When i had heard Gamearts was releasing a bonus disc for Grandia, I just had to get it. This is probably one of the best extensions to a game i have seen in a long time.

Generally this game is a series of mini-quests that you go through with Justin, Feena, and Sue. You start off in a graphicly stunning temple where you meet Riethe where she explains that you are being sent on a quest to gather items. This game plays just like the normal Grandia game expect everyone starts off at Level 25 and you had a rather large inventory of special moves. In the temple you meet all the other major characters who explain and tell you things about the place. There are a lof of rooms which have a purpose for all the items you get throughout the game. So, Here's what each room has....

1. Saturn Memory Room.

This is more like a little cubby hole where you walk in a see a White Saturn on a table. Hidden through out the levels are several Sega Saturn Ram carts. When you find a Ram Cart and bring it to this room. It allows you to create a save file in your Saturn that let's you see certain parts of the story.

2. Character Image Room.

This room is an area where you can view all the character's facial expressions. The items you are looking for are something like photo cards.

3. Art Gallery.

This room is as the name states this art Gallery requires you to find stone slabs that are spread throughout the game. It contains a lot of the character design sketches as well as a varaity of pictures of places in the world of Grandia itself.

4. Omake Theater.

Probably this room was the most easy to get stuff. That is if you have about 65,000 Gp a pop.*hack* The items you can buy are tickets in the temple but, be prepared to cough up some moolah for this. If anything, wait until you have the other rooms completed and you have bought the best weapons and armor you can get before you waste you GP on this. It's theater that allows you to listen to each of the character voices in a omake fashion.

5.Video Arcade

Now this is what i'm talkign about. :) This room makes all that work worth it.The items you are looking for are nothing mroe than Floppy Discs. Each Disc you find allows you play a mini game. One game is the Deck scrubbing game from Grandia itself. Each game is unique and fun. My favorite is the Gadwin hitting game. In a baseball like fashion Rap pitches balls to you with Justin and Sue cheering you on. The better you do the more nasty Rap gets. He throws all type of Balls from flaming fast balls to fakeouts. The other games are more or less equally fun.

Now let's get to the areas themselves.......

When you are ready to leave the temple you goto the center of the foutain and you are teleported to a high-up place with and entrance to each area. Here is the order in which i took them.

1. The Underground Temple.

This very large place is divided into roughly 4 sections. the goal it to get to the boss located on the lower level. the main thing to do is open a hidden chamber to the lower level by going to a small room with 4 doors. You have to get all 4 doors closed to enter the lower level. This place if any requires a bit of backtracking and fighting though some slightly annoying fights. After you get to the lower level you fight a large fire-type boss. This place has some so-so graphic effects. The music tho is PERFECT for this area.

2. Imperial Base.

This place like the 1st requires you to fight 6 boss fights all together. You fight the female commanders starting with Mio, Nana, and Saki. I strongly recommend you do it in this order because each has more Hp than the other. When you finally defeat them. You continue on and fight them again but all three at once. After this battle you have one of the nastiest boss fight being Mullen and Bahl. There is a side boss fight also fighting one of the boss creatures from Grandia itself. It's easy so if anything it's free Exp.

3. Desert Tower.

As the name decribes you are transported to a desert where you have to manuver through a series of paths and then enter the tower itself. I cannot stress how annoying the Mid-boss was at this place. Leveling up is a must here. After you beat him head back to the main area and head to the last area.

4. The Water Zone.

Now this place blew me away. Graphiclly this is amazing to see a Saturn push out this kinda of detail. There are 2 HUGE areas to go through here and it's very easy to get confused when going through here. The bosses here are tough but not tough enough where a few levels are concerned. As always through each area there are items spread out all over the place where you have to retreive them and take them to the temple.

Well, There is a lot more places to explore than this and i have only touched the surface on some places. This is more like a small RPG than a bonus disc. So, be prepared to play through quite a few hours of fun. :) Overall this package is a must have for any Saturn owner who has even purchased the import version of Grandia. Like the Shining Force III : Premium Disc i did a review on a while back, It's a shame that this type of extra will never see the light of day in the U.S. So, to the guys at GameArts, This game deserves a major thumbs up!! :)

BonusKun

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