The game starts off with a family of treasure hunters led by patriarch Grieg, his son, The Hero, and his daughter, Milka, arriving in the port town of Dea in order to explore some nearby ruins for the sake of finding treasure. After eluding knights of the Evil Empire within the ruins, they encounter a statue of the goddess, Mave, one of twin goddesses who created the world, who comes to life and tasks the family with obtaining and protecting six Relics from falling into the hands of the empire and being used for evil purposes.
The battle system is turn-based with each character having a specific job and skill set (though some skills are not unique to a single character) and overall the gameplay contains elements of numerous other RPGs from the 16-bit era such as Final Fantasy, Phantasy Star and Lufia.
This game contains examples of:
- Anti-Villain: Laurent isn't evil, but he does have a slight case of My Country, Right or Wrong at least until his emperor is killed.
- Turns out the Emperor is also one of these. His empire is aggressive and militaristic, but he honestly cares for his subjects and tries to mitigate the harm caused by the machines. His methods are definitely not nice, though.
- Arbitrary Head Count Limit: Only four characters can be active at a time. The rest are on stand-by at the local tavern.
- Brought Down to Normal: Asty is a humanoid avatar of the goddess Ishtry, who is sealed underground for most of the game.
- But Now I Must Go: The two Goddesses leave the world in the hands of humans after Ishtry is defeated and her plan stopped.
- Cathartic Chores: It's hinted early on that Grieg has thrown himself into hunting for treasure to cope with the loss of his wife.
- Chick Magnet: Elysha immediately falls for the hero upon his rescue of her and Oreana hints at falling for him a little when speaking to her in a tavern after she joins the party.
- Contrived Coincidence: The party of four has no money to sail to a different region to search for the Relics, but the head maiden at Mave's shrine just happens to have four tickets!
- Curb-Stomp Battle:
- On the player side, it's possible to turn on a setting that will automatically skip any non-boss battle where the player team significantly outclasses the monsters. Rather than entering the main battle screen, the victory theme plays and the results screen appears instead.
- Played straight again in the first battle against the Emperor.
- Developer's Foresight: Every party member has a unique saying for every piece of conversation throughout the game.
- Determinator: The hero is still willing and able to stand up to fight against someone who just put him on the receiving end of a Curb-Stomp Battle.
- Disappeared Dad: Oreana's is one. It's quickly revealed he died at sea while researching the Relics.
- Disc-One Final Dungeon: The Temple of Darkness and the Imperial Castle could be considered one.
- Dual Boss: Laurent and Asty join forces against the party in the Imperial Castle.
- Dub Name Change: Milka is named Mika in the 3DS port.
- Early-Bird Cameo: It's possible to go to Mave's Shrine and speak with Elysha, complete with character portrait, before being tasked by Mave to collect the Relics.
- Evil Empire: The game doesn't even try to hide it. Though Laurent is an exception as he refused to execute Dingo because he's still a child.
- Expy: Milka bears a very striking resemblance to Rebecca from Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade, especially since they are both archers.
- Fragile Speedster: Dingo. He hits fast and hard, while maintaining enough defense to keep him out of Glass Cannon territory.
- Frothy Mugs of Water: Averted. Despite Dingo's claim that "For pirates, booze flows as freely as water!" the tavern won't serve him any because he's underage.
- Gaia's Vengeance: Ishtry's motivation. Humans build machines and harm nature? Let's just Kill All Humans in order to save nature!
- Game-Breaking Bug: In several areas, particularly one town, entering a screen from east or west will completely freeze the game, forcing a full shutdown of the 3DS in that version.
- A patch has been released... but now the game will freeze at any random time.
- A second patch has now been released and people playing the game have reported no more major freezing issues, but moments of lag during battle.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation: While Milka complains that Grieg spent all of their money on boat tickets, the party starts off with enough money to purchase some items and equipment. And no matter how much money you have after rescuing Elysha, Milka and Grieg imply it's still not enough to get your next boat tickets!
- Good Scars, Evil Scars: Both the hero and Grieg have scars on their faces.
- Gotta Catch 'Em All:
- Plot-wise, the six Relics. Gameplay-wise, each enemy has an entry in the bestiary; including what items it drops/can be stolen from it.
- One side quest involves collecting Old Glass Bottles to trade with a Collector for items and equipment.
- Global Airship: In the form of Mave's pet bird.
- Grimy Water: Though the entire party takes damage if only the leader steps on a hazard tile.
- Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: The goddess Mave.
- Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Played straight after the first battle with Laurent (which is, ironically, a much easier fight than the boss fight before him).
- Heel–Face Turn: Laurent will join the party after they help him snap out of a Heroic BSoD.
- Hello, [Insert Name Here]: The hero doesn't have a canon name and is meant to be a player surrogate, but the game's release trailer has named him "Kaneda."
- Heroic BSoD: Laurent after the Emperor is killed by Ishtry. Snapping him out of it is what convinces him to join the party.
- Heroic Mime: The hero, natch. His bio even lampshades that he very rarely speaks.
- Hot-Blooded: Grieg, especially when it comes to treasure hunting (but is also a bit ironic as his job class is Warrior while the hero is the Treasure Hunter).
- Humans Are Special: Mave recognizes that humans using science to advance their civilization is humanity realizing its potential, but warns that the Relics belong to the world and their misuse would be catastrophic if abused for personal gain.
- Infinity +1 Sword: Any weapon forged from the limited quantity of Moon Ore found throughout the game.
- Just a Kid:
- And Milka hates being called one. It riles her up even more that Dingo is younger than her, is the leader of the pirates, and doesn't care about being called a kid.
- Dingo knows he's still a kid and doesn't let it bother him for the most part.
- Knights and Knaves: The Ghost ship offers a variation. You need to find the right key to the treasure room based on the facts told by the pirates. The catch is, all the pirates are lying.
- Leaked Experience: Inactive party members still gain levels and learn new skills despite waiting around in a town's tavern, though they don't earn 100% of the experience gained by the active party per battle.
- Level Grinding: Not overly necessary as enemies yield generous experience to stay along the difficulty curve while progressing through the game. Grinding for money for new equipment is more likely.
- Level-Up Fill-Up: For HP and recovering from status ailments, anyway. MP is not restored.
- MacGuffin Delivery Service: It's really no surprise that the Emperor steals the six Relics right away after obtaining the final one.
- Metal Slime: The Lemming enemies fit this bill. They give higher than average exp. for the areas they appear in and are prone to running away.
- Missing Mom: The hero and Milka's mother is dead. Milka complains early on that Grieg has done nothing but drag them around to hunt for treasure ever since her death.
- Mook: Most boss fights have two of these accompanying the main boss.
- No Name Given: The hero has no official name. The closest is "Kaneda" as seen in one of the game's trailers.
- Official Couple: Heavily implied to be the hero and Elysha as per the ending.
- Optional Party Member: Two: Imperial Knight Laurent and Lemming Hero.
- Random Encounters: With skills to increase or decrease occurrences for 300 steps.
- Rescue Romance: Elysha is immediately smitten with the hero after his team saves her from Asty.
- Secret Character: Lemming Hero. He's not that hard to find, though, if you talk to all the people in towns.
- Shipper on Deck: Milka tries to nudge her brother towards Elysha.
- Squishy Wizard: Oreana. She has the worst defense in the game.
- Stripperiffic: Asty the imperial sorceress.
- Tsundere: Milka towards Grieg and Dingo.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Emperor wanted to use the Relics to recreate the nature destroyed by his machines. Mave, however, did not approve of using them that way.
- "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: Shown as part of the credits sequence.
- With This Herring: Averted! Even though Milka complains they spent all of their money on boat tickets at the start of the game, you actually start off with a fair amount in order to buy items and equipment upgrades.
- Worthy Opponent: Laurent sees the hero as this.
