Legrand Legacy Review: A Love Letter to JRPGs Past

<p>When <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> went on Kickstarter&comma; it somehow flew over my radar&period; After getting a look at it on Steam&comma; however&comma; I realized that it had the potential to be something I have been waiting for&comma; which has been sorely lacking from my Steam library&period; <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is a game that pays homage to the history of JRPG’s that aims to take the turn-based action and turn it on its head with modern ideas and conventions&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Not only does <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> utilize the turn-based combat elements of old school JRPG’s&comma; it also uses tactical warfare elements found in games like <em>Suikoden<&sol;em> to showcase large-scale battles&period; At times it will be your party fighting alone&comma; and other times it will be your allies leading larger battles against other armies&period; The first thing I noticed when I began playing <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; was the cinematic nature of the game&period; With rich graphics and FMV sequences&comma; one might question the indie nature of <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&period; It looks and feels like an AAA JRPG one might see from Square or another AAA developer from the JRPG golden age&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;133342" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-133342" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-133342" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;01&sol;19224949&sol;LL-6-Tactical-War-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-133342" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Legrand Legacy&comma; Another Indie<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Legrand Legacy’s environments are hand-drawn&comma; but they look fully rendered&period; That&comma; combined with the design of the characters gives the game a very rich look and feel&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; you begin as Finn&comma; an amnesiac slave captured and forced to fight in a gladiator style match&period; After mysterious events lead Finn to manifest powers that decimate his competition&comma; it leads Finn on a journey that will ultimately determine the fate of the world of Legrand&period; Finn will find himself meeting many people over the course of his journey&comma; and you will be able to undergo both important storyline quests&comma; and side-quests that will provide many rewards&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The combat in <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is deceptively complex&period; It seems simple enough at first&comma; with turn-based action that requires you to use the ACT system&comma; to time your button presses at the right time to execute powerful attacks&period; This system is similar to <em>Shadow Hearts<&sol;em>&comma; in that you have a circular spinning wheel that has 3 different fields to it&semi; A normal field&comma; a good field&comma; and then a smaller &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;perfect” field&period; If you execute attacks &lpar;or defense&rpar; in the perfect field&comma; it will be a stronger attack or guard&comma; while the good field results in standard attack&sol;guarding and normal field attacks&sol;guards are less effective&comma; and result in lowered critical or evasion chances&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;133343" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-133343" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-133343" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;01&sol;19225032&sol;LL-4-Epic-Boss-Arkwora-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-133343" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Legrand Legacy&comma; Another Indie<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>As in most JRPGs&comma; party members can be placed in the front or the back row&period; Putting stronger allies with a higher defense in the front row allows them to protect the back row from everything beyond ranged attacks or magic&period; Melee fighters cannot attack in the back but have a higher attack in the front row&period; This encourages you to be careful how you manage your party and approach battle&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>An improvement over the RPGs of Yore is that in <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; you can save at any time as long as there are no enemies around&period; This allows you to do the tried and true &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;save early and often” method&comma; in case you get in over your head&period; It also helps if you are going to be facing environmental traps you’ve never dealt with before&comma; or if you forgot to equip items for battle prior to entering a new area&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>If an enemy approaches you from behind in the field&comma; you are unable to act on the first turn of battle&comma; letting them get free hits on you&period; Luckily&comma; you are extended the same capability if you hit an enemy from behind&comma; so try to be careful when you approach enemies out in the field&period; Enemies also have a variety of &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;types” and attack capabilities based on Legrand Legacy’s version of the weapon trinity of Impact&comma; Slash&comma; and Pierce found in games like the <em>Persona<&sol;em> Series&period; The Elemental composition also matters&comma; a concept taken from many RPG franchises over the years&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Strangely&comma; all these different moving parts and tactical options work very well together and provide an interesting combat experience that feels like a mixture of <em>Persona&comma; Shadow Hearts<&sol;em>&comma; and <em>Final Fantasy<&sol;em> in the best way possible&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is by no means easy&comma; but it is a difficulty that encourages practice and isn’t unfair&period; It harkens back to the days of RPGs where if you were having trouble&comma; it meant you needed to level up and grow stronger&comma; not adjust a difficulty setting&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;133344" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-133344" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-133344" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;01&sol;19225123&sol;LL-3-Action-Circle-Tempo-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-133344" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Legrand Legacy&comma; Another Indie<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The progression system of <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is easy enough to understand&comma; as you level up you accrue AP which you then put into one of five stats&comma; each character utilizes different stats for their abilities&comma; and slowly gains new abilities&sol;spells over time&period; The other half of the progression system involves gaining crafting materials and using them to create items through alchemy&comma; or gear to enhance your characters’ capabilities&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Part of the difficulty curve of <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is making sure you grind out items to enhance your gear&period; Without proper gear&comma; your stats will not be high enough to progress&period; This can be frustrating&comma; as it means you have to spend a lot of time grinding&comma; however&comma; once you get used to it&comma; it isn’t all that bad&period; Sadly though&comma; with the constant Quick-Time-Event element of the combat&comma; grinding isn’t a quick affair&comma; and neither is combat as a whole&period; Boss monsters FEEL like colossal titans that you must overcome&comma; but from time to time the combat does begin to feel like a chore&period; The writing for Legrand Legacy&&num;8217&semi;s dialogue also feels a little odd at times&comma; but most of the time you won&&num;8217&semi;t notice it too much&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Another problem that I’ve found lies in the fact that at times if you don’t have more than 2 hours to sit down with <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; you won’t get very far&period; <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> isn’t a game you can breeze through&comma; just to digest the story and enjoy it&period; With that being said there is a lot to love in <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; and fans of old-school RPG titles will most likely feel right at home&period; It is also a game with a lot of moving parts&comma; a lot of quests&comma; side quests&comma; and content that will keep you occupied for hours and hours of gameplay&period; Things like tactical war battles&comma; rebuilding Dumville Castle&comma; and a ton of other things make <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> a massive RPG experience that shouldn’t be missed&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>If you are a fan of RPGs that challenge you and force you to take your time and grow familiar with its mechanics&comma; then <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em> is for you&period; The world that the developers at Semisoft have created is interesting&comma; dark&comma; but beautiful all at the same time&period; This is a game that shows the power of Kickstarter&comma; bringing fantastic experiences to PC and hopefully other platforms&period; Don’t sleep on <em>Legrand Legacy<&sol;em>&comma; despite its problems &lpar;namely the QTE’s&rpar; it is a game I am glad to lose hours in&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong>A Steam Review Key for Legrand Legacy was provided by Another Indie for the Purpose of this Review&period;<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;