PART ONE: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/mLKTeZOaqs2vmY0.html

Ogre Tactics is actually a pretty groundbreaking JRPG. One thing about it that really stands out is it's very mature story. The creator even took story elements from real life events at the time, most notably, the ethnic Yugoslav Wars of the 1990's. This is also the work of the writer behind Final Fantasy Tactics. I was very impressed by Ogre Tactics when I beat it.

Quintet was too good for this sinful world

Run Sabre is so damn good! I've been trying to figure out the name of that game since 1998 probably. I lost the game when I was younger and couldn't remember anything about it with the exception that you could hang on things, flip, and you had a sword.

The story of IoG was the memorable part of the game for me. When I realized years later that the locations in Illusion of Gaia were based on real locations, it kind of blew my mind.

The things Tactics Ogre does well, which is extensive, is overshadowed by how ludicrously difficult and grindy it is. Your characters get permadeath and new recruits are always back to level 1. So you need to spend hours bringing them up to snuff in training. Absolutely brutal

Being 11 years old and entirely girlfriend-less, I enjoyed the Illusion of Gaia/Time story sections.

I didn't realise Illusion of Gaia was hyped at all lol. Cool content as always dude. Keep it up :D

"You ain't winning this fight."

Okay, people are still commenting on this video so i'm gonna say it. I have played Illusion of Gaia not one, or two, but three times. First on Spanish, then on English and finally, Japanese. And to this day, i still don't know what the hell is going on with the plot man. I have some KH level of confusion.

Illusion of Gaia? That's a hidden gem. There was rarely any hype at all back in the days.

illusion of Gaia over hyped?? IOG is severely underrated.

Glad I found this channel watching this sober or drunk it's just my style of reviews great job!!!

I really apprediate how considerate snes drunk is to his viewers. So polite. :)

Love your channel, IOG settings alone make it a favorite of mine.

I tried Tactics Ogre one and it didn't last me long because the game felt way too grindy. There was a huge gap in power between two units that were even one level apart. Is that just an early-game flaw that goes away after a while or something?

Illusion of Gaia deserves the hype is deserves I think. Soul Blazer is underhyped, but I personally feel it didn't age as well.

Tactics ogre has a great remake on psp as well.

dude fist bump on the tactics ogre. I LOVE that series.

Wow, great video. Tactics Ogre looks epic. I wish I had heard of it back in the 90s! I cannot wait for the SNES Classic, because I'm too lazy to turn my Raspberry Pi into a SNES.

Good call on Run Saber but with Illusion of Gaia it's the weirdness of the story that I enjoy the most about that game. Remember the part where the painter commits suicide by painting his self portrait? Or the vampire palace, or the almost photorealistic rendering of Angkor Wat with the weird vision of real life Tokyo at the end? It didn't really make much sense but had a dreamlike atmosphere that I thought was really cool

I found your suggestions very usefull. I tried to find different experiences in the RPG genre and I've completed Tales of Phantasia, Feda: The Emblem of Justice and Earthbound! I also played a bit of Terranigma and some of the Fire Emblem saga, but I think Tactics Ogre is what I am looking for, specailly in the plot aspect. I have a question about the Fire Emblem games: Is it true that if one of your characters die it doesn't reappears(in anyway) in the next mission? Sorry about my english. I'm from Argentina, spanish is my native language.

What's your opinion on Ninja Warriors? That game is awesome, very challenging, and the 3 characters play completely differently. hard to beat for sure, but i was able to beat it with 2/3 characters.

Speaking of Bahamut Lagoon, I think I managed to make some of my dragons invincible in the literal sense. It was over 10 years ago since I played it, so my memory is a bit foggy, but I remember the later parts of the game being stupidly easy because of how overpowered your dragons get. Sure, dragons should be powerful, but the game needs to match their power somehow, or it just gets dull. Great concept, poor execution, is my verdict on that game. And I think the hype Illusion of Gaia gets has more to do with it being a bit overlooked back when it was released. Soulblazer seems to have sold alright, while Illusion of Gaia did not. So it became a "hidden gem of the SNES library", and that made it really hyped. Then again, local conditions might differ. I'm from Europe (where the game was released as Illusion of Time. And yes, it was released here, unlike what some people on the internet like to tell you ;) ), and it was mostly overlooked. The local SNES-focused magazine did not exactly give it a glowing review either.

I'm glad someone else agrees about Mortal Kombat.

Illusion of Gaia is on the list ONLY because it was published in North America by Nintendo and got a little more promotion than the other two games. However, it didn't get the same promotion that other Nintendo games got...for example, there were no commercials.

I agree that Illusion of Gaia's story can be convoluted at times, but the game play is amazing. I haven't played Soul Blaze or Terranigma yet, but I hope to in the future.

I haven't played much tactics ogre, my expectation at the time was an improved march of the black queen so it was a bit disappointing that it wasn't the case. Will have to revisit.

You should do a part 3 of these if u haven't already. You show some fascinating games and the snes/super famicom library is so vast theres tons of games out there alot of people havent heard about

In my opinion Illusion of Gaia had and still has great combat, environments, music and an interesting story - I give them props for touching on some deeper subject matter compared to the more shallow good vs evil of the time; sure the writing is exceptionally awkward(I don't think the translators understood the story at all) but as far as I'm concerned every narrative focused snes game suffered from the same to some degree. Fun fact: the story for illusion of gaia was actually written by an award winning japanese science-fiction novelist.

I know this is late, but I had tactics ogre ported to the psx, and it's one of my all time favorite games. Thanks for the lists!

Wait there is an English patch of the snes tactics ogre?

thanks for the info on Run Saber... going to be getting this game next !!

I played IOG avhen I was young and it totally blew my mind at the time : the music and general atmoshere was so strange, poetic and mysterious... In France it was sold with a big booklet (comics-like format) that explained everything and I mean EVERYTHING, a 50 pages guide, because Nintendo thought that European kids were dumb. And man, was I dreaming to reach the next transformations of the hero. Like Secret of Mana and Super Metroid or Secret of Evermore, one the best immersive games I played, I loved the story, the funny characters, the cute cutscenes (like the plane)...

Gonna be totally honest here. I've played quite a bit of Tactics Ogre, and gotta say... I don't care for it all that much. When I got to the end of the game and found most of the side content, I found that Tactics Ogre was insanely grind heavy. You need levels for classes, you need to unlock classes, you need levels in the skill of what weapon you're using you need levels in the battle skills you use, you need levels in the elemental affinity of your weapon, you need your chaos frame at the right number to do this side quest or get this character, etc. etc.

ooph, i think part of me died a little bit on the Illusion of Gaia bit... i much preferred it over Soul Blazer. Blazer i felt was TOO straight forward and gameplay oriented, like just go into the area with enemies and kill them until you rebuild the town, then move on and do it again. i liked the story breaks in Gaia.

"mortal kombat 2 is overrated, go play a power rangers fighting game" SSSSSSSSNES troll!

That Gundam fighting game is FANTASTIC

Mortal Kombat wasn't rotoscoped. The chatacters were digitally filmed.

I'm glad you got around to mentioning the ninja gaiden trilogy eventually.

Very cool to see Run Saber featured. It was one of my favorites for its co op way back in the day. Also agree with your assessment of mortal kombat. I cant stand a fighter that reads your inputs!

The AB/YB problem is something that Nintendo games tend to do even to this day. I hate it. Recently I tried out Donkey kong Country Returns on the 3ds but stopped playing after a few minutes since the only 2 control schemes this games offers are Using the Circle Pad with YB or using the D-Pad with AB. You can not Use the D-Pad with YB and that sucks.

If you do a 3rd part of this series you could include Super Adventure Island II in there.

I grew up lusting after Illusion of Gaia, the marketing hit me perfectly as a 13yo, but all my game purchases at the time were multi-player and I never delved into RPGs like I wanted. Now playing the Quintet trilogy as an adult, Soul Blazer is what I wished IoG had been! Though fantastical, the story feels consistent and offers both humor and surprising depth, the gameplay wastes NONE of my time (which is much more precious as an adult), and the music is absolutely top-notch and stylistically unique on the system. Never would have heard about it without this channel so cannot thank you enough. Now onto Terranigma!

Illusion of Gaia is an action RPG, so it having a lot of story scenes makes sense. Never been the hugest MK fan, much prefer Street Fighter. I'll have to look into that Power Rangers game. Run Saber looks nice. I own copies of Ogre Battle and Tactics Ogre on PS1 and PSP, still need to play those.

I forgot about that Power Rangers fighting game. I'll have to check it out soon!

I love not hearing about games before. It makes all the worth while being a retro collector and try to find them to add it to my collection!

I find Gaia underhyped. The story pulled me into it. I enjoyed Soul Blazer as well, But enjoyed Gaia more, I find not many people have heard of either of those games. NG Trilogy music is horrible compared to the NES. MK2 was greatness at the time with all the fatalities, pit and spike deaths, babality's, and friendships introduced =] But in terms of smooth gameplay it never had anything on SF2 series.

Watched this like 5x cuz I lol at the illusion of Gaia shit but whenever you bring up playing games 2 player co-op I just laugh at my lack of friends. :D

I like how you address future comments in your video's. Probably saves a bunch of time.

I think the reason why Run Sabre was overlooked because I speculate that everyone thought it was some sort of Strider Clone

I HAVE BEEN LOOKONG FOR THIS GAME FOR SOO LONG!!!!! SO MANY GREAT MEMORIES THANK YOU!

My list: - Overhyped: 1. NBA Jam 2. TMNT 4 3. Donkey Kong Country 4. Mortal Kombat 2 5. Contra 3 - Underhyped: 1. The lost vikings 2 2. Ogre Battle 3. Lemmings 4. Jurassic Park 5. Looney Toons B-Ball

Hard disagree on Gaia. I loved the story of friends on a journey through weird and wonderful places, and there were some moments that will forever stick with me (waking up on the gold ship, being lost at sea, the artist who painted himself into a portrait, the brief glimpse into the modern world). Having played through it recently, my criticism is with some of the dungeons being a bit boring and some progression triggers being impossible to discover (ex: reading the note that appeared in your inventory, wtf).

You are totally right with Tactics Ogre. I remember back in the day i got me Ogre Battle ... man, i needed 1 month to beat it the first time ... since i "farmed" the enemy Units in each stage until the boss ran out of money xD Then on the PSX i got Final Fantasy Tactics ... that was a very good game but then they released Tactics Ogre on the PSX and i was so blown away. While Final Fantasy Tactics has quite some errors ... broken skills "Blade Grasp" catching everything from Arrow to Bullet and Melee with 90+ Brave but mainly the fact that Characters would keep getting Speed and Spells would not ... making enemy's being able to Move and Act 2 to 3 times before the Spell went off ...Tatics Ogre does only has some negative things that are not so heavy, like the increased Stats from Tarot Cards ... if you keep picking those up with lets say your Main Hero by the 4th Chapter hes kinda unstoppable. And i still play Tactics Ogre, the original one on my PSP. Yes i do have the PSP Remake, but that has compared allot bad design choices. Like the fact that now nearly every Caster Class can cast Status Effect Magic that in the original only Witches could ... making the NPS just keep casting those instead of trying to actually cast damage Spells ... because those barely do any damage without +Spellpower. Which leaves you mainly busy with dispelling those debuffs ...

In Europe Illusion of Gaia was known as Illusion of Time, it got translations for the languajes of the countries it was released with a very big box and included a personalized guide. It's release was considered a great event by the specialized press and the story telling was considered one of it's strongest points. Good luck finding a complete copy for less than 150 €.

As someone whos been gaming for 25 years, Tactics Ogre LUCT (PSP remake) is one of the few games that has managed to force its way into my top 10 games of all time list in recent years. Its SRPG heaven, unfortunately play it enough you will find there are balance problems (some stupidly OP classes) that really needs some kind of mod/patch to fix... despite that though its still an absolute gem of a game. I love the artwork so much I even imported the Japanese Artbook, great soundtrack to...which reminds me need to get hold of the CD set.

All the games Enix's Quintet team developed are amazing titles IMO

Run Saber and Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together look awesome. I've played Tactics Ogre on the GBA. This SNES version looks just as great. For another ninja themed/beat-em up game, have you tried Ninja Warriors Again, from Natsume/Taito? It's pretty neat in that it kind of feels like a mix up between a fighting game and beat-em up. It recently got remastered for the Switch and PS4 in 2019.

So, can someone give me recomendation on any modern PS4 game in vein of Soul Blazer/Crystalis?

guys do u know any similar games to tactics ogar? sorry no idea how to spell it

One thing I appreciate more as I get older is the music from Illusion of Time. The atmospherics it creates are brilliant and culminate in that Dark Gaia boss theme. My favourite game for the SNES when I was growing up.

Illusion of Gaia is the last in the line of the "Raiser" series. Soul Blazer is actually entry before it in the series. The main character, will, in Illusion of Gaia is the reincarnation of Will from Soul Blazer. This link is established by collecting all of the red gems scattered through out Illusion of Gaia, this unlocks a secret boss battle against the final boss of Soul Blazer, where the boss calls you out as the reincarnated hero before attacking you.

Well done with the Illusion of Gaia and Soulblazer matchup. Spot on.

Awesome video!

Didn't TOLUCT get ported and brought to America via psp?

Thanks for the recommendations , die hard mortal kombat fan do, do thank you for honesty when you review

SoulBlazer is a much more interesting idea than actual game. Haven't really played Illusion of Gaia, but SoulBlazer feels kind of unpolished and bare at times. It's ok, but it doesn't hold up all that well imo. The back tracking that is clearly there to artificially extend the length (and difficulty) of dungeons makes it hard to recommend to casual modern gamers. You aren't the only one that likes it more, but that opinion is a pretty strong minority. I guess it just shows games are kind of subjective as well. I like the "martyr-esque description you have there for the video.

Have you played Magical Pop'n? What do you think of that game?

Hold up, so a translation patch for the SNES version of Tactics Ogre that makes it completely playable is out already? I knew there was a team working on it but they stopped once the PSP remake was announced, and given there is the PS1 version as well a lot of people deemed the original SFC game obsolete.

No no.. Your arguments are sound and well constructed based on your experience/preference. Yes, your subjective expectations for well rounded games that should meet certain criteria are apparent... but that's just the flavor that we keep coming back for! Thumbs up ... as always!

This was a good one... so was final fantasy tactics a rip off of tactics ogre? They sure look similar

Illusion of Gaia had a huge magazine campaign in the 90s. It was advertised in every GamePro, GamePlayers, EGM, Nintendo Power, etc. for months in the mid 90s. A lot of the love comes from nostalgia. I don't know too many people who played it through rental or gift and didn't at least like it. I'd say that's where the affection for it comes from.

Solid list there. I do still enjoy IoT/IoG, but it's definitely a case of nostalgia over substance. It was one of the very few games to be localised in Spain at the time, so that was a big factor in reception there. Still much more partial to SoM/SD3/CT.

thumbs up for tactics ogre... don't sleep on Ogre battle though, fantastic game in its own right

Soulblazer is awesome. Growing up we borrowed SNES games from a family that moved away and when they did I had a list of games I needed to buy that I used to borrow from them. The list included Secret of Mana, Earthbound, FF III/VI, and Soul Blazer. I bought all of those off ebay used, except SoulBlazer. Wish I had, but at this point I'll just emulate it if I want to play it like I would with the others I do own. Also, I own illusion of guia and although I liked it didn't enjoy it as much as the aforementioned titles. Those and DKC and DKC 2 and Yoshi's Island were my favorites. Never played or owned Chrono Trigger though.

I played the Power rangers when i was young and it is awesome. I did not know ninja gaiden was on SNES

Hell yeah Tactics Ogre! Also, technically it did get to the states, we got the PSX version. Also the kick ass remake

Listening to this one a few years later I do have to admit I get your take on Illusion of Gaia. I loved it as a kid and have tried to go back and play through it as an adult at least 4 or 5 times but the long cutscenes and unintuitive/obscure story triggers that separate each dungeon really bog down what should really be an all time classic. A rom hack that retranslates and cleans up the dialogue while cutting down on downtime between dungeons could do a ton to make the game more playable.

Solid choices, Bahamut Lagoon has grown on me, and I only prefer it over Tactics Ogre now because I've played TO and FFT to death at this point in my life, but I wouldn't argue on whether those games were on the wrong side of the hype train in your video.

I agree with everything you said. Except Run Saber, haven't played that one yet.

Alright, yeah, I admit that Soulblazer holds a special place for me. As much as I loved Illusion of Gaia, I haven't replayed it since my SNES days, whereas I beat Soulblazer again just a few years ago... again. :) I always wanted to play Run Saber, but could never get a copy at Blockbuster. To me, it kinda has a Shadow of the Ninja vibe to it, and my childhood buddy and I would have played it to death. I still want to play through Tactics Ogre to this day. :(

Agreed. Run Saber is short and repeatability is low. But the graphics are awesome, especially the aerial boss battle with the jet. It screams Contra Hard Corps.

Why do you limit this videos to snes only? I'd like to see your input on all classics

How would one go about playing tactics ogre on snes?

Tactics Ogre: Let us Cling Together is wonderful, good way to end the video. I wish we had more Tactics Ogre games!

Illusion of Gaia is still in the underhyped section as most official websites don't list it.

I gotta give you some credit on the Mortal Kombat 2 criticism.You hit the nail on the head about the single player campaign.Even on the easy difficulty its near impossible for me because you can do so well so far,but then you get into that one fight on the 2nd half of the tier and you cant even attempt to attack the CPU character head-on without it either landing a throw attack you or shooting you out of the sky with a special attack when you jump at them.It was definitely a game meant for primarily multiplayer.

What's the name of the last game in this video? can any body help me?

3:51 this boss almost looks like a redrawn sprite from a parodius boss

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together is on the PSP in English if you need it.

I agree with pretty much all of these! Well, except for Tactics Ogre / Bahamut Lagoon, but I'm not a huge SRPG guy, so that's a pass. Great vid.

Not ALL of the Mortal Kombat characters were played by the same guy, though some were played by the same actors. For Mortal Kombat 1 they had the brothers Daniel and Carlos Pasena (the former were the also the movement coordinator as he knew martial arts moves), Ho-Sung Pak, Richard Divizio and Elizabeth Malecki. In MKII in addition to Divizio, Pesina brothers, Pak and Malecki in a cameo appearance, Anthony Marquez, Philip Ahn, John Parrish, Katalina Zamiar and Brian Glynn. In MK3 and Ultimate MK3 only Divizio, Parrish, Marquez and Glynn would return as Midway cheated on Daniel Pasena and for story reasons didn't use Carlos as Raiden, so other actors were used: Kerri Hoskins, Michael O'Brien, John Turk, Lia Montelongo, Eddie Wong and Sal DiVita. Daniel Pesina played Sub-Zero, Scorpion and Reptile (playable only in II) for MK and MKII, using a palette swaps to save memory, in order to get more characters plus they wanted a rivality between Sub-Zero and Scorpion. Ho-Sung Pak played Liu Kang in MK1 and 2 but only did Shang Tsung in 1 as Philip Ahn and John Turk did him in MK2 and 3 respectivley. Richard Divizio played Kano in all three MK games and Ultimate MK (though Kano was only playable in 1, 3 and Ulitmate, Baraka in II and Kabal in 3. Katalina Zamiar play both Kitana and Melina in MKII similiar to Daniel Pesina. Sal DiVita played Nightwolf, Sektor, Cyrax and Cyborg Smoke (all Cyborg characters were palette swaps like in case with the ninjas). Due to backlash from fans that missed the original Sub-Zero as well as Scorpion, Reptile, Melina and Kitana, Ultimate Mortal Komat 3 was made with adding said characters but this time they played John Turk (Scorpion, Reptile and original Sub-Zero as well as new characters Smoke and Noob Saibot, both being hidden characters you could fight in MKII, and a new ninja character named Ermac after fan speculation in MKII after a hidden message that mentioned Ermac) and Becky Gable (Kitana, Melina and Jade, like Smoke and Noob Saibot also were non-playable but fightable in MKII).

I actually play games mostly for the story. When I was in a dungeon in Illusion of Gaia, my goal was to finish it so I could get back to the story. We're all different, and there are multiple ways to enjoy the same thing. 😊

Illusion of Time was an earlier SNES title which I think explains some of the rougher edges of it. The inofficial sequel Terranigma was much more polished.

Can somebody please explain why Soul Blazer uses the exact same HUD as Actraiser?

Soul Blazer was amazing. It was my childhood. That and chrono trigger

Lol all the intro being illusion of Gaia.

Back in my days of being a video game RPG nerd, I don't remember even the most devoted fans of the genre mentioning Illusion of Gaia, so I personally don't see how it was "overhyped". I actually got recommendations for Seiken Densetsu 3, Tales of Phantasia, Star Ocean and even Tactics Ogre from them, but Illusion of Gaia was one of those games that I ended up discovering and playing by myself. Also, back then, I remember that I was also very impressed - at first - by Bahamut Lagoon, mostly by its visuals than anything. Unfortunately, I never finished it, but when it comes to Strategic RPGs on the SNES my bet is on Front Mission - another one that hadn't left Japan at that time (but eventually got a Western release years later).

Run Saber was a lot of fun, spent so many hours on this as a kid