Grandia II

"Grandia II: Very good, very fun, very easy."

Grandia II is the follow up to the Sega Saturn (later Playstation) game Grandia. Story wise the two games are not related at all; I did not see a single reference to the first game in the second. Grandia II keeps the best parts of its predecessor and improves the parts that needed improvement, emerging as a very good RPG.

Story: Although Grandia II's story does follow the basic RPG formula of “boy meets girl, falls in love, saves world in process” it manages to present enough twists and good dialogue to make it stand out from other similar stories.

One very refreshing change is that the main character's abilities are logically explained by his background. Instead of a humble 17 year old protagonist who suddenly develops world-class swordsmanship, you have a hero (Ryudo) who was born in a village of swordsman and has been adventuring as a Geohound (mercenary) on his own for years. The other characters are also well grounded and explained although there is one (Roan) that is just a little too boring and predictable. Some of the characters are quite memorable and engaging; you actually end up caring what happens to them, which is one of the signs of good writing.

Grandia II has some of the best and funniest dialogue of any RPG I've played, especially from the mouth of Ryudo, who starts as the cynic of cynics before finding his true self during the quest.

The story seems to be pretty simple at first, but gets deeper as the game progresses, and throws in some interesting plot twists along the way. You will get tired of hearing the word “Darkness” though, as it's mentioned numerous, numerous times.

Gameplay: The battle system from Grandia remains unchanged, which is a very good thing. It is a unique cross between real-time and turn-based. A visible IP gauge determines when characters and monsters can move; the higher one's Agility is, the sooner one can move. When a PC reaches the three-quarter part of the gauge, all action freezes and the player enters a command. When that PC reaches the end of the gauge the command executes. Various skills can be assigned to characters to increase the speed at which commands execute, how quickly they recover, and so on.

The skill system has been revamped from Grandia, and all for the better. Instead of each spell or move incrementally leveling up each time it is used, Special Coins (SC) and Magic Coins (MC) are gained after each battle. These coins can be spent to increase a particular move or spell, respectively. Skills are also leveled up in this same manner. This is a very fun system because it allows you to customize all your characters. There are skills for fighting, magic, defense, and even item usage. The right combination of skills and powers can make characters very formidable, even in the early part of the game, which leads to the only flaw in this excellent game:

Challenge: “These guys were no real challenge!”

That's what Ryudo says after battle if your party won without taking a hit, and you will be hearing that a lot. Simply put, this is one of the easiest RPGs out there. Death is almost impossible. I had two characters die the entire time I played, in both instances because I was in a hurry and didn't want to bother healing. The characters are very powerful even in the early stages and can become nearly invulnerable later on. It is entirely possible to win boss battles without taking a single hit. A mage can take out almost any group of wandering monsters with one spell. If you do manage to get hurt there are plenty of healing items all over the place. In fact after buying some poison antidotes at the first shop I never bought a healing item again. To top it off there are save points in all the dungeons, including right before any boss battle, where not only can you save, but you get a free full recovery! I don't mind an easy game, but it does get a little hollow to defeat every enemy without having to think about tactics at all.

Graphics: Like Grandia on the Playstation, Grandia II on PS2 was ported over from another system (in this case Dreamcast), and ports almost always mean problems. In this case the problem is a very noticeable slowdown, especially in towns. The camera sometimes turns so slowly that you think it has stopped. The slowdown isn't enough to make the game unplayable, but it does get somewhat annoying.

As far as the visuals themselves, they are OK, but not up to PS2 standards. Everything looks a little fuzzy, although the movements look good, and the few short FMVs look very nice. The graphics for the spells were in general impressive, and not so lengthy as to get annoying. Overall, the graphics are not terrible but not awe-inspiring. Again, because this is a port, this is not the game to show off the power of the PS2.

Sounds/Music: Music is a very personal thing, and in this case I really enjoyed the soundtrack. When things were tense in the story the music was appropriately intense, and when things were down in the story the music was very subdued, or even depressing.

The battle sounds were realistic and well done, as were the field sounds (water, wind, birds, footsteps, etc.) One problem with the audio was that the sound effects were often far louder than the dialogue, at times even drowning out what the characters were saying. Surprisingly, there were no options to change the volume, or much of anything else for that matter (there are only four options to change in the options screen).

The voice acting was very well done; to me the star of the game was Jodi Benson, best known as the voice of The Little Mermaid. Here she gives a very good performance as Millenia, helped by some humorous dialogue. The only character's voice I didn't care for was Elena, but even hers was tolerable.

Replayabiility: I'm not the best person to talk about replayability, since I'm the type that once I've finished a game I don't go back to it, especially RPGs, but in this case I really think one playthrough is all you'll need. You can obtain every spell, move, and piece of equipment the first time through without breaking a sweat, and the path is completely linear; there aren't any alternate ways to go. You might want to play again to enjoy the battle system some more (including an optional area that opens up near the end of the game), but that's about it.

Overall: Overall, Grandia II is a very fun, very engaging, and very easy RPG. If you're a jaded RPG veteran, looking for a challenging game, this is not the one for you, although the battle system makes this game a worthwhile play for anyone who enjoys the genre. Everything in this game is good but not spectacular, other than that wonderful battle system. But it does have that certain charm that makes a game “greater than the sum of its parts”, and would be a great game for anyone looking to be introduced to the genre.

Buy or Rent?: I'm an RPG collector, so this is always “Buy” for me, but if you're not a collector a rental should suffice. The game takes about 30 hours to beat, and has minimal replayability, so there's not much reason to keep it around. Then again, this game can be picked up pretty inexpensively, and why rent when you can buy?

Overall Score: 8.5/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/10/04