i have a very unfortunate issue when it comes to writing about games. there's a very arbitrary threshold on where i think my words have any real meaning and where they start to feel they're just extremely cheap. that is usually proportionate with how much i like the game itself, I don't think I've ever written anything meaningful about Mother 3 all these years and I don't know when I will, it's my favorite game after all.

so, when a game is just "me" like SaGa Frontier is... yeah it becomes super hard to even try to talk about it. especially harder when this is some weird niche game a lot of people can't get into. like if i can't even feel like any words i write about it will be worthy of me reading them, who would it be for then?

it's a bit like trying to talk about myself, i think i know my strong points but it feels weak when i externalize it. so i usually mask it with a joke so that's what i'll do here i'm just gonna tag each route like they were in doujinshi or fanfiction websites:

Asellus: rebirth, vampire, obsession, power exchange, harem, yuri
Red: super sentai, vanilla, revenge, martial arts tournament, evil organization, alien
Lute: slice of life, relaxed, women in power, political, giant robot
Riki: monster, innocent, corruption, inspired by the lord of the rings
Blue: twins, assassination, magic, training, heaven, hell
T260: robot, colosseum, amnesia, found family, virtual reality, doomsday device, power-up
Emelia: marriage, murder, prison break, casino, martial arts tournament, harem, commando, secret organization, ancient mask, devi
Fuse: detective, comedy, alternate universe

After fiddling with this game on and off to little success in my teens, I found an approach that worked for me: pick it up once every three years or so, beat one scenario, and put it down. This keeps me from burning out on the relatively slim amount of content (i.e. torturing myself with back-to-back Rune quest runs) and preserves the mystique of the intricate mechanics, the postmodernist style mashup, the cryptic staccato dialogue, all the stuff that makes Frontier special. The only character I have left is... Riki. (I doubt I'll play Fuse, since I've cleared four of the other characters on different platforms and I don't much feel like doing it again.)

Anyway, Lute blows, but everyone knew that already. See you in 2026!

Played through Asellus's story. I will return to other scenarios later so I don't get burnt out. I was interested in Asellus based on Miwa Shoda's work in Nights of Azure and reading her interviews and drafts on the work in The Essence of SaGa Frontier/The Complete of SaGa Frontier. While it doesn't delve much into the eroticism or sensuality that you'd find in Nights of Azure, the focus on much more of a subtly queer identity struggle makes sense for what's a more conventional JRPG coming of age narrative that's just a bit quietly subversive of the gendered dimensions that usually surround such stories. It's really funny to imagine Miwa Shoda writing the scene after White Rose stays behind in the Dark Labyrinth and Zozma interrogates Asellus on her internalised homophobia while in the next room over in Division 1, the FF7 team is cooking up the Honey Bee Inn.

Played three routes: Red, Emilia, and most of T260G.

Really interesting but not especially fun to play. Feels like a reimagining of the Game Boy SaGa games with its mosaic setting and four unique character types, but no one type is as satisfying to raise as humans were in the Romancing SaGa games (and monsters are just awful). The structure of the game encourages you to play it once for each of the eight (!) protagonists, but playthroughs are too long and repetitive for that to feel worth doing. Also, the remaster is kind of ugly, sleek UI aside.