Romancing SaGa 2

"This is the Legend of the Seven Heroes...

Once, they subdued countless hordes of demons, and saved the world... And then vanished from it... Kujinshi... Subier... Dantarg... Noel... Bokuohn... Rocbouquet... Wagnas...

And one day, so they say, they will return to save the world again..." Long after the people were scattered across the world, they told the legend, and were thankful for their salvation...

However, as peace and prosperity came, the legend was forgotten... The world of man was once again prosperous. The peaceful times that brought stability to the nations came to an end. An era of division and war began...

And the names of the Seven were spoken once more... ...and then... they came... ...so they say....

Romancing SaGa 2 is the 5th game in the SaGa series released only in Japan by Squaresoft; it does not focus on just one character but a lineage of an empire.

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This game provides examples of:

• Action Girl: Lots of them.
• Artifact of Doom: The Demonstone Ring; it negates status ailments, but you must sleep in the Emperor's Bed otherwise you lose Life Points at an inn, and it can't be unequipped.
• Artificial Gill: The Fishman Potion. Que the annoying Fetch Quest. But as a benefit, you unlock the Nereid Class
• Back From the Dead: Kujinshi and the Hive Queen who receive massive upgrades.
• Bag of Spilling: Subverted, all the items you are equipped with are sent directly back to storage after completing each generation. It's still annoying to reequip the characters you do have though.
• Battleship Raid: (A Land Battleship!)
• Badass
• Because Destiny Says So: It was first shirked off by Emperor Leon until his eldest son was killed by Kujinshi.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: The termites complete with Hive Queen in which you have to fight twice by the way.
• Charm Person: Rocbouquet's Temptation ability charms all males in the party; and there are other techniques as well that can charm allies.
• Chosen One
• Clingy Costume: (Subverted) The Iron Will, which can negate mental ailments such as charm but can't be unequipped if gotten through cheats. Some Classes have a permanent 4th item which cannot be removed either
• Combat Tentacles: One of the abilities Subier has is called Tentacles; and does it hurt!
• Cool Sword: Moonlight Sword has a healing technique built into it in addition to Moonshades, which shoots out frigid Blue Skulls at the enemy.
• Elemental Powers: You cannot have spells of opposite elements, though.
• Face Heel Turn: Noel, if you kill Rocbouquet after making peace.
• Fallen Heroes: And there are seven of them.
• Flaming Sword: (Providence Cut Technique)
• Game Favored Gender: The Final Empress as she will be immune to Rocbouquet's Temptation in the final battle, she also has the Moonlight Sword as the default weapon.
• Giant Space Flea From Out Of Nowhere: Most of the Seven Heroes show up in quests that tie back into their plans and you can go in expecting to fight them. Dantarg is the exception, however, pretty much showing up to fight you without much buildup or prior warning.
• Hard Levels Easy Bosses: Enemy grunts scale up as your characters gain health and skill with weapons. Bosses, however, don't. Not to say that the game is devoid of hard bosses though, it's just you will sometimes end up fighting grunts far more dangerous.
  • The Seven Heroes however are the exception, they do become stronger as you level up, the only one who doesn't is Subier, he is upgraded only if you kill Master of Ocean beforehand. Dantarg has 4 forms depending on your stats.
• Hello, Insert Name Here (Subverted) Will only appear in Final Generation
• Hot Amazon: The Amazon Class
• How We Got Here: The Emperor you chose at the start of the game is at the bar where the Bard retells the story of the Empire.
• High Altitude Battle: Hakuro Castle; AFTER the inner sanctum of the castle is ripped straight out of the ground!
• Idea Bulb: This is the game in the SaGa Series that started the system of learning techniques and evasions during battle.
• Jungle Princess: Rocbouquet.
• Life Energy: (LP)
• Lost Forever: Coppelia, Mountain Monk if you kill the monster in control of a certain cave, City Thief if you destroy the Canal fortress Gate, Grimoire for Shadow Magic or being able to recruit Salamander depending on what action you take during the second Komulune Island event, Iris; if you use the Helicopter to reach Wagnas.
• Global Currency: Crowns.
• Musicalis Interruptus: Dungeon or area music would stop and change to boss music at a certain part of the Dialogue with bosses or the Seven Heroes.
• No Export for You: SaGa is fairly good at getting across the pond, but this game never made it. Recently rereleased on the Virtual Console in Japan, but there's no word on a translation. A Fan Translation by Aeon Genesis was in the works, but never made it out of Development Hell.
• No-Gear Level: If you choose to sneak aboard Bokuohn's landship by purposely being abducted
• Non-Human Sidekick: They can even be the Emperor once they are recruitable. They also fall under the tropes of One-Gender Race and Elemental Embodiment.
  • Mole Men
  • Merfolk: The Nereids
  • Salamander
  • Harping on About Harpies: The Irises
• Our Mermaids Are Different: And how!
• Palette Swap: Every recruitable character and emperors except Leon, Gellard, Last Emperor/Empress, and a few others...
• Ruins for Ruins Sake: 3 of them; all sidequests.
• Samurai: East Guard.
• Sequential Boss
• Shout-Out: The names of the Seven Heroes are actually anagrams of stops in train lines in Japan; also, the music from the GB SaGa Games is used in a scenario
• Sword Fight: A one on one battle with Sekishusei; Retainer to Lord Ato; Ruler of the Eastern Lands.
• Take Up My Sword: Leon to Gellard.
  • Also can happen in later generations if you get a Total Party Kill.
• The Chessmaster: (Bokuohn; as he commands a large number of the monsters under the command of the Seven Heroes)
• The Empire: You are the ruler this time around!
• The Strategist
• Thieves' Guild: Using the empires' own graveyard as their base of operations
• Time Skip: From less than a year to 250 years depending on how many enemies you killed.
• Took a Level In Badass: Gellard, after his father's death by Kujinshi.
  • Every person ascending to become Emperor or Empress gets this since it removes any Crippling Overspecialization their initial class would have had (a Squishy Wizard receives more health and proficiency in previous weapons, a Bare-Fisted Monk can handle weapons and use magic, etc.)
• Trojan Horse: The only way to sneak aboard Bokuohn's Land battleship; creating a fake one to draw the enemies away from the real one.
• Warrior Prince: You are the Emperor who has to save the world.
• What the Hell, Hero?: To get the Dark Magic, you must allow the towns of Zemio and Tsukijima to burn. This however causes the Emperor of that time period to abdicate the throne.
• Wutai: The entire Eastern lands.