8 Things You Need To Know About Square Enix's SaGa Franchise

The SaGa series has become one of Square Enix’s lesser-known properties. Since it debuted in 1989 in Japan and 1990 in North America, that wasn’t always the case. Due to lack of support, the company stopped making these games regularly though.

On top of that, many of the entries in this franchise were not localized outside of Japan. SaGa is not even a B-tier franchise in Square Enix's catalog, but it is more like a C-tier one. That said, it has its niche audience and Square Enix has steadily realized that there are those still out there hungry for more. Therefore, in honor of the upcoming remaster of SaGa Frontier, let’s dive into a little more history with this often forgotten RPG series.

8 Final Fantasy Origins

The original game launched as Makai Toushi SaGa in Japan in 1989. For whatever reason, the game was tied to the Final Fantasy series and renamed The Final Fantasy Legend when it launched in North America.

Its two Game Boy sequels also used this moniker, although they dropped "The" from their titles. The first game in the franchise to be properly labeled outside of Japan was 1998's SaGa Frontier, which came out almost a decade after the series started.

7 Common Mechanics

Before jumping into one of these games, one should know they play very differently from a typical RPG like Square Enix’s Final Fantasy series. Instead of fighting monsters, gaining experience, and then leveling up, heroes grow stronger in another way.

By using certain commands, like attack, that ability will get boosted over time. This works for getting hit as well, as taking damage improves defense and increases HP. Many games also feature non-linear stories, told through many angles left up to the player to choose.

6 Big Delays

There are many games in the series still trapped in Japan. However, before diving into that subject, let’s first look at some revelatory releases. For example, Romancing SaGa 2 released for the Super Nintendo, or Super Famicom, in 1993. It would not get released outside of Japan until 2016 with a phone port, so fans had to wait 23 years to try this game out.

Not to be outdone, Romancing SaGa 3, which was first released for the SNES in 1995, didn’t get an English transfer until 2019 through a plethora of systems including the Switch. To a lesser extent, SaGa: Scarlet Grace took three years to come over after its 2016 PS Vita release.

5 The Games That Are Still Missing

SaGa 2 Hiho Densetsu-Goddess of Destiny promo art

Now, as for the subject of SaGAgames still trapped in Japan, there are technically five. Romancing SaGa released first on the SNES in 1992, but it did get a PS2 remake in 2005 which did come over to North America. A remake that didn’t get localized was 2009's Final Fantasy Legend II for the DS.

Final Fantasy Legend III also got a DS remake two years later. All three of those games mentioned so far do have English fan patches at least. That is not the case for the 2012 mobile game, Emperors SaGa, or Imperial SaGa, a 2015 browser game.

4 Akitoshi Kawazu: The Mastermind

Akitoshi Kawazu joined Square in 1985. One of his first big accomplishments was working as the battle designer for Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II. It’s that work on Final Fantasy II that would inspire him to direct the start of his own series, SaGA, along with help from others.

Since then, Kawazu has been involved in the series in one form or another, be it as a director, writer, producer, and so on. He is the face of SaGa, or more like the voice of it.

3 Square Sales

This might be hard to believe but The Final Fantasy Legend was the first Square title to reach a million units sold. That was mostly in Japan but it did get a small boost elsewhere.

At that point, only Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II were out. While good, they did not become iconic right away as Dragon Quest was still the talk of the town when it came to JRPGs. That series has always been bigger in Japan, whereas Final Fantasy became the big franchise in the West. As for SaGa, its sequels were never as groundbreaking in terms of sales but they weren’t horrible either.

2 SaGa Frontier Cut Content

SaGa Frontier has a well-documented history of cut content, which can be found in full detail on both Unseen64 and The Cutting Room Floor. To start, it was first envisioned as Romancing SaGa 4 before changing its name to SaGa Frontier.

It was to include nine scenarios, or characters really, instead of seven. One of these heroes, Fuse, is still in the game as a recruitable character but he has no story of his own. That is unless someone digs into the game’s code where some of his content is still found. The other character was a girl, but not much about her is known.

1 From Opium To Bananas

As great as it was to see Japanese games get localized in the West, Nintendo was pretty strict in the '80s and '90s in terms of how translations were handled. This could ruin some experiences. That is not the case for Final Fantasy Legend II as the translation is more funny than ruinous.

In Final Fantasy Legend II, there is a quest involving the capturing of thieves who are selling opium. Drug references were an obvious no-no for the child-friendly Nintendo in North America, so they were changed to bananas which kind of makes the quest better. Imagining the chaos a banana could bring to society is hilarious.

NEXT: Final Fantasy VII Remake: Every New Game And Update Coming Soon