Lunar: Remastered Collection Review: Showing its age

Today, RPGs are a staple of modern video games. It’s relatively common for RPG elements to pop up in almost any other game these days. Leveling up, increasing stats, going on quests, and side missions- these are all features popularized by some of the earliest RPGs. What an RPG can be has evolved over the years, and many have been remade and reimagined to fit with more modern trends.

Lunar: Remastered Collection re-introduces two classic pixel-art RPGs. Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete and Lunar 2: Eternal Blue Complete from the late 90s. The original games were developed by GAME ARTS, but this collection is being handled by ASHIBI and Gungho Online Entertainment, in collaboration with the original developers. The remaster improves the visual quality of both the pixel art characters and landscapes, as well as the hand-drawn animated cutscenes with full voice acting. The remaster also introduces some modern mechanics to improve the overall experience. If these RPGs were a favorite of yours all those years ago, this is far and away the ultimate way to play them now.

This new remastered collection has several notable improvements from the originals, however, it has also chosen to remain extremely faithful to the story and characters of the original games. Of course, this collection is not going to the same lengths as, say, Final Fantasy VII Remake when it comes to remaking an old classic. But maybe it should have. While Lunar: Remastered Collection’s retro visuals give it some charm, it feels too stuck in the past to stand out today.

What Is Lunar?

If you are like me, you may have been only six or seven when the first Lunar game arrived in Japan. It didn’t take too long to reach North America, but despite a generally warm critical reception at the time, this RPG franchise did not manage to establish itself as a household RPG franchise that people recognize.

For those who may be hearing about these games for the first time, Lunar: Silver Star Story and its sequel, Lunar 2: Eternal Blue, have very similar visuals and mechanics. When the player is in control, you are moving a small, pixel sprite character around an isometric pixel art landscape. Towns and cities are somewhat detailed and complex, but traveling between specific locations zooms out to show the party traveling across a much larger landscape.

The gameplay is divided between exploring the world and its cities, talking to NPCs, and exploring dungeons. Each dungeon may not always be exactly a dungeon. Sometimes, it can be a cave, a sewer, or even a fantastical palace ruin. But generally, these operate the same way despite their aesthetic differences. Monsters appear in the overworld and approach the player if they get too close, which results in turn-based tactical combat.

The visuals really stand out in the occasional hand-drawn cut scene. These scenes are fully voiced and sometimes even feature original songs. They often felt reminiscent of and on par quality with animated movies and TV shows from the late 90s. Even by today’s standards, a pixel-art RPG is not the most uncommon style of video game, but these animated scenes make Lunar stand out. Even though I have not played the original games, the remaster appears to have given special attention to upgrading these scenes.

A Dated Narrative

The Lunar: Remastered Collection is a victim of its own faithfulness. By keeping the same story, characters, and quippy dialogue from the original games, Lunar falls into what now feels like classic RPG tropes and cliches. I can imagine that at the time, these tropes and cliches may not have been as established, but it’s been well over two decades now. RPGs have grown and evolved, while these two games have changed only visually since their original release.

The story from the first game, Lunar: Silver Star Story, in particular, left me wanting more. The characters felt uninspired and stereotypical. Within the first hour, I was already tired of their dynamics, repetitive jokes, and insistence on breaking immersion in favor of sticking to character stereotypes.

For example, in one of the first adventures, the stoic wannabe hero Alex, his adopted sister (who’s also weirdly in love with him), Luna, the inexplicable talking animal companion Nall, and Alex’s money-loving friend Ramus venture into an ice cave to find a treasure from a dragon. Throughout the cave, the party encounters dozens of monsters. All three of the humans play essential roles in each fight. Ramus doesn’t have special moves like the others, but at many points, he does more damage with his basic attack than even Alex does. After returning to the village, Nall berates Ramus for “thinking more about snacks than actually helping fight monsters,” which rang absolutely hollow to me. It felt more like the writers were forcing a joke about a stereotypical character rather than actually thinking about the gameplay experience.

While not overly offensive or unenjoyable, the story did not capture me. With an RPG like this, especially in a modern gaming landscape, it’s tough to ask players to sit down for over two dozen hours for a story that won’t hook them. While the retro visuals and hand-drawn cutscenes are great, the narrative brings down the whole experience.

Lunar 2: Eternal Blue fares slightly better, story-wise and character-wise. The story at least starts off feeling less cliche, but it still does not feel fresh or modern. Overall, both games have a narrative that gets the job done. If you’re willing to brush past the dated dialogue, tropes, and cliches, this story will carry you through. But it won’t work for everyone. There is one element of these games that could turn the ship around, and that’s, of course, the gameplay.

Dungeon Crawling

Both Lunar games have similar gameplay loops. Explore a new area, venture into a “dungeon,” fight monsters, reach the end of the dungeon, and fight a boss monster. This could be anything from chasing down a jewel thief in the sewers to mastering a trial for entry into a magical floating city.

Turn-based tactical battles take place on a small rectangular grid. Outside of battle, you can choose a formation for your party, determining where each character stands at the beginning of combat. However, there are no tactics in deciding where each character moves during the fight. Movement is included in your choice of attack rather than something you need to input separately. Most characters have a basic attack along with a selection of special moves or magic.

The game does not bother with many tutorials, instead relying on the player to figure things out for themselves. In some ways, this is great. The early hours of gameplay are not bogged down by constant reading. But on the other hand, coming up against a particularly challenging boss battle with minimal understanding of the battle mechanics can accidentally increase the difficulty.

Not unlike many RPGs, battles can get repetitive quickly. This is aided by the option of automatic battles. Simply press a button, and the game will play out the combat for you. This remastered collection also introduces the option to adjust the speed of combat, helping those repetitive encounters pass you by all the more quickly. While this is a nice, self-aware inclusion, it’s not exactly a great sign of how engaging combat is when the game allows you to speed things up and let the game play it out for you.

Again, this is another element of these remasters that is fine. While not anything special, the tactical combat is serviceable. As you progress, characters learn more interesting moves, and more characters join the party. If you don’t mind relatively repetitive combat, or maybe you actually enjoy the sound of an RPG that can often be a mindless grind, then this is the game for you. Up the combat speed, select automatic battle each turn, and coast through the dungeons. While it’s not for me, I won’t judge anyone for finding joy in that.

Final Thoughts

Lunar: Remastered Collection is fine. It’s a faithful remaster, and it accomplishes that well. It’s not trying to do anything revolutionary, and that might be what holds it back. This is the ultimate way to play these classic RPGs now, but I have a hard time imagining anyone choosing to jump into the world of Lunar if they don’t have pre-existing nostalgia for the series.

These games are certainly not bad, they just aren’t great. This makes it a tough sell with how many great RPGs there have been. Even in just the last few years, you have games like Baldur’s Gate 3, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, and Metaphor: ReFantazio. But if you are looking for something more retro, with a pixel-art style, there’s also Sea of Stars, Octopath Traveler, and Triangle Strategy. While these are all different games, they have been created with more of a modern RPG audience in mind, which can’t be said to the same extent as these remastered games.

Ultimately, this is a fine RPG. Its artwork, especially the visual upgrades in this remastered collection, is what makes these games stand out from the crowd. The story and the gameplay can hold it together enough to make this an enjoyable experience, but I don’t get the feeling that this will be enough for this game to find a new audience. Lunar: Remastered Collection seems fine with reliving the glory days of the past, and for now, that’s where the fondest memories of this series will remain.