Overview
Bandai produced this Saint Seiya RPG to cash in on a recent movie adaptation of the TV anime and manga. The manga concerns five brave souls, called "Saints", who fight for the Greek goddess Athena against the other gods of the Greek pantheon. In order to do so, they each wear sacred armor that contain signs of the zodiac. The show was popular in its native Japan and in a few other countries such as France, but would not see an English translation for some time.
Gameplay
To tie-in with the astrological theme, the game will ask for the player's date of birth. Depending on which sign they have, they will be assigned a different initial stat layout. It's a concept that would later be seen in Final Fantasy Tactics.
Regular gameplay plays out like a brawler: Seiya walks along and fights enemies with his punch attacks; defeating the enemy grants Seiya some amount of experience points. When faced with an important story character or boss, the game switches to a turn-based RPG mode where the player must strategically plan out their course of attack, as well as maintain their defenses. Seiyu and his opponent take turns trading blows until one of them falls.
Experience points, unlike in most JRPGs, must be spent in various attributes to have any effect, with larger stats needing more experience points to increase further. This is opposed to the usual system of simply hitting a pre-determined total to level up, increasing all the character's stats instantaneously.
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