Romancing SaGa Re;univerSe - Release Date & First Impressions

Square Enix can’t have enough of the gacha train, and we’re glad for that (but maybe they could lower their prices?). Romancing SaGa Re;univerSe was originally released in December 6, 2018 in Japan, and after almost two years, it released worldwide in June 24, 2020.

The SaGa series goes back in time, with the first SaGa game releasing under the name “The Final Fantasy Legend” back in 1989, for the original Nintendo GameBoy!

Since then, various remakes and re-releases were made, most notably:

• 1989 – The Final Fantasy Legend
• 1990 – Final Fantasy Legend II
• 1991 – Final Fantasy Legend III
• 1992 – Romancing SaGa
• 1993 – Romancing SaGa 2
• 1995 – Romancing SaGa 3
• 1997 – SaGa Frontier
• 1999 – SaGa Frontier 2
• 2002 – Unlimited Saga
• 2005 – Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song
• 2012 – Emperors SaGa
• 2015 – Imperial SaGa
• 2016 – SaGa: Scarlet Grace
• 2018 – Romancing SaGa Re;univerSe

Without further ado, let’s review Romancing SaGa’s main features, and if it’s worth your time as a gacha game.

Heroes – Unique Illustrations & Detailed Sprites

While pixel sprites are kinda “love it or hate it”, Square Enix is known to do an amazing job with them, bringing a big amount of nostalgia on our HD phones.

Compared to their huge hit – Final Fantasy Brave Exvius – I think it’s a big upgrade, as every hero (referred to as “Style”) is portrayed with both the illustration and the sprite, which brings the characters to life.

As you would also expect from a Square Enix gacha game, there are a multitude of combinations you can have in your team, and each hero has too many unique elements to make him the “same” with another one.

Combat – Easy to Learn, Fun to Play

The combat is much more “JRPG-ish” than both FFBEs, without tactical maps, deep strategy and complex environmental systems.

I do think this is good too, as it’s much more fast-paced and fun, than having to plan out a single stage for 1 hour. I mean I love both scenarios, but I’m just glad they opted for a much simpler – yet still engaging and strategic – combat system.

I’d say it’s quite similar to the original FFBE, though much easier to control, removing back and forth frustrations.

Game Modes – Expected Variety Without Something Unique

Everything in SaGaRS is super polished, but sadly there aren’t many surprises in the game modes offered.

Everything you should expect to find is there, resource grinds, dispatch modes, multi-difficulty stages etc. I can’t complain for using the recipe to success, but as we’ve also seen from The Seven Deadly Sins: Grand Cross, breaking the boundaries and thinking outside the box can truly make for a unique game experience, that’s hardly matched from polished “copies”.

The event system seems to be very strong at least, with literally a ton of time-limited special missions to take part in during global launch, and hopefully they will keep up this pace – as they’ve shown they can with their other gacha games.

Story – Uhm… Good?

All the story cutscenes are short and to the point, something I greatly appreciate as a person that can’t resist reading every tiny dialogue, no matter if it’s good or bad.

Sadly there are no voiceovers, but the excellent soundtrack does make up for it, so the overall audio experience is top-notch.

I guess people who’ve experienced any of the previous Romancing SaGa games will have a much better time following the story than a newbie like me, but I still enjoy it a lot so far!

P2W? – Square Enix?

We can’t set out expectations too high with a Square Enix mobile game, so expect to encounter a ton of overpriced offers, that literally only whales can afford to buy.

Of course, the main gameplay, events and dailies are more than enough to provide you with a great gameplay experience, so you don’t need to worry too much about these packages.

There are also a couple of fair-priced monthly packages, which is always appreciated.

Last but not least, they are using the most P2W and garbage business model (in my opinion) of “paid” jewels. That means you can’t use your free jewels in everything, there are some gacha pulls and packages that are exclusive to paid currency. Such a sh***y way to monetize a game… But Square Enix has always been the worst at this, innit? ?