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Updated 2005-10-21

Legend of Legaia demo FAQ v1.3.5

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Introduction

I received a demo disk for Legend of Legaia (LoL?) in the mail from Sony around March 23rd 1999. While there was some news about this PlayStation game being released in English, there was an amazing lack of information about how to play it, even in Japanese, out on the net, even at GameFAQs. Because there are absolutely no instructions with the demo disc, I figured there were other baffled people out there besides me. While the information here won't be much help for the "Complete Version" (as the demo refers to it), it's better than nothing.

First question: Why is this in HTML?
First answer: because text isn't very good for doing arrows in all four directions, or triangles or squares. This way you don't have to pay Bill to read it in Word. Or I don't have to pay for Adobe Acrobat (not the free reader).

Second question: Why don't you tell me the entire story?
Answer: because you should do that yourself. It's just a demo, man!

Third question: Why is this page still here? The demo came out over 6 years ago, the game itself soon after.
Answer: The lack of included documentation on how to play the demo is still a fact. You never know when somebody might find this information useful.

An actual question: Will you sell your demo disc, or send me a scan of the artwork?
Answer: Intruiging… I'd consider it, but I actually lost the email that asked this so I can only reply this way. A scan of the artwork maybe, but no sale as long as I still have a console that can play it.

Boss question: In the "Complete Version", after you get Meta and revive the Genesis Tree, go to the normal tree in the bottom left corner of Rim Elm. "Talk" to the tree, and you will be attacked by a swarm of bees as a hidden boss. Beat them, and you will get the "Honey", which raises stats by a large amount. NOTE: If you talk to Nene, she will take the Honey from you. Don't talk to her if you don't want to lose the Honey.) Is this in the demo? [contributed to GameFAQs by ______Cait]
Answer: I'll have to check this out someday.

Showing the Buttons & Arrows

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Game Buttons

When you start up the demo disc, it eventually asks you to press the Start button. Do so to get the beginning movie, which leaves you zooming into the town of Rim Elm.
Press the Select button during the beginning movie to skip to the end (zooming into Rim Elm).
Press Select and hold Start at any time to restart the demo from the "Press Start" screen.
Press , , L1 or L2 to advance text when there's an animated button in bottom right corner of text box.
Press Select or to enter the menu screens. In them, press or L1 button to do something, or L2 button to cancel. You can view information about known arts here, and how much AP a character has, but there's no display for what moves were last done or how long the action bar is. Press or L2 to exit the menu screens.
Walking around: Move around with the directional arrows. Just move into a door to try to open it and enter. Hold or R1 down and move to run. Unless you changed the Options in the menu screens, press or L1 to talk to somebody. Press to try to open a container.
I found no way to change the camera angles in the demo.

Things to Get/Do

Go into all the houses you can, and open the large cupboard on the upper left side of the circular room for an item. Equip them on the proper characters once combat is possible.
Talk to Tetsu (the monk in orange) at the beach to receive one healing item (which you have to use, so no change), learn the Spin Combo art, and get Gala to join. If you do ↑ ↓ ↑ ↓ ← when the game wants you to just do ↑ ↓ ↑, you learn both Spin Combo and PK Combo!
Don't bother using a healing item after Vahn trains with Tetsu. All HP will be restored when he sleeps, before the next possible combat.
Go into the Cave and pick up all the healing items. If Vahn has Meta, you can open the chest for a book that gives Noa the Frost Breath Hyper-art.
As soon as Vahn gets Meta, talk to the lady near the tree to get a book that gives Vahn the Tornado Flame Hyper-art.
Talk to both people in the store first floor once the Wall is broken to get some free equipment for Vahn, and activate the store for the rest of the game. Save up to buy armor for Noa and Gala.
I found no way to open the drawer upstairs in the store; every time, either it's locked or there's a kid in the way.
Talk to Nene to get free healing and MP as many times as you need it.
Talk to Mei once the Wall is broken to have an option to take her to your house, although it doesn't change the outcome of the demo.
Find Tetsu fighting a Seru, and talk to him to get a book that gives Gala the Thunder Punch Hyper-art.
Using a Healing Leaf (not sure about Healing Shroom) will restore 200 HP and also raise AP to 100.

Characters & Combat

In general, during combat Noa will go first, then Vahn, then Gala. Unless modified by equipment, the damage each does goes up the same (Noa does the least, Gala the most).
The visible monsters on the map can be fought by walking up to them and pressing . These are always 2 Gimard.
All the other monster types (Freed, Vera, Gobu-Gobu, Mushroom, Green Slime) are randomly encountered while you are walking around the map. I've even had them show up between opening the door to Vahn's house and actually entering it! Gobu-Gobu may steal an item, but it will be retrieved if you kill it. A Green Slime may divide to become two, and so on…
Rarely, you will get an item from combat. I've seen so far: Survival Knife (weapon for all 3), Nail Glove (weapon for Noa), Electric Shoes (armor for Noa). Equip these if they're better than what you have already. You can do a "Best Equipment" to let the game choose the best stuff. There really isn't enough in the demo to have much of a problem though.
If a character dies (goes to 0 HP or below), they can't be healed during combat. You must use a Phoenix item (from the store), or wait until after combat. After, the 0 HP character will now be at 1 HP.
Each character has an AP bar and an action bar. The action bar is the (initially empty) area in the lower left of the Attack-Commands screen that you fill by selecting combat moves. The length, and therefore maximum number of moves in a turn, varies by character; Gala's is the shortest. The action bar gets longer with experience, and temporarily gets to a maximum if a character does a Spirit. A long action bar lets a character hit more times, and get to the longer combinations of moves that are more powerful arts.
No, it's not your imagination: some moves are longer on the action bar than others. This is really noticeable for Gala.
Once the characters have their Ra-Seru, one of the moves will become "Ra-Seru". It's either left (←) or right (→), depending on the character. I don't think it makes a difference.
If a character has a weapon, the other side move becomes "Arms". Again, no difference in play really.
When a character goes up a level, they have more maximum HP, MP, and I guess other statistics too. The default length of the action bar also goes up slightly with a level.
In the demo, the maximum experience points a character can get is 9999. Sorry, the demo limits you to 10th level.

Arts

You get all 3 characters (Vahn, Noa, Gala) before any of the combats. There's only a little explanation of arts, and no mention of hyper-arts, in the training the monk gives you. Basically, they are move combinations that cause extra hits and/or damage.
Each character has an AP bar, from 0 to 100. AP increases slowly while fighting, if no arts are done that turn. AP increases more, and the action bar may increase too, if the character does a Spirit that turn. Doing a Spirit or two (or more) is the only way to get the longest possible action bar. The action bar shrinks back to normal after a combat, so you always start a battle with the fewest possible moves.
If you put a character on Attack-Auto, they will do the previous move sequence each turn. At least that's what it seems to do.
The first time (if previously unknown) a character does the sequence of moves that forms an art properly, you get some splashy lettering on the screen, and the art is added to the list of known arts. Unfortunately, except for those learned from books, the display shows them with mostly blue arrows, at least one extra, and one or more are wrong. Only those with all yellow arrows are correct. Personally, I think this is an annoying thing the game authors force on you; just keep a list of arts handy on a piece of paper! The following list shows "normal" arts sorted by order of increasing numbers of moves, then the Hyper-arts (which require a book and/or having the Ra-Seru to learn).
There's an interesting side effect of how the game looks for the sequences of moves that make up an art. For example, if when training with Tetsu you do ↑ ↓ ↑ ↓ ← when the game wants you to just do ↑ ↓ ↑, you learn both Spin Combo and PK Combo! This uses more AP, but gets you two arts in a single turn if Vahn can do 5 moves. With 6 moves in a turn, you could do any two 3-move sequences, etc.
The arts lists that are out there for the Japanese version, or posted on other games sites, are for the Complete Version, not the demo. Some combinations just do nothing in the demo. Either they are disabled, or you don't have the item or book needed to activate or learn them.
I may not have gotten all the arts valid in the demo. If you verify any more, let me know.

Magic

A character's Ra-Seru may acquire a magic power if that character kills a monster with a magic effect by using an art. Doesn't always work though, so you may have to fight something several times. In the demo, you can tell which monsters have a magic effect by the "(element)" in front of their name, e.g. "(Water)Freed". Once a character, actually their Ra-Seru, has a magic, it will go up in effect level as you cast it. So as long as you have MP, blow 'em away!
The highest effect level I got to was 4. At level 3, the spells have an additional minor effect on the target (nothing useful for Vera).
In the demo, the 3 monsters that I found to give a magic were:

The Vera spell can also be cast out of combat, but I saw no indication the Cure Venom effect occurred then.
Gala's Freed magic does about twice as much damage as Vahn's. Noa's Gimard magic does less than Vahn's too. So maybe the order noticed for combat damage applies to magic too.

I'm looking forward to playing the "Complete Version" when I can find the time. Sorry, but I've got lots of other games to finish first!

If you have comments on this FAQ, wish to post it on your website, or want to send me money, contact me.

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