The first two Lunar games have always excelled at simplicity. Regardless of which of the many versions you’ve played, they tell straightforward stories well, full of characters with wit and optimism that refuse to bow to darkness, and have relatively simple graphical styles and gameplay loops to boot. Regardless of popular game trends at the time, Lunar fiercely maintains what it is. That might not always work for people, but the fact that we’re now on at least the fifth and third major version of these two games means there’s still an appetite for the particular brand of hope Lunar brings.
It doesn’t surprise me that GungHo stayed true to that spirit of simplicity for the Lunar Remastered Collection. There are some minor adjustments and quality-of-life improvements here and there, mostly for the better, but particularly if you’ve played the original PS1 versions of Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete and Lunar 2: Eternal Blue Complete that this remaster builds on, it’s easy to feel at home.
If you’re like me, that’s a good thing, because I need the purity of the storytelling in Lunar, especially nowadays. If you haven’t played these games before, think Saturday Morning Cartoon meets early 90s anime. Lunar Silver Star Story follows Alex and his childhood friend Luna as they embark on a journey for Alex to become a famed Dragonmaster, just like his hero Dyne. In Lunar 2 Eternal Blue you play as Hiro who meets a mysterious girl named Lucia who claims to be from the “Blue Star,” and you quickly go on the run as the church accuses her of being the “Destroyer” sent to end the world.
You really don’t need more than that to get the flavor, and neither story, even the slightly more mature Eternal Blue, are meant to be complicated. They’re full of every trope under the sun: multiple anime betrayals, dragons, sweeping romances, and characters earnestly shouting about hope and togetherness against the forces of evil in the final hours.
That’s not going to work for everyone, I’m sure. But you’re reading RPGFan, a site that originated as a Lunar fan site over 25 years ago, which means you probably like those things and know it usually works if they get one aspect right: the characters. And the cast of Lunar absolutely soars. Whether it’s the witty banter between Kyle and Jessica (my favorite), Nall’s quips, Ronfar’s feigned indifference, or Lucia’s earnestness as she comes to grips with humanity, these casts are beautifully balanced. They work better together, which sells the themes of togetherness and makes the games instantly fun to play.
But, if you’ve played Lunar, you probably already knew that, and you also know that Working Designs’ localizations are a big part of these character dynamics, even down to the delightful NPC asides. Those scripts are also controversial for littering in pop culture references, sophomoric humor, and generally “going off script” from the original Japanese. Regardless of your feelings, they were hugely influential in moving localization forward, and the releases without Working Designs suffer mightily in my eyes.
I’ve always been a fan of the Working Designs scripts, outside of a few unsavory missteps. So, I’m delighted that the remasters are working from those same PS1 scripts. Much of the dialogue is either identical or virtually identical, and many of the jokes, even the immature ones, are still here. But it’s still tidier; they changed a lot of the offensive material, and the ’90s references are also gone. It’s exactly what I wanted—maintaining the spirit and tone while getting rid of some of the specific weirdness of PS1 scripts.
While I’m happy the dialogue itself is mostly the same, I am a bit sad to say goodbye to the old voice acting. Don’t get me wrong—I know the voices in the originals are often cheesy and over the top, but that was part of the charm. John Truitt knew how to chew all the way through a scene with his delightful cackling, and Ty Webb’s overly formal Leo is perfect for that character’s complete lack of self-awareness. The voices here are a little more naturalistic but also a bit flat. I can’t point to a single stand-out, but I honestly can’t point to “bad” ones, either. Maybe I’m just listening through my nostalgia earbuds here (if that’s a thing), but this is the one place that feels like a slight step back for me even if it’s more consistent. At least all of the PS1 music is intact, and Luna’s voice actor does a great job singing the famous “boat song.”
The visual presentation, though, is almost entirely in line with the originals, regardless of whether you play the “Classic” version, which maintains the resolution of the PS1 originals, or the Remastered version, which cleans up the graphics and moves it to widescreen. The animated cutscenes are exactly the same, just much more clear and detailed. You can choose which mode to play in from the main menu, and if you change your mind, your save file works in both versions. Frankly, it’s fascinating that the Classic mode is even here when it’s not present in other games that change the graphics much more substantially; unless you’re the most diehard of purists for an original look (of a game that’s a remake to begin with) then I think the “Remaster” can satisfy anyone who likes the originals’ look.
All the adjustments I’ve talked about cover both games, but gameplay is where things get weirdly lopsided. You still traverse dungeons with monsters on the field that you can (try to) avoid. Combat is mostly classic turn-based stuff, with the twist of enemies and party members moving around the field causing positioning to be important for how some attacks hit.
The only addition to both games is the ability to speed up combat up to 3x, which is an absolute game changer. Maybe I just didn’t notice before, but it turns out combat is pretty darn slow in these games, and you fight a lot. I shaved at least five hours off of my playtime in each game as a result, and it makes the pacing feel much quicker and the dungeons much less annoying, even the puzzles in Lunar: Silver Star Story.
Oddly, though, all the other gameplay adjustments are to Silver Star Story. First of all, the difficulty adjustments that Working Designs made (read: they made it way harder) aren’t here, so the slime on the boat won’t be as much of a roadblock. You can now set each party member’s AI individually, so no one is going to fire off that precious Silver Light unless they have permission. The biggest update is the ability to swap to a “shared” inventory instead of each party member having their own. This makes inventory management significantly easier. Greater inventory ease, coupled with the additional silver (from revised treasure chest values) you’ll roll with this time, makes stocking up on recovery items possible and removes some of the challenge. That’s not to say some boss fights didn’t still give me some trouble, but if you choose, you can make this game much simpler.
But all of that makes the adjustments they didn’t make to Eternal Blue slightly confounding. It makes sense; Silver Star Story needed a little more love. Playing them back to back makes things like the less robust AI features for autobattle or the fact that you can’t compare stats on equipment at the shop a bit more confounding than they need to be. It’s not that big of a deal, but I would love to see Eternal Blue get a few mild updates in patches.
Maybe the most important thing a developer can do when remastering a game is choosing not to fix what isn’t broken. For the most part, that’s exactly what GungHo did here; they kept the remaster simple, but not because this is a cheap port. Adding a bunch of fancy bells and whistles would diminish the purity of these games. Simple is the point. And if simple is what you need right now, then spin up the Lunar Remastered Collection. You’ll be in for a good time.
