To think that it has been over thirty years since Working Designs, one of the most iconic old school JRPG publishers, released the first Lunar to the masses. This was a game that took the world by storm, with its innovative combat mechanics and creative storytelling. Unfortunately, while we did see a sequel a couple of years later and various updated versions of the existing two games, the Lunar series has mostly gone into obscurity and become a cult classic. Thankfully, developer Game Arts and their parent company, GungHo Online Entertainment, want us to remember the good o’ days of JRPGs back in the ‘90s as we now have a remastered compilation of Lunar: Silver Story Complete and Lunar: Eternal Blue Complete.
Back to the Classics
If you’re someone who grew up in the ‘90s or early 2000s on JRPGs, Lunar probably holds a small place in your heart. The two games originally came out for the Sega CD, but they would eventually be ported to the PlayStation as complete packages, coming with various audio and visual enhancements, along with additional story content.
The stories of both games are simplistic as events happen fast. They share more of a fascinating lore behind the two worlds that are so closely tied to one another than anything else. That’s not to say the stories aren’t interesting, as they still deal with strong characters and compelling plots. They even feature beautifully drawn cinematics along with quite a bit of voiced dialogue to help tell the stories in the best ways possible.
As far as combat goes, it holds up well. This might have something to do with the games featuring an AI combat helper. For the most part, the AI battle system works well, while other times you really have to take the reins when things become hectic. The AI will make silly mistakes and prioritize the wrong things. Still, it makes some of the tedious battles a lot more enjoyable, as while there aren’t random combat encounters, some of the enemies in the environments can catch players off guard.
It’s a turn-based game where proximity matters. This makes some fights even more challenging because there isn’t any means of placing allies in specific spots on the battlefield, or where they end up, outside the start. More times than not, you’ll be praying for multiple enemies to stack up right next to one another, so a devastating AOE blast can change the course of a fight. This system does make things inconsistent, but at the same time, highly enjoyable as it throws a bit of variety into a sometimes simple fight.
Holding Up in 2025
Surprisingly, Lunar: Silver Story holds up better than its successor when comparing the number of features and options. Both games have the means of speeding up fights, ensuring no combat scenario takes too long, but there are quality-of-life elements that the first holds over the second. For example, auto-advancing dialogue is made available in the options, and while in dungeons, sprint is essentially always on. This is compared to Eternal Blue where dialogue needs to be progressed manually, and Hiro, the protagonist, can only sprint in short intervals while in dungeons.
On top of that, and maybe to a lesser degree, comparing equipment while in a shop is also much better in Silver Story, with Eternal Blue having obscure icons next to a character’s portrait displaying if there’s an increase or decrease in damage or defense. In comparison, Silver Story shows the direct numerical comparison between the two pieces of equipment. Then there’s something small, such as the save menu that can be brought up with a single button press in Silver Story, whereas Eternal Blue needs to go through two separate menus to get there. It’s these deviating decisions that make Silver Story hold up better than its sequel in terms of the quality-of-life options.
Surprisingly, Lunar: Silver Story holds up a little better than its successor when comparing the number of features and options.
Graphical Improvements
As a remaster, Lunar Remastered Collection has been treated with care. Both of the remasters come with two separate modes: Classic and Remastered. Both share the same save file, so moving between each mode is made easy, but there are distinct differences. For starters, Remastered is a true 16:9 aspect ratio (except for the animated cutscenes) as the developers have been able to properly expand the screen without simply zooming in. This goes for both in the world and battle. Remastered Mode also comes with Post FX, although it mostly adds a depth of field blur at the top and bottom of the screen, which can be disorienting when the characters have to transition to a new area in those parts.
Text, specifically the character information such as their level, HP and MP, has been upscaled, but maybe not to a positive degree. It’s meant to be higher resolution, but it looks like they were washed through a filter more than it was run through updated text options. The dropped shadow effect on some of the text is inconsistent with the rest. This seems more noticeable in the Silver Story remaster than it is in Eternal Blue.
Finally, a lot of the world and cutscenes have been nicely touched up. For the most part, it looks much nicer and brighter, with the animated cutscenes in particular gleaming with smoothness — although there are a couple of strange anomalies here and there. The world and character 2D sprite artwork remains mostly the same, with only a couple of the environments losing a bit of detail. Thankfully, the developers have almost all the sprite artwork intact, with smoothing techniques only being used on menu icons, menu text and still-images.
Classic mode comes with its own set of advantages. For starters, diehard 4:3 fans will be happy to know that Classic Mode retains this aspect ratio, appreciating it how it was meant to be. There’s also a background option to fill in the 16:9 ratio monitor/TV — something most classic remasters do as well. But with that, classic mode also features three CRT filters, mostly just being different levels of the effect, something we greatly appreciate. We would have liked a couple more options, but for the most part, this offers a more classic way to play the game for nostalgic gamers.
Closing Comments:
Somehow, the Lunar games still hold up in 2025. While not perfect, they’re still well-written and highly engaging JRPG classics that have stood the test of time thanks to mechanics and features that were ahead of their time. For the most part, the graphical enhancements have only improved the quality of the experience, with only some of the upscaling techniques getting in the way of the enjoyment. Even then, you have the option to go back to its original art style. Having both the classic and remastered versions as available options ensures that the iconic JRPGs are brought to life in a new way, all while preserving their original look and style. We would have liked it to be more of a seamless process, as having to back out of one game to swap the visual styles is a chore, but at least the option is there. The only thing we had hoped would stay true was the voice acting. Don’t get us wrong, the newly recast voice actors do a good job, but we wish there was an option to have the old and new tracks available. In the end, Lunar Remastered Collection is a must for new and old school players alike, bringing the two classic JRPGs from the ‘90s to the modern age in a monumental way.
