Terranigma is a unique action RPG that weaves a profound tale of creation and rebirth. As Ark, you'll guide the resurrection of the world, solving puzzles, battling through dungeons, and shaping the development of towns and their inhabitants. While the combat can be somewhat simplistic, the game's strength lies in its moving narrative, memorable characters, and the satisfying feeling of bringing life back to a barren world. With its thought-provoking themes and classic SNES charm, Terranigma stands as a hidden gem of the era.

The back third is a complete slog. As soon as you revive humans you better get ready for vague objectives and fetch quests galore. Kinda reminds me of Breath of Fire's end-run, but even worse. It's super ambitious for an SNES title I'll give it that, maybe with only Chrono Trigger or FFVI in competition for what it was trying to achieve.

I get that they were trying to make this almost world-building simulation take place within the confines of a JRPG, but figuring out what to do is always a problem at this point. The western portmanteau for the title, Terranigma (Earth/Riddle), is definitely more apt than the Japanese, Tenchi Souzou (the creation of heaven and earth). But it's less Zelda puzzles and more what do I need to do to progress? Lots and lots of that.

First third is amazing and now I realize why I always lost interest somewhere after that.

If we're being real this is the culmination of ActRaiser, Soul Blazer, and Ilusion of Gaia as it has traces of all of those games directly in its story and design.

I might want to do a more in-depth review later but I'm just glad I finally beat it now. I liked the ending quite a bit, but getting there was pretty rough. This went from a 4.5 to a 3.5 game for me sadly. Mainly due to the vagueness of the story and the translation.

One more bucket list title completed.

Been dealing with some health problems lately so I'm too sick to work on my own projects but instead have a lot of time for bucket list games. Can't complain (too much).

Terranigma is one of the several "good vibes" SNES games. Others include Chrono Trigger, Soul Blazer, Secret of Evermore, EVO... probably more. But they're the best type of nostalgia imo. Only a few other PS1 games come close to that feel. Can't really describe what that feel actually is, but if you know you know I'd say.

I've tried beating Terranigma twice, but I lost interest about halfway once and the other I think I got stuck on Bloody Mary (that's the boss that everyone complains about so I think that was probably it).

This game is beautiful though. Graphics and music is absolute top notch for the system. Might even be my favorite at times. I don't mind being sick so much if I have Ark as company.

Quintet's search for elegant and varied battling culminated with Terranigma, the final (and by far the best) part of their trilogy that struck the right balance of brawler, RPG and adventure ingredients. Moreover, it consolidated and polished ideas they established in the past: The platforming of ActRaiser, Soul Blazer's multifunctional equips, the Zelda influence and special attacks of Illusion of Gaia, and the premise of 'world restoration' (that connects these 3 games together) are expanded dramatically and set to slick production. But theirs is - above all, an action-RPG that's repetitive without feeling monotonous. New and versatile options (jump attacks, rapid strikes) complement the better ideas of IoG (KOF-style running, dash attacks with i-frames), and the result is an ever-fresh moveset whose execution seems closer to fighting games than to contemporaries (Seiken Densetsu 3, Secret of Evermore, etc.). Equally fortified - if not as complex, are its dungeons, where stronger elements of LoZ fuse with Metroid elements (unlockable auto-equipped skills, hard-to-reach treasure), while retaining their gift for original designs, scenarios and aesthetics. They also mark a return to form for their RPG side (EXP & item-based upgrades in place of its predecessor's collect-a-thon-esque approach), and - for once, their bosses are fun to challenge, although one wonders if that's more so due to their designs or combat's merits.

It's not only gameplay that excels: Early-game dungeons are followed closely by vibrant, warped, almost psychedelic cutscenes played in slow-motion, that achieve disorienting effects via creative use of Mode 7. When the trip subsides, these scenes begin to depict more traditional but no less poignant stories whose ecological, historical and humanitarian themes reveal the true soul of the Gaia series. Whereas Soul Blazer was more preoccupied with gameplay, and IoG with personal subplots, here their storycrafting skills advanced to a whole new level of maturity. More than a meticulous update, this is one of those rare SNES games that are as much a visual treat as a functional & narrative one.

Terranigma é um espetáculo.

Contendo visuais e animações muito impressionantes, um sistema de combate polido, não é a toa é um dos jogos que mais se aproveita de todo o potencial que pode do Super Nintendo para trazer um mundo vivo, rico e em constante crescimento.

E de fato, é em acompanhar o crescimento do mundo que o jogo mais brilha. Jogar terranigma é uma jornada em quatro capítulos de pouco a pouco criar, expandir, e descobrir todo um novo mundo, inspirado no nosso próprio, e através das interações com personagens, sidequests e com a progressão da história ver como as ações de indivíduos podem mudar o rumo da humanidade e da civilização.

Porém, o jogo ainda apresenta alguns problemas, e outras coisas que me deixaram com um amargor na boca durante a experiência. É bem notável que várias decisões da história foram tomadas aos tropeços, e por causa disso vários momentos acabam não sendo satisfatórios e muitos personagens tem um desfecho incerto. O jogo também não é muito denso, com uma variedade muito pequena de dungeons que são bem lineares, chefes e inimigos repetitivos e sem graça, o que constantemente causa a sensação de um potencial muito maior que ele poderia ter, lugares que seriam interessantíssimos de se explorar, mas que nunca foram finalizados ou expandidos.

Apesar disso, ele se sustenta como um clássico de sua época e do super nintendo, e um jogo muito agradável para fãs de action-rpg desta era, junto de Soul Blazer e Illusion of Gaia.

Does a really evocative, mythically simple treatment of the acts of creation and discovery in the first chapter, reminding of something like Leaf by Niggle or Journey. That atmosphere fades the more defined the game's world becomes and is gone by the second half, when it assumes a pretty typical tone and style for the medium. The dungeon sequences are completely uniform and without challenge or interest throughout, but my personal limit was the racially-charged Alexander Graham Bell cuck dialogue.

I want to preface this review by saying one thing.

This is one of my most favorite games of all times. So, when you read this review, keep in mind that I am absolute in love with every bit of this game.

I was only a child when I first played this game, so the initial impact was made at a time when I didn't yet understand video games in the way that I do now. I loved this game from the start. The atmosphere of the first few hours, masterfully crafted by visuals and soundtrack, completely captivated me. And they were just the beginning, as the world quite literally opens up to you after the initial challenges. And from then, the game becomes something truly special.

Having a huge burden placed on your shoulders, the stakes are high, but the path is clear. Every dungeon brings you closer to achieving your goal, and the world around you changes with every step you achieve on the way to this goal.

You also make friends. Recurring characters that accompany you for parts of your journey, eventually helping you in saving the world. But there is a lot of light and dark in the story, and sadness too. A few twists that shocked me as a child and resonate with me as an adult.

The soundtrack is beautifully done. Be it a huge forest, an icy mountain range, a zombie infested desert. The atmosphere is well captured in scenery and music.

The combat is fast and fluid, however it suffers from two tiny flaws. First, there is one attack that is just better than any other attack by a mile, because it gives the most invincibility frames and mobility. Besides personal choice, there is not really any reason to use any other attack in the entire game. This sadly also applies to the very fancy summon attacks, that are not that useful as a result. Second, if you are unprepared and just keep going through the game, you will be under leveled at some point, resulting in some grinding. This is easily mitigated by knowing to just level up once or twice per dungeon. The problem with being under leveled in this game, is that the difference between doing ok damage and doing only 1 damage is often just one or two levels. The flipside is, that if you are over leveled, you will absolutely destroy everything, including the final boss, in one or two hits.

However, this does not take away from an otherwise fantastic experience. Talking with people around the world, listening to their needs, witnessing the rise of civilization. Being responsible for good and bad resulting from it. The game does a good job of making you feel like a hero while also showing you that some of your actions have sad consequences for the world and its inhabitants.

The last arc before the final can sometimes feel a bit out of place, but I have come to enjoy it, especially with everyone pitching in to resolve the situation.

The ending scene and credits are among the best I've ever seen, and left me thinking about them for a long time.

This game is not a game that will let you go easily, if you decide to let it in.

"Ark? The Earth is screaming."

Surprisingly, not my favorite in the Quintet Trilogy. The presentation is a massive step up from the previous titles, but it's also a big fucking downside for me because it feels like I'm staring at the fucking screen waiting for the slow-ass text to scroll for like 15 seconds per animation in a single (albeit kino) cutscene. It's a shame because this game LOOKS way fucking cooler than both Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia but ends up not being nearly as satisfying to play as either of them. You'll have to probably end up grinding at some point in this game which was NEVER a problem in either of the last two due to the unique progression which was scrapped for some reason for Terranigma. The puzzles also somehow got worse in this one. Not really sure what that's about so use a guide if you need to. There were a lot of times I felt the game was fighting with itself trying to take itself seriously then immediately following it up with some bullshit that breaks up the pacing. That being said, the serious moments by themselves are amazing.

The music is great, Ark and Yomi are fucking awesome, and the combat is... par for the course albeit grindy as fuck at some parts.

Terranigma is a massively ambitious SNES JRPG that really nailed its presentation and themes for me but not really much else. I can see why a lot of people like this game, but man it really got worse and worse for me as it went on. I guess this is a game I'd say I respect more than I like. Despite shitting on the game, I can't help but recommend it.

It's whatever. I'd say the story peaks in Loire, at least that was the part that actually grabbed my attention plotwise. I thought that this was gonna end up being a "good not great" game for me but the last stretch kind of killed it for me. A fair amount of moments where the game doesn't progress until you do some seemingly unimportant sidequest which got pretty annoying during the final leg of the game. Gameplay is fine. It's not horrible it's just kind of there. I don't think any of the bosses are anything noteworthy about other than the last few bosses which I thoroughly disliked (dumbass robot/final boss). The soundtrack is great though so I'll hand it to them for that one.

Terranigma is a game that I wish I could experience again for the first time every single time I play it. It is easily one of the best games of its era on the merits of a complete package. Terranigma is by no means the most complex game on either story or gameplay fronts, but manages to execute them in a way that has not been replicated by anything before or after. The gameplay is simple but easy to learn and keeps the pace going strong. In a way it feels comparable to how fast bump combat can feel when adjusted to, especially with the inclusion of dashing attacks that keep you moving while attacking. The story is not the most convoluted of the genre but stands apart due to its theming, and, more importantly, making the limited usage of scenes count when pieced together into a greater narrative, ambiguous or not. This game is one of the few JRPGs that truly does feel like an odyssey of legend, from the mere premise of restoring the world and its inhabitants, good and bad, to how the story is paced alongside the ever-changing world and how you interact with it in your journey. It is a game that starts out calm and mildly familiar before completely pulling the rug out from underneath, and has the most effective weaponization of a homecoming I've ever seen in a video game. This one is a must-play for anyone interested in Super Famicom / Super Nintendo RPGs.

I'll be thinking about the game for a long time to come, and I can say that about very few games these days. Terranigma does a lot of things very well. The battle system is fun, the hit feedback is fantastic and the sound effects when attacking enemies are super characteristic. The music is generally a great strength, there are so many beautiful pieces in this game. I particularly liked the pacing of the game, how quickly dungeons, story sections and exploration alternate is great and it hardly ever gets boring.

The themes that the game raises are sometimes really profound and philosophical. It's about duality in all things, good and evil, light and shadow, freedom and predestination, nature and progress, but also the differences between different social systems. I particularly liked the first half of the game, which is really original and different from other JRPGs of the time: you are still alone in the world, talking to animals and creating new life. When humanity begins, the narrative takes a more traditional trajectory, but that's not a bad thing either.

As good as the pacing is, the second half unfortunately also has lengths and somewhat crude narrative reasons why Ark has to do this or that ("You have to go to China because a trader is buying up all the metal there and I can't build my plane that way" or "The plot is is reaching its climax, the big final battle is imminent, please collect 5 McGuffins that are scattered wildly around the world before we continue"^^).

And there are also elements in the dungeons that deserve criticism. It happened twice that I got stuck there and the solution to the puzzle was that I should have found an item hidden somewhere in the dungeon (dog whistle and later dragon lance). I had to backtrack half the dungeon to do this, which was annoying and I would have killed for a map.

The usability of the menu navigation is also horrific. To place an item in the quick use slot, the following dialogue appears: "Select item? - Yes, No", With a click on "No", it then goes into the quick slot, lol^^ I only realized that after 5 hours or so. But the inventory is beautifully designed, especially the magic chest looks great, even though magic is mostly unnecessary in the game. The difficulty level was almost always appropriate, but sometimes fluctuates extremely (Bloody Mary WTF), for the final boss I had to grind for 14 minutes because I did exactly 1 damage per attack at level 29, but hey, 14 minutes is close to nothing, so it's totally ok.

Overall, just for the melancholic mood, especially in the first half and the very serious themes in general, it's worth a look and is actually fun all the time (except the stealth dungeon, what was that for :D). The ending is absolutely amazing, I'll remember it for a long time.

Closing out the Quintet trilogy of action/adventure games on the Super Famicom that I started last year, I finished Terranigma just at the start of the new year~. Now, unlike Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia (two games I really loved), Terranigma is a game I knew almost nothing about but have heard great things about for years and years. As long as I can remember, this has been held up as one of the best games on the Super Famicom, as well as one of the best games that never made it to North America. Finally getting a good excuse to play this game in particular was one of the biggest reasons I started playing through the Quintet trilogy in the first place, really. Regardless of any other feelings I may've had on this game, it was very interesting to finally get a taste of the game that people have been praising for all these years. It took me about 17.5 hours to beat the Japanese version of the game on emulated hardware without abusing save states.

Terranigma, or as it's known in Japanese, "Tenchi Souzou" (lit. Creation of Heaven), is the story of Ark. A young man living in the secluded forest village of Crystalholm, his whole life changes one day when he breaks down a forbidden door and finds Pandora's Box (and its resident scrimblo, Yomi) inside it. This sets off a chain of events that sees the elder of Crystalholm sending him on a grand adventure through the underworld. First, a mission to restore the continents of the overworld, and then a quest to guide the newly restored world to life again by saving its residents' souls. It's a story that, in its broader strokes, is very similar to the other two games in this trilogy, and in many ways it honestly feels like a strange midpoint between Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia. However, that comparison is good as much as it is bad. Actually, scratch that, it's actually much more bad than it is good ^^;

Terranigma isn't written by the same person who did Illusion of Gaia (weirdly enough, Illusion of Gaia seems to be the only game that person has ever written, actually). It was written by the same writer as Soul Blazer along with a co-writer. Now however well their writing may've worked for a relatively smaller game like Soul Blazer, it really does not work nearly as well for a much larger game like Terranigma. The narrative pacing of this game is absolutely dreadful, with massive swaths of the middle of the game (I'd say from like the 20% mark to the 70% or 80% mark) having little to nothing to do with the overall themes or premise beyond "it's something else for Ark to do to restore the world or just progress through the map".

That in and of itself isn't usually a bad thing, mind you, as not every game needs to be this grand epic that tells a meaningful story. Terranigma, however, IS trying to be this grand epic that tells a meaningful story, and just how many characters and thematic beats it tries to cram into its last leg comes off very poorly with just how little time we've had to get used to these characters and what they believe in. Even Ark himself, present through the entirety of the game, comes off as a really weirdly written character because he just so infrequently actually gets lines to give his character any sort of meaningful depth over the course of the narrative. There's a kinda sweet love story in here somewhere, and I think there's even something about the nature of good & evil and the cyclical nature of history and the universe, but it gets so confused and hurried at the end that I honestly had a lot of trouble trying to figure out what this game was even going for. Part of that is due to the game's own clumsy writing, sure, but part of it is also that a LOT of this game just feels like a far more poorly done rendition of Illusion of Gaia's story. That game actually had a well paced narrative with characters slowly and thoroughly developed throughout it, and the lack of that narrative writing ability really hurts Terranigma's overall story (not to mention makes it look very poor by sheer comparison in the first place).

Terranigma also has some pretty bad issues with casual racism (particularly towards African Americans and First Nations Peoples) as well. This is something Illusion of Gaia kinda struggles with, but it's WAY worse here. It's hardly the worst instance in the world, granted, and it's certainly not the biggest issue the writing has, but it was so distracting that I couldn't leave it unmentioned here. At the end of the day, though, Terranigma just isn't a very well told story. The bones of the narrative are largely just a poorer replay of Illusion of Gaia's story, sure, but that didn't need to be its death knell. It could've been a perfectly fine story just living here as a vacuum separate from its predecessor, but even divorced from its lack of originality (within its own series), the lack of care and attention in how the story itself is executed causes a lot more harm than any amount of copying Illusion of Gaia's homework ever could.

On a gameplay level, we're kinda stuck between good and bad here as well (though more so leaning towards bad in a lot of ways that matter). In a vacuum, this is (seemingly) easily the best playing of the trilogy. The ways Ark can jump around, dash through enemies, use his run button (which we finally have) to zip from place to place, it all amounts to a game that feels very nice to play around in compared to the previous two games in the series, both of which felt like you were in some way locked to a grid. You also have a neat magic system where you find blue crystals (Magirocks in English), and they act as a sort of total mana. You buy magic rings at vendors (you have a money system now!), and how many Magirocks you have dictate how many total rings you can carry around. One ring is one use of that spell, and once it's spent, you get thost Magirocks back to "spend" again, not unlike spell slots in something like Dungeons & Dragons. We have lots of big, impressive bosses to fight, and there are tons of different weapons and armors to collect to give yourself different elemental damage & status effect resistances and strengths.

However, despite just how far this laundry list of mechanical advancements may make it seem like we've come since Illusion of Gaia, these successes start to fall apart under closer scrutiny. A lot of areas are quite close quarters, so your nimble character doesn't feel like his speed in combat is particularly useful compared to how fast his enemies are. Boss design in particular is quite bad, frankly, and I cannot begin to count how many bosses (including the very first one) not only did MASSIVE amounts of damage compared to enemies in their area but also had quite unclear methods on how to even damage them in the first place. Dodging attacks, getting nuked down in seconds, and waiting very annoyingly long times between opportunities to be able to hit the boss at all are something that plague the fights in this game terribly, and that goes especially for the dreadful final boss. The bosses in this game aren't so much "not fun because they're so difficult" so much as they are "not fun because they're often just as boring as they are frustrating", and that's not something I can even begin to say for the other two games in this series (at least in their Japanese versions).

None of this is helped, of course, by other bad choices or clumsy implementations of other mechanics. The jumping is a "neat" new mechanic, sure, but that doesn't really solve how the platforming in this game just overall kinda sucks. Walking on (or god forbid walking onto) ropes is an overly fiddly experience at the best of times, and most of the jumping that is here is either barely necessary or far more frustrating than it needs to be. The painstaking put together magic system is also just basically useless as well. Rings don't cost that much, but they cost more than enough that they'll add up very quick with how limited their uses are. They're generally also very ineffective compared to just pummeling things to death, and they're often not too useful for bosses either.

On top of all that, unlike the previous two games, enemies respawn as soon as you leave and re-enter a room now, so using a big magic spell to forever-kill a difficult enemy isn't a consideration anymore either. Factor in as well that the level design and signposting are awful, so you're going to spend a LOT of time being lost and re-wandering around areas over and over. I reckon I spent about 4-ish hours in total lost over several points before I just looked up a guide for it, and I recommend following a guide for this game in general, frankly. To top it all off, the game even has a DREADFUL stealth section full of guards who use have random patrol patterns in areas almost always clearly not actually designed for stealthing (as they're often reused from other castle areas in whole or in part), and it's no small miracle that I managed to get through that section as quick as I did without using save states. On the whole, I found Terranigma's gameplay thoroughly mediocre. It's hardly the worst on the system, sure, but it's a huge pile of bad-to-just-okay implemented systems that do a lot more harm than good compared to the more simple but polished experiences offered by its predecessors.

Aesthetically, at least, this game is very very nice. It's a Super Famicom game from 1995, and damn does it look like it. From environments to NPCs to enemies to bosses, this game looks absolutely incredible, and for all the other bad things I can say about it, the graphics are outstanding. The music is also quite good, but it leans more towards atmospheric tracks than the previous two games. It's not a bad soundtrack, but it's my least favorite of the three, at the very least.

Verdict: Hesitantly Recommended. I wish I could only chalk up how hard this game is to recommend on sheer disappointment. I had heard a lot of great things about this game over the years, and with how much I enjoyed the previous two games, I was excited for a grand crescendo to a great trilogy. But with how bad stuff like the boss fights, signposting, and stealth section are, there are much larger caveats to recommending this game than simply "well it's not as well executed or written as the previous ones". Terranigma is a very pretty game, but it's just not a very good one. While it may not be an outright bad game, you'll honestly be better served playing one of the many other better games in this genre on this platform than trying to have a Just OK time trudging through this game's missteps.

Playing through the Quintet Trilogy (and Actraiser) had me kind of burnt out by the time I reached Terranigma. I was thinking I would've had to sit through another dated Action RPG, but to my surprise, it was one of the best games I've ever played.

Environments that would normally be boring in other games look gorgeous here. Whether it's a desert area, a forest area, or whatever else, there's always so much detail in the world. A big reason the game's graphics are so appealing to me is that the color usage is great. There's a lot of darker colors used, which creates very moody environments, as opposed to something like Secret of Mana, which can look very saturated and one-note. This game also has incredible world-building. It was always interesting to see the sub-plots of the areas you go to and the stories that play out. There's even a side quest where you can help build a rural town and watch it grow. A bunch of the game is like this too, which is why Terranigma is so great.

The gameplay is pretty fun, too. It's standard Action RPG stuff; there's your melee attack, magic, and a block. There are a few combos you can do, like a flurry attack and a running dive attack, which spice up the combat a bit and make weak enemies pretty quick to blaze through. My only grievance is that the game is very easy. There's a very good combo that proves useful the whole game and makes fights really simple. It's also very easy to grind levels, which may be a good thing depending on the person.

I like to view Terranigma as some sort of Chrono Trigger-esque achievement of the Action RPG genre. It feels like the culmination of all Quintet had learned contributing to the genre and offers one of the most refined experiences you'll be able to get from said genre. HD-2D PLEASE!

Everytime the Perry/Perel Theme hits I go so hard that my neighbors complain but when they hear it they just dance away to those sick beats yall.

Should have had a better Leveling System. Make Ark learn new moves as he levels up and have the Spells tied to an MP meter. The Crystals should have been used to level up your magic instead of being finite currency for mostly useless magic items.

Also I found alot of the dungeons just too big and disorienting. Bloody Mary and the Final Boss were way too strong and as in any game grinding was a tedious and unfun process.

The Story was fun especially how unnecessarily devious Mei-Lin was. It made for some entertaining scenes.

If they made the Gameplay progression better with a more rewarding Leveling System this could have been a 4.5/5 for me but as it stands I'll give it 3.7 stars

Why aren't there more remixes of the Perel Theme?

We are all individuals. We should live naturally.
Don't live for some duty, for some God. Live for yourself. Live for the individual.
Sadly, it appears that this message of Terranigma is commonly misunderstood, and people believe the game promotes self-sacrifice and bowing down to nature, when it's in fact about the beauty of humanity that allows us to conceptualize reality on a grand scale and create.

The gardener caring for his pretty pumpkins is happy and prideful because of his own accomplishments, because he lives for himself.
The butcher is happy because he can create a new meal.
The inventor is happy because he himself invented airplanes that will allow all of humanity, including himself, to improve.

And finally, Ark, the protagonist, is happy and filled with pride, because he helped the world grow. He learned, he improved, which is the greatest joy there is.
In the end, he's not rewarded with death. The game does NOT contradict its own message by hypocritically having the protagonist die for his duty, for a God, for someone other than himself. Rather, he is gifted with a dream, flying through the world in pride, knowing he was what led to this beautiful earth. And afterwards, although his journey as a hero is over, he will continue to live on. For himself. In happiness, together with his beloved.