How Mystic Ark Ties into The 7th Saga
Jun. 6th, 2012 07:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
indigozealIt doesn't.
Yeah, I know. "But what if there's a little tidbit everyone's overlooked?" I mean, there's a Lemele and a Lux, right? And everyone hates The 7th Saga; how would they even recognize a storyline connection between the games if it existed? I'm afraid it's no go, though. Reviewing the possible ties one by one:
Lemele: The male option for the main character is named "Lemele" (or "Remeer" in the opening's alternate transliteration), which is also the name of the god-child king who sends you off on Saga's quest. We never get a close-up of Lemele in 7th, but from what we can divine from his sprite, it's not a stretch to imagine Ark's white knight to be his younger self.
OK, first, something I forgot before playing Mystic Ark: the king in Saga is not named "Lemele" in the original Japanese. (His name's "Shiida" there in the raw language; I'm not sure how it was intended to be transliterated.) Furthermore, the parentages of the characters are mutually exclusive: Saga's Lemele is the reincarnated soul of your player character, lent the flesh of the godlike Saro; he's "born" without a divine mother, like Christ from God sans Mary intermediary. Ark's Lemele, meanwhile, is the child of some sort of goddess of light who's imprisoned on an island; we're not told how he was created, but the "child" appellation doesn't seem to be metaphorical.
Now, world-jumping is a major part of Mystic Ark's storyline - the player characters, as well as a smattering of NPCs, have all been kidnapped from their respective homeworlds, and you're tasked with returning everyone to their native land and finding the power to stop the abductions, which involves a lot of transdimensional travel. So, hey, if you really wanted to twist it, you could say that this might depict the adventures of the guy after whom Saga's capital city was named, couldn't you? I mean, he could've traveled to Sagaland, right? But, ehhhhhhh - there's no reference to the world of 7th Saga in Mystic Ark, and in the opening sequence, before being shanghaied into the game's main proceedings, Ark Lemele is wandering one of Ark's lands, not that of Saga. Yeah, maybe he could've traveled to Saga's world before that, but the proceedings kind of imply that this spacetime-hopping isn't something that's really done or possible outside of divine interference necessitated by extreme circumstances. (Post-game, Ark Lemele goes...somewhere different I'll discuss briefly, and it's implied it's his last stop.)
(ETA: Japanese Wikipedia asserts, and various Googling confirms, that "Remeer" is also the default name in both Japanese and English of the hero of Brain Lord. We're not, then, dealing with any furtive plot connection; Enix for some unfathomable reason really likes this name, and we just have an odd nontrilogy of Games with Guys (and Places) Named Remeer.)
Lux: The two Luxes are pretty different design-wise, but we can chalk that up to artistic license. Reconciling their storylines isn't as simple. Saga's Lux is a product of the ancient advanced civilization of Melenam, which sank Atlantis-like beneath the waves when it made the mistake of developing a supercomputer that was powered by pure evil, as you do. Lux's goal in-game was to discover the mystery of his race's origins, as his memories had been overwritten by centuries of life experiences; the Melenam thing is a late-game reveal.
Ark's Lux, on the other hand, is the product of a different ancient advanced civilization, that of the subterranean realm of Metallimo. Unlike Melenam, Metallimo still thrives, and its technological wonders regulate, Mother Brain-like, aspects of life on its world's surface, such as...the transmission of sound, and...the flow of time...and color. OK, spoiler: Mystic Ark was developed by a bunch of hippies who don't really know what computers do. Perhaps you could concoct a scenario like Metallimo being founded by a splinter group from Melenam or something, but that's a lot of unsupported extrapolation - and again, as in the case of Lemele, the sense is communicated that extradimensional travel isn't really a common deal or freely available to the public.
One more things: Saga's tetujin (Lux's race) are all sentient or almost so, and Lux himself certainly is. We never meet any sentient tetujin in Metallimo, though (they all seem to be mindless workhorses), and Lux himself never speaks - but, then again, neither do any of the rest of Ark's PCs. There's nothing, though, to indicate that Ark's Lux has a mind of his own, instead of being just an empty robotic shell.
OK, outside of certain concept art. (But his ending, with him just falling back in line with other mindlessly-marching copies of himself, seems to underline the jes'-a-robot interpretation.)
Wilme & Kamiwoo: 7th Saga's eclectic PC cast includes Wilme, an alien who is despised by Saga's medieval populace and embarks on Saga's quest to gain power and, thereby, respect. (We're never told exactly how Wilme happened to get stuck on this planet.) Though his sprite is the same on both shores, Wilme's character art changes greatly from Japan to the U.S. In the latter, he's depicted as with smooth orange skin and a Predator-like visage with insectoid mandibles; in the former, he's an ogre/beastman-like monster with orange tiger-striped fur, pointed ears, and horns on his forehead and shoulders.
Now, in Ark, there's an ogre character named Kamiwoo whose design seems influenced by Wilme's. His skin is either orange or light green, depending on at what art you're looking, and he seems to have adopted Wilme's horns and ears. In his intro, he's shown running with the wild beasts.
I mean, if Wilme were from Kamiwoo's homeworld, he'd still be an "alien" on Saga's planet despite the presence of humanoid life forms back home. Yeah, it's tenuous, but it's the strongest possibility for a Saga-Ark tie-in - and, admittedly, it's not much; more probably an artistic influence than a direct plot connection.
Arks: Called the "Runes" in English, they govern different powers in the two games. Saga has Light, Water, Wind, Star, Sky, Moon, and Wizard (God in Japanese). Ark has Light, Water, Power, Wisdom, Fire, Darkness, and Wood, and the arks all look like elemental sprites from the Mana series. We're never told the origin of the Runes/Arks in Saga; in Ark, they're fragments of the power of the light goddess trapped on your starting island.
That's it for direct tie-ins. Ark does have the amusing parallel of ending its black mage's story with her at a bar counter snittily refusing male company, whereas that's how the story of Saga's own black mage begins. Its end dungeon also does that thing from Gorfun where there're eight ways to go but only one leads up, though not as well as Saga. The runaround with Gain and the map is replayed with a different character and object - but we're getting into gameplay territory that I'll be covering in a subsequent post.
I did notice, however, a way in which Ark's ultimate story could be construed as a response of sorts to Saga's. In Saga, once you collect the Runes that have been your quest's objective, you discover the Lemele who sent you on this task is actually the ancient evil Gorsia, said to be vanquished by Lemele's godly father Saro millennia ago. Gorsia slew Lemele five years ago, took his form, and trained apprentices to retrieve the ancient runes/arks that could release him from imprisonment and allow him to travel back in time and upend the scales in the dramatic showdown. The main character is caught up in Gorsia's time-travel maelstrom and, upon awakening in the past, indeed learns that history has been changed and Gorsia has emerged triumphant. The hero strives to rescue Saro, but it's to no avail; with his dying breath, Saro asks you to take up his quest and win where he could not. You succeed, but are slain with Gorsia's dying bit of strength; in an act of divine mercy and gratitude, refusing to let you fade, Saro's spirit preserves your soul, sending you to be reborn as his son.
Upon completing Ark's quest, meanwhile, we learn from our newly-freed goddess friend that the bile-spewing monster of hatred and malice we just fought as the final boss was actually...the main character's dark half. The goddess initially created the world through which we've been traipsing as a series of tests to build our character. To ensure further our healthy development, the goddess sliced away our evil thoughts Dark Materials-style and confined them within their own pocket universe, whereupon they grew strong enough to overpower her and split apart her power into the arks. Now that all is restored, the goddess begins to fade and tells us we must depart for yet another new realm. There, she says, we will face challenges even more daunting than those we've overcome...but she knows we will be strong and do well, "my child." The hero steps through a door into blinding light, and we hear a baby's cry (symbolic of reincarnation?) and the sound of modern traffic as the game fades to black.
Whereas Saga is about betrayal from without, by a parental figure, Ark is about betrayal from within, from one's other half, and affirmation of original parental love. Saga's hero, initially an ordinary human (or alien or robot or what have you), is reborn as the child of a deity as reward for his or her good deeds. In Mystic Ark, the conflict comes from within, and as reward for triumph, the hero is reborn from demigodhood into mundanity; instead of ascending to light, he descends from it.
Fans of Mystic Ark make much of how the hero is meant to be our real-life selves, but I don't think this storyline is developed thoroughly enough throughout the game. What lingers more in my mind is how both games end with a reassuring claim of divine love. Saro claims a good soul as his own child, creating by force of will a bond of blood where none previously existed; the last gasps of hatred cannot overcome goodness and love; and the father figure who betrayed you is replaced by another. The goddess, meanwhile, reveals your parentage and affirms her love, but, like a butterfly, sets you free - sends her beloved child even to another parent, if the reincarnation interpretation holds - as an act of confidence in your own strength of character.
As a chaser, here're a couple links on digital reconstruction of the game's namesake, the real-life Mystic Ark, a long-lost mural by theologian Hugh of Saint Victor meant to depict "all time, all space, all matter, all of human history, all of human learning, and all of human spiritual endeavor from the beginning of time until the Last Judgment."
.
Yeah, I know. "But what if there's a little tidbit everyone's overlooked?" I mean, there's a Lemele and a Lux, right? And everyone hates The 7th Saga; how would they even recognize a storyline connection between the games if it existed? I'm afraid it's no go, though. Reviewing the possible ties one by one:
Lemele: The male option for the main character is named "Lemele" (or "Remeer" in the opening's alternate transliteration), which is also the name of the god-child king who sends you off on Saga's quest. We never get a close-up of Lemele in 7th, but from what we can divine from his sprite, it's not a stretch to imagine Ark's white knight to be his younger self.
OK, first, something I forgot before playing Mystic Ark: the king in Saga is not named "Lemele" in the original Japanese. (His name's "Shiida" there in the raw language; I'm not sure how it was intended to be transliterated.) Furthermore, the parentages of the characters are mutually exclusive: Saga's Lemele is the reincarnated soul of your player character, lent the flesh of the godlike Saro; he's "born" without a divine mother, like Christ from God sans Mary intermediary. Ark's Lemele, meanwhile, is the child of some sort of goddess of light who's imprisoned on an island; we're not told how he was created, but the "child" appellation doesn't seem to be metaphorical.
Now, world-jumping is a major part of Mystic Ark's storyline - the player characters, as well as a smattering of NPCs, have all been kidnapped from their respective homeworlds, and you're tasked with returning everyone to their native land and finding the power to stop the abductions, which involves a lot of transdimensional travel. So, hey, if you really wanted to twist it, you could say that this might depict the adventures of the guy after whom Saga's capital city was named, couldn't you? I mean, he could've traveled to Sagaland, right? But, ehhhhhhh - there's no reference to the world of 7th Saga in Mystic Ark, and in the opening sequence, before being shanghaied into the game's main proceedings, Ark Lemele is wandering one of Ark's lands, not that of Saga. Yeah, maybe he could've traveled to Saga's world before that, but the proceedings kind of imply that this spacetime-hopping isn't something that's really done or possible outside of divine interference necessitated by extreme circumstances. (Post-game, Ark Lemele goes...somewhere different I'll discuss briefly, and it's implied it's his last stop.)
(ETA: Japanese Wikipedia asserts, and various Googling confirms, that "Remeer" is also the default name in both Japanese and English of the hero of Brain Lord. We're not, then, dealing with any furtive plot connection; Enix for some unfathomable reason really likes this name, and we just have an odd nontrilogy of Games with Guys (and Places) Named Remeer.)
Lux: The two Luxes are pretty different design-wise, but we can chalk that up to artistic license. Reconciling their storylines isn't as simple. Saga's Lux is a product of the ancient advanced civilization of Melenam, which sank Atlantis-like beneath the waves when it made the mistake of developing a supercomputer that was powered by pure evil, as you do. Lux's goal in-game was to discover the mystery of his race's origins, as his memories had been overwritten by centuries of life experiences; the Melenam thing is a late-game reveal.
Ark's Lux, on the other hand, is the product of a different ancient advanced civilization, that of the subterranean realm of Metallimo. Unlike Melenam, Metallimo still thrives, and its technological wonders regulate, Mother Brain-like, aspects of life on its world's surface, such as...the transmission of sound, and...the flow of time...and color. OK, spoiler: Mystic Ark was developed by a bunch of hippies who don't really know what computers do. Perhaps you could concoct a scenario like Metallimo being founded by a splinter group from Melenam or something, but that's a lot of unsupported extrapolation - and again, as in the case of Lemele, the sense is communicated that extradimensional travel isn't really a common deal or freely available to the public.
One more things: Saga's tetujin (Lux's race) are all sentient or almost so, and Lux himself certainly is. We never meet any sentient tetujin in Metallimo, though (they all seem to be mindless workhorses), and Lux himself never speaks - but, then again, neither do any of the rest of Ark's PCs. There's nothing, though, to indicate that Ark's Lux has a mind of his own, instead of being just an empty robotic shell.
OK, outside of certain concept art. (But his ending, with him just falling back in line with other mindlessly-marching copies of himself, seems to underline the jes'-a-robot interpretation.)
Wilme & Kamiwoo: 7th Saga's eclectic PC cast includes Wilme, an alien who is despised by Saga's medieval populace and embarks on Saga's quest to gain power and, thereby, respect. (We're never told exactly how Wilme happened to get stuck on this planet.) Though his sprite is the same on both shores, Wilme's character art changes greatly from Japan to the U.S. In the latter, he's depicted as with smooth orange skin and a Predator-like visage with insectoid mandibles; in the former, he's an ogre/beastman-like monster with orange tiger-striped fur, pointed ears, and horns on his forehead and shoulders.
Now, in Ark, there's an ogre character named Kamiwoo whose design seems influenced by Wilme's. His skin is either orange or light green, depending on at what art you're looking, and he seems to have adopted Wilme's horns and ears. In his intro, he's shown running with the wild beasts.
I mean, if Wilme were from Kamiwoo's homeworld, he'd still be an "alien" on Saga's planet despite the presence of humanoid life forms back home. Yeah, it's tenuous, but it's the strongest possibility for a Saga-Ark tie-in - and, admittedly, it's not much; more probably an artistic influence than a direct plot connection.
Arks: Called the "Runes" in English, they govern different powers in the two games. Saga has Light, Water, Wind, Star, Sky, Moon, and Wizard (God in Japanese). Ark has Light, Water, Power, Wisdom, Fire, Darkness, and Wood, and the arks all look like elemental sprites from the Mana series. We're never told the origin of the Runes/Arks in Saga; in Ark, they're fragments of the power of the light goddess trapped on your starting island.
That's it for direct tie-ins. Ark does have the amusing parallel of ending its black mage's story with her at a bar counter snittily refusing male company, whereas that's how the story of Saga's own black mage begins. Its end dungeon also does that thing from Gorfun where there're eight ways to go but only one leads up, though not as well as Saga. The runaround with Gain and the map is replayed with a different character and object - but we're getting into gameplay territory that I'll be covering in a subsequent post.
I did notice, however, a way in which Ark's ultimate story could be construed as a response of sorts to Saga's. In Saga, once you collect the Runes that have been your quest's objective, you discover the Lemele who sent you on this task is actually the ancient evil Gorsia, said to be vanquished by Lemele's godly father Saro millennia ago. Gorsia slew Lemele five years ago, took his form, and trained apprentices to retrieve the ancient runes/arks that could release him from imprisonment and allow him to travel back in time and upend the scales in the dramatic showdown. The main character is caught up in Gorsia's time-travel maelstrom and, upon awakening in the past, indeed learns that history has been changed and Gorsia has emerged triumphant. The hero strives to rescue Saro, but it's to no avail; with his dying breath, Saro asks you to take up his quest and win where he could not. You succeed, but are slain with Gorsia's dying bit of strength; in an act of divine mercy and gratitude, refusing to let you fade, Saro's spirit preserves your soul, sending you to be reborn as his son.
Upon completing Ark's quest, meanwhile, we learn from our newly-freed goddess friend that the bile-spewing monster of hatred and malice we just fought as the final boss was actually...the main character's dark half. The goddess initially created the world through which we've been traipsing as a series of tests to build our character. To ensure further our healthy development, the goddess sliced away our evil thoughts Dark Materials-style and confined them within their own pocket universe, whereupon they grew strong enough to overpower her and split apart her power into the arks. Now that all is restored, the goddess begins to fade and tells us we must depart for yet another new realm. There, she says, we will face challenges even more daunting than those we've overcome...but she knows we will be strong and do well, "my child." The hero steps through a door into blinding light, and we hear a baby's cry (symbolic of reincarnation?) and the sound of modern traffic as the game fades to black.
Whereas Saga is about betrayal from without, by a parental figure, Ark is about betrayal from within, from one's other half, and affirmation of original parental love. Saga's hero, initially an ordinary human (or alien or robot or what have you), is reborn as the child of a deity as reward for his or her good deeds. In Mystic Ark, the conflict comes from within, and as reward for triumph, the hero is reborn from demigodhood into mundanity; instead of ascending to light, he descends from it.
Fans of Mystic Ark make much of how the hero is meant to be our real-life selves, but I don't think this storyline is developed thoroughly enough throughout the game. What lingers more in my mind is how both games end with a reassuring claim of divine love. Saro claims a good soul as his own child, creating by force of will a bond of blood where none previously existed; the last gasps of hatred cannot overcome goodness and love; and the father figure who betrayed you is replaced by another. The goddess, meanwhile, reveals your parentage and affirms her love, but, like a butterfly, sets you free - sends her beloved child even to another parent, if the reincarnation interpretation holds - as an act of confidence in your own strength of character.
As a chaser, here're a couple links on digital reconstruction of the game's namesake, the real-life Mystic Ark, a long-lost mural by theologian Hugh of Saint Victor meant to depict "all time, all space, all matter, all of human history, all of human learning, and all of human spiritual endeavor from the beginning of time until the Last Judgment."
.
