Makai Toushi SaGa ( 魔界塔士) or The Final Fantasy Legend, is the first entry in the SaGa series, released on the Game Boy. While it shows very few features of what makes SaGa so famous, it plays slightly more like its sibling series, Final Fantasy. This game also has a remake on the WonderSwan Color.
"It has been said that the tower in the center of the World is connected to Paradise. Dreaming of a life in Paradise, many have challenged the secret of the tower, but no one knows what became of them. Now there is another who will brave the adventure.."
The story primarily revolves around a single character, and up to three allies, who explore multiple worlds, help solve the problems of the world, and take on Asura's minions as they climb higher up a gigantic tower, hoping to reach the top to defeat Asura once and for all, and possibly live an easy life in Paradise.
Playable Characters
The Final Fantasy Legend used a guild system allowing the player to select from a variety of characters, each with their own strengths and flaws, making customizing a party either remove most of the challenge to the game, or adds greatly to the challenge of the game.
Gameplay
(Taken from the FF Wiki) At the beginning of the game, the player creates their initial character to lead the party. They are given a choice of three races:
Human - Humans cannot learn any special skills or use books of spells. Instead, they have the most equipment slots allowing them to equip a wide variety of weapons, and they grow stronger using special potions sold in shops to increase their stats.
Mutants (called Espers in the Japanese version) - Mutants grow stronger with each battle, obtaining random stats boost at the end of the battle. They also may learn or forget skills, up to a total of four skills being available to learn; they are the only one that can use the books of spells.
Monsters - Monsters get stronger by defeating other monsters. After an enemy is defeated in battle, they may drop some meat which the monster can eat, turning them into a new monster thus increasing their stats and possibly teaching them new skills.
The player can also choose a gender of the character, but this has no bearing on gameplay. After the initial character has been created three more can be recruited at the base of the tower, created just like the initial character, to make a party of four members.
Battle is a standard affair, taken in turns. When the attack option is chosen, the character must decide which weapon, spell, or personal skill they want to attack with. However, equipment has durability. Using a weapon or book will decrease its durability by one and when it reaches zero it breaks and must be replaced. Luckily a character can equip multiple weapons so they will not be totally useless should one of their weapons break.
Throughout the story, the party will meet a variety of characters they must help or fight to continue on their quest to defeat Asura.
King Armor - The king of the castle to the northeast, and generally a kind fellow to be around. He gives players the King Armor if they help rescue his lover and her home village from the bandits in the cave to the south.
King Sword - The king in the castle to the south, surrounded by mountains. His castle is rampant with monsters, and some of them even serve him as his guards. The king himself is a very aggressive person, and will attack anyone trying to take his precious sword. Players will obtain the King Sword for defeating him in combat.
King Shield - A sickly old man who rules the castle in the forest right next to the central village. His guards do not take very kindly to visitors, and will throw anyone out if caught. The king himself prefers isolation, and greedily hoardes the shield, but does not take an aggressive route like King Sword does, possibly due to his frail condition.
Steward - King Shield's personal servant. He secretly poisons the king and makes off with the shield while leaving the king to die. Players will obtain the King Shield upon defeating him.
Ryu-O - The king of all dragons. He fled the underwater world and lives on an island in the guise of an old man. Players will obtain the second half of the Blue Sphere, the Blue Orb, upon answering his riddle.
Gen-Bu - One of Asura's four minions, and the guardian of the Black Sphere. He comes to attack the party when they return all three pieces of the King set to the statue in the central village and obtain the Black Sphere.
Sei-Ryu - One of Asura's four minions. He guards the Red Orb, one of the halves of the Blue Sphere, in his underwater palace. To further protect anyone from getting the orb, he surrounded himself with many fake orbs guarded by ferocious monsters.
