Arc the Lad II

"The sequel delivers and the story continues... Don't miss it if you played the original"

This game is the second installment of the Arc the Lad series. Although more complex than the original, it is a good game to get you familiar to the SRPG genre.

Story: 9/10
Arc the Lad II is a direct continuation of the original game, and it is heavily recommended that you play the predecessor first. This SRPG takes place in sub modern times - there are trains, air travel, scientists. It features a parallel story. We continue to follow Arc and their companions (I won't say more about that to avoid spoilers) in the first story, and our new hero - Elc in the second story. Elc is the last living member of the flame tribe. When he sleeps he has nightmares that his village is being destroyed, and he is taken away.

Graphics: 7/10
Although it has some low resolution cut-scenes, this could have easily been an SNES game. Graphics are better than the original but still basic, and very colorful. Characters are more detailed than original but they also have oversized heads. There is no camera movement as basically you are always presented with an top down view, about 90% of the time. There are two ways of traveling. On foot, where you walk on the world map, or by transportation where you basically select places you want to go on a big map. When main characters are communicating, you do not see their face, but instead there is a comics bubble to know who is talking - but if characters are bunched together you sometimes have no idea who said what.

Sound: 9/10
Sound is good, great music all around. During a battle depending on the action, characters shout in Japanese.

Game-play: 8/10
I will break it down to few sections.
BATTLE SYSTEM: It is a turn based SRPG and the battle system is very similar to Arc the Lad I. There are no random encounters. You are fighting on a grid, and depending on your move level and jumping level you can move x number of spaces in any directions. The order of who acts first depends on how high is one's agility attribute. If your foe is within your physical damage reach you can attack it. Physical hits get countered, regardless direction of the attack 90%+ of the time. In addition you can do an ranged attack over large distances and use magic/ability which can effect a single square or multiple squares. Most of the time when you kill all the foes, you exit the area. So basically you deal with one area at a time. Also if not mission related, when you enter an area you can abort the fight by simply choosing to exit the area but this causes a problem. The exit zones, whenever you go over them you get prompted to leave the zone, and if you select No you move back. So unless you want to exit, this can become an obstacle when moving in tight areas and no such problem existed in the original. 95% of the time when you are navigating a dungeon and come back to the area where you killed all the monsters, it will be empty. Exiting a battle does not fill your HP and MP like in the original. On the beginning of each battle you get prompted to choose which party members you want to use. If you get KO in the battle you respawn in the same area but you lose 1/2 of your money.

MONSTER CAPTURING: one of your party members possess an ability to capture a monster. It is all nice and dandy but it has a really bad success rate. The captured monsters can be used in a battle or traded. Another thing about it is that these monsters have limited abilities and are virtually useless as compared to regular party members. The only benefit I've see was to use flying monster when there is a chest to be retrieved over a large gap, and such situation is very rare. Captured monsters as party members gain levels when used in a battle.

LEVELING: Experience points are earned on the individual level only, so you don't level as a party. You get experience points when you cast a spell, get hit or attack. In addition to your base level increase, your throw and jump ability can level as well and so are your spells/abilities - those max out at 3. In addition your equipment and weapons have level caps and those can level as well, boosting your base stats at the same time. In some instance you can raise those level caps making your gear even more powerful. There is also something called Boost level. You can boost your character's attack up to level 7 and then in a single shot release tremendous attack power - and on the same token make your boost level 0. Leveling is very quick, and it maxes out at 999, as compared to 60 in the original. If you converted your save file from original, the characters you used in original will have that level in ATLII.

THE GUILD SYSTEM: you are an employee of the hunter's guild. The hunter guild provides you with requests: wanted monsters and jobs and a successful completion of a job or capture of a wanted monsters grants you Merits. The more merits you have the higher is your standing with the guild. 95% of those jobs are not story driven, so you can basically dismiss this guild system as an option side-quest if you wish. Some jobs, and wanted monsters are situational so you have to be in the right place at the right time to get a certain job or a monster, and YES those ones are missable.

EVERYTHING ELSE: there are shops in this game which means you can buy equipment, weapons, and accessories. There are only 2 slots for accessories. In the original equipment and weapon were permanent and the only thing you can change were the accessories. There is a nice modification system, which means in a places that you discover you can add effects to items, gear, and weapons, and modify your abilities. As mentioned before this game offers an option to convert your file from ATLI - what comes over are the character levels, and accessories. Even with the convert the game can be tough sometimes and the last boss with a wrong party setup can really bring you to your knees. FYI people with characters @ level 120 still have issues with the last boss.

Final Impression
A great game that will keep you entertained from start to finish. The use of parallel story for the portion of the game is excellent. If you desiccate yourself to do all guild jobs, capture all wanted monsters, plus do some mini games, this game can easily clock 80+ hours. If you haven't, it is recommended that you play ATLI before this, since this game is a direct continuation of the original. The replay value exists, as this game is fun to play from time to time. You can get your hands on this game as part of the Arc the Lad collection new for $115 and used for $32, or the import.
I'll give it 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/26/07

Game Release: Arc the Lad II (JP, 06/20/96)