Well, that old Sega CD RPG that was really cool, then was re-released onto Playstation; now there’s one on Game Boy Advance. However, this new title carries remarkable resemblance to Lunar: Silver Star Story for Play Station. It carries similar graphics with it, as well as, interestingly enough, very similar locations.

Lunar still keeps that great story telling ability, and it is definitely one of the best story-telling RPG’s on the Game Boy Advance. Snapshots of characters’ faces portray the great amount emotions behind the characters. It’s great to see an RPG that shows the characters’ expressions instead of just a plain old box, for once you can actually tell how something is meant to be said. As well as that, all characters come fully equipped with their own personalities, which (when they clash) spurs some excellent and often humorous dialogue. Interactions continue on with NPCs, one example is a mage on Black Rose Street that pesters and insults Alex’s capabilities throughout the game. Even more features that influence the storyline of Lunar Legend are the animations of the characters, watch them, and you’ll see what I mean.

The music is good, well composed but somewhat gargled due to the Game Boy’s sound capabilities and translation. Graphics represent the same art style as they did on PS, but now the character sprites are much nicer-looking and world map travel is less tedious. They look fantastic on the Game Boy Advance–an excellent translation.

A different battle system

A trading card system has been added as well. You get cards of monsters, bosses, and characters. These cards can be bought, traded for, given, or gained after a battle. It gives you an extra thing to look for, which can be good if the RPG is an enjoyable experience, or bad if the thing sucks and you don’t want it drain all your time away into doing pointless sidequests.

What about the story? It’s based on the Silver Star Story from PS- much like many other points in this game, but I’ll go over it anyways. Well, it starts out as a young hero (Your character, Alex) wishing for more from life, and hoping to have an adventure like the Dragonmast Dyne from the past. Ok, seen this before, its a kid that want to explore- “you’ve got have an adventure”. Then it develops more, an Evil Magic Emperor controls the notorious Vile Tribe and is attempting to take over the world. With no Dragonmaster to defend the land, they will surely win. Luckily Alex is attempting to become a Dragonmaster, like his hero Dyne. All the while you travel with your childhood Girlfriend, Luna. Yet a twist lies ahead. The Evil Emperor kidnaps Luna (as well as many other songstresses of the world) for some unknown reason. Now the plot develops from “you’ve got to have an adventure” into “you’ve got save the world” and “you’ve got to save your girl friend” major bummer. Alex goes into a wild adventure trying to pass the trials of the great Dragons in order to become a Dragonmaster strong enough to stand up against the Evil Emperor. Pretty up beat huh?