Early in the Sega Saturn’s life it looked like the system would be THE place for RPGs. Sony had a negative stance on the genre, and Nintendo went with the extremely limiting cartridge format. Meanwhile Gamearts and other smaller similar studios were big supporters of the Saturn. Even Sega themselves were developing numerous role playing games themselves including Sakura Taisen, Shining Force, and more. One of these early releases in Japan was an action RPG based off of the Magic Knight Rayearth franchise. Publisher Working Designs quickly bought up the North American rights to the game. In typical fashion they delayed the release for several years. One of the first RPGs on the console in Japan soon turned into the final game released console in the North America. Though it received mixed reviews I enjoyed this off-beat adventure.
The game begins with three Japanese students from different schools and a chance encounter on a field trip to Tokyo Tower. With a flash of light the girls; Hikari, Umi, and Fuu are transported to a fantasy realm where magic reigns and monsters run rampant. These three have been brought to this world in order to become the fabled ‘magic knights.’ They are tasked with saving this world, known as Cephiro, from an oppressive ruler named Zagat. The girls must first gain their powers, and fight their way through an army of henchmen. In the end they must face off against the evil king himself. There are a few twists and turns (with one major plot revelation I never saw coming). In typical Working Designs tradition the dialogue is often hilarious and quite charming.
Magic Knight Rayearth is a 2D action RPG wherein you guide the three girls through a series of town areas and dungeons while fighting off an army of monstrous foes. In typical fashion you’ll solve light puzzles and collect treasures along the way. The camera displays the action from an overhead view like in the Zelda games and there are virtually no 3D elements here. Magic Knight Rayearth felt retro even in the time it was released because most developers had moved on to the third dimension. It’s familiarity and simplicity is one of the game’s strengths.
Combat occurs completely in real-time. You control only one of the three characters at once and the other two simply follow you around. The inactive party members do not participate in battle, and are also invulnerable to enemy attacks. Most of your time spent in this game is focused around battling enemies in dungeons. For the most part the battle engine is smooth. You’ll find no major clipping issues and even the hit detection is fairly competent. The major unique gameplay feature here is the ability to switch between the characters at will. Each have a different weapon (the attack patterns vary quite a bit) as well as their own unique magical spells.
Unfortunately this is where the game is unbalanced. Hikari and Umi both use melee weapons. Fuu is the outlier. Her bow and arrow allows you to more safely dispatch foes from a distance. Because of this I found myself using this character significantly more than the others. This held true from start to finish, and it was extremely rare that I would even bother switching between them. To make matters worse Fuu is the only one in your convoy that can use the infinitely useful healing magic. Hikari and Umi aren’t nearly as useful as she is. The developers should have spent some extra time fixing the balancing issues.
The major difference between this game and most pure action RPGs is that you don’t gain experience points from battle. Furthermore each of the three characters have the same defensive and offensive power throughout the adventure. New enemies simply require more hits before they perish. You can still upgrade your characters, but this is done by finding jewels. You can use these to add another notch to either your life or magic bars, but that’s it. What is cool is the fact that you can choose the character in which to use them on. Unfortunately, as I mentioned earlier, the game is extremely unbalanced. Choosing anyone other than Fuu for these upgrades is a waste. These jewels are often well hidden and reward players for exploring off the beaten path.
The dungeon designs here are a step above those in your common action RPG game. These are handled like mazes with the first few being straightforward to help ease you into the mechanics. Later areas can be downright confusing at times. You will have to backtrack a fair amount as new paths open, but it isn’t overbearing and the game handles it well. Many of the later dungeons feature light puzzles, but this is never too overwhelming. To be honest I found navigating the labyrinths generally more difficult than combat. Magic Knight Rayearth isn’t the hardest game around, but I did find myself struggling against certain bosses. I lost my progress fairly regularly. Having three characters makes things easier because it’s almost like having three lives, but Magic Knight Rayearth is balanced around this very feature.
The Sega Saturn excelled at two dimensional games, but this was an early release in Japan and it didn’t fare quite as well as most others. The characters each feature anime portraits during dialogue that are drawn very well and are true to the anime series which is nice. They look a little pixelated, but still nice overall. In-game the character models are adequate and are distinct from one another. They also animate well and even their hair sways as you walk. The enemies also look really nice with a lot of sprite detail.
The game is extremely colorful with vibrant backgrounds and characters, and in a time when most developers were trying to make things dark and edgy this is really cool. I do have a few problems here though. The boss characters are rendered in a rather unpleasant CG style. It might have been impressive back in the day, but now it just looks cheesy. In addition the game is full of FMV taken straight from the anime series, but it’s extremely grainy here and looks bad. Despite this Magic Knight Rayearth is quite easy on the eyes.
To be honest I’m not the biggest fan of this game’s soundtrack. Many tracks feature decent instrumentation and melody, but they lack a little something to make it memorable. The basic dungeon theme is extremely cheesy, and the others that simply don’t get as much playtime are a lot better. What’s interesting is the fact that Working Designs brought over the Japanese opening theme, but they changed the lyrics and featured a different singer. This is easily my favorite song in the game, and they did an incredible job with it.
In addition they hired new voice actors and completely re-did the dialogue in the FMV sequences that were taken straight from the television show. They surely went the extra mile, and this is one of the reasons I really miss this publisher. The sound effects are very well done and sound quite authentic. Although the soundtrack is lacking the audio is pretty decent overall, and I rather liked the voice acting.
Magic Knight Rayearth has some issues. The unbalanced characters is the biggest of the bunch, but in the end it’s not enough to completely ruin this game. The dungeons are fun to explore, and combat is smooth as butter. The story isn’t going to win any awards; that’s for sure, but it’s fun and more than enough to carry the action along. As usual Working Designs went the extra mile with this release with their translation, but they also printed three different disc covers which is really cool. It’s almost worth owning this game simply because it was the last Saturn title released.
