each night with me playing it :-p Even with OSRS Ironman account screaming at me to be played :-p

Definitely the best Look so far in this part of the Sho-Gun Palace

Interesting idea with the Dungeon near the end where you can just collect the Magi and leave, but you also can delve deep into the dungeon for some of the best equipment in the game.

Yesss when Odin dropped his meat. Ok I gotta give this game credit, I wound up feeling that intense RPG urge to finish it TONIGHT. (tho every time I get this craze, I regret it cuz I tense up and still don't finish it cuz end game RPGs are always long :-p )

I'm on the Final Dungeon! (Or so it's called... I've been tricked before), and what a Look it has!

Thank goodness for the very powerful save function! If only more console RPGs from this era would've had that heh. A QoL thing I noticed it had was, remembering what your last selection was. Even between battles it seems!

How did Apollo's meat make me weaker... Lol. Logical. And jeez this final dungeon (actually final this time) is brutal. Like in the first FFL... Ugh yea just like in the first FFL, the final dungeon is just so disgustingly unbalanced lol. Plz say this is the final boss I'm so exhausted (I knew this would happen haha). This final boss is SO annoying. It keeps repairing the Cannons after I defeat them.

Omg FINALLY. With only 2 characters still alive. Ridiculous. I will do the ending segment tomorrow. (Well, I wound up doing it now despite my exhaustion and overheating from the final boss/es haha) So it jumped straight to credits, ok, tho some of the final tunes were nice and the plot/Isis character was quite nice and I always like flashbacking through the areas of an RPG (tho it's becoming quite dime a dozen in 91)

Cute idea of Mom joining for the next adventure, not a big fan of the Lost Ark joke/concept there, but still. And omg, so this is where I got my "The End" image from that I have on my Discord?! I must've really liked it my first playthrough, I probly knew some trick for the final boss heh (and yes I was using Heal Staff, the Cannons just frustrated me to no end).

Look: 8.5/10 Neat and classic GB Look, but nothing spectacular. Well, wait gotta give recognition for the Ending screen I so adore.

Sound: 8/10 Good enough tunes, and started getting that nostalgic GB vibe.

Play: 8.5/10 Classic RPG hook. Irritating sometimes, but not as bad as many of its contemporaries about status ailments. And the FFL neat idea of different ways to level different classes, with lots of replayability from that.

Feel: 9/10 Can't deny the hook I get from these FFLs, and how important the series is for me. This one didn't feel quite as special as the first, but it's still special for me.

Attachment: 8.5/10 I mean, I've already 100%'d it twice so that says something. Not my favorite of the early FFs, but still worth a replay time to time and to try different class setups.

Overall: 8.5/10

Completion: Main Story

Story (3/5) | Characters (3/5) | World (3.5/5) | Gameplay (3/5) | Visuals (3/5) | Music (3.5/5) = 64% overall score

Almost everything that I disliked about FFL1 was adjusted and made better in FFL2. Out of the three games, I'd say that this game is the "hidden gem" out of the three and the one I enjoyed the most. While still retaining the unique character progression, FFL2 makes the system of gaining spells on mutants much clearer and also adds the best class (robots)! Combined with the MAGI system which allows you to equip unique MAGI stones to provide different bonuses, this makes the gameplay pretty fun (but still hard to get into and not a complete blast). I went with a more unique party of a robot, human, mutant, and monster for variety and I enjoyed the strengths and differences in each.

There actually is a story this time around where you have to follow in your father's footsteps as he climbs the tower of different worlds. I laughed a little every time my robot main character called his human father "dad". NPCs will join you as a 5th party member this time around which makes them a lot more memorable. The worlds you explore are also a lot more unique and fun to explore (e.g. a giant's world, a feudal japan world, etc).

There are a lot more unique sprites and unique environments to explore and see as you climb the tower. And the music is pretty good overall as well considering the hardware.

Time to Complete: 15 hours

Favorite Chill Theme: Another World

Favorite Action Theme: Boss Battle