3/5 ★ – truewalrus's review of Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven.

Romancing Saga 2 has some novel ideas that don't quite elevate it away from its long list of mediocres. Story, music, UI, attempting to glimmer, battle rank, the life point system - all of these things detract from an inherently interesting combat system and lineage system, as well as an enjoyable character (job/cast) collectathon with a large quantity of potential builds. One of the more interesting concepts in Romancing Saga 2 is the lineage system. If your main character dies, or some (unclear? arbitrary) thing happens in the world, the game triggers a time skip and a succession occurrs, allowing you to pass down your main character's skills and abilities to a new main character chosen from your list of side characters (more like a job system but you do get a new coat of paint). 100s of years pass, and in theory, the world changes around you. Unfortunately, this mostly doesn't occurr. There are a few rare occassions where there are connections between what you did in the past and the current time, but most of the time, your list of quests remains exactly the same. People are still looking for help from someone strong, the boy is still lost in the cave, the amazon warrior you saved is still just waiting for you to come back so she can offer to join you, none of the towns have evolved in the least, etc. This lack of progression tends to make the story mostly irrelevant. The game does reveal things over time and makes you understand what has happened but since your main cast of characters, including the main character, keeps rotating, there's no connection between the player and the characters. It's a very bare bones approach that could have better been served by a more thorough exploration of the passage of time. Another area where Romancing Saga 2 really suffers is in its music. There are 3 or 4 themes for the different types of areas and they are played ad nauseum throughout the whole game. They're fine tunes, but a full RPG with only 3 or 4 themes isn't going to cut it in this day and age. Especially when immersion is already suffering due to other reasons. The bosses are all the same, the enemies are all the same, and you can tell what type of area you're in simply based on the track playing. One other interesting system that Romancing Saga 2 brings is the glimmer system. Characters gain skills and abilities by using skills and abilities of the same type. This is fun. And combat, mostly, is fun. My enjoyment of my playthrough came almost entirely from this aspect as it's really the only aspect with any depth. It's mostly enough. It's a good system. There's a bit of an annoying reliance on learning certain skills in order to defeat certain boss fights that does detract from the enjoyment though. I thnk someone who has enjoyed Saga games before would have found more enjoyment in Romancing Saga 2 than I did, but the systems it introduces does make me want to potentially play another. Played on expert (except for the final boss because what in the world is that difficulty spike) playtime: 46.7 hours