Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals

"Lufia II : Rise of a much better game than it's predecessor"

The first Lufia game was honestly, not much of a good game. The game had massive gameplay flaws that made it sometimes extremely frustrating and annoying. The story though, had a lot of potential, was told quite well and left quite a lot of things open for a sequel... or a prequel.

So here we are with Lufia II : Rise of the Sinistrals, prequel to a not so good game.

STORY

If you played the first game of the series, you already know the ending to this one, but it still is interesting to see how everything happened and why, even if the game still leave some things to be interpreted. In the intro, you see a mysterious character named Arek that says to a girl named Erim that the time of the judgement has come. Now at this point you can hardly understand what's going on, but you'll see while playing through the game. The main character is a red-haired (his hair is NOT spiky, it's even weirdly slick!) boy named Maxim. What's his job? He kills monster with a sword! Eventually he'll leave his hometown due to some abnormal monster activity, and he'll end up learning about his destiny, which is to “fight”. Fight who or what? You'll have to see by yourself.

The game offers a few plot twists, a complete love story involving the main character, and a awesome dramatic ending. Some of the dialogs are awkwardly translated though, with weird lines like : “My destiny is to fight. A woman in a cave told me so.” The characters are excellent, some of them lack a detailed background, but the way they develop through the game makes up for it. Personally, I really liked the main cast of the game.

What's sad though, is that the game leave a lot of questions unanswered. It's a prequel so that was to be expected, but still, too many things are left open, and we're still waiting for a real sequel to conclude the whole story.

So I'm giving the story a 8/10.

GRAPHICS

Not that bad for a SNES game. I like the sprite. They are colourful and well done. A lot of the non-important non-playing characters are similar though, there's a lack of variety there. There are quite a lot of enemies, with good designs, although they could me more detailed. They are not animated too, but for a typical turn-based RPG, that was typical on the SNES. I really liked the battle animations though. Some spell effects were pretty amazing to see, and there's a good variety there.

Areas can be quite repetitive. You have only a few types of dungeons : caverns, tower or underground dungeon/castle. Even if they are completely different one from another, they do LOOK similar. The overworld is simple, but efficient. Nothing outstanding there.

For the graphics, I'm giving it a 7,5/10. In sum, they are well done, but often repetitive.





GAMEPLAY

That's where the game really shines in my opinion. First, yeah, it's a typical RPG. Major difference when compared to other SNES games, battles are NOT random, except on the overworld, and you won't be spending a lot of time on it. In dungeons, you see the enemies and can avoid them! How awesome is that? The enemies won't move until you do, some will move one step for two of your steps, while some are faster when will make two or more steps. You can also stun the enemies using different things like arrows or a hookshot. Now that we're talking about that, the dungeons are full of puzzles that you have to resolve. That's another thing that make this game great. You can cut herb and vines using your sword to discover hidden switches, use your arrows to shoot far away levers, blow up things with some bombs etc.

Even if it may sound quite simple, you'll see that some puzzles are quite complicated and take some time to figure out. They are not too frustrating though, with a few exceptions here and there. If you're up for a challenge, you can try the “World's hardest puzzle” at a certain point in the game. It's completely optional (luckily for us) but it's a lot of fun to do.

Like I already said, the battles are fought on a quite typical turn-based manner, but there are a few twists here and there. You have the normal battle commands, like attack, defend, use items or spells, and you have IP attacks. Each characters has an IP gauge that goes up when he takes damage. When it reaches a certain level, the character can use special attacks that depend on his equipment. Weapons will often carry attack that deal massive elemental damage, some armors will have often have defensive abilities, or restorative abilities. This add a little strategy in battle and in characters setups. The strongest equipment isn't always the best.

Throughout the game, you'll also find some “Capsule monsters”. Those little things can join you in battles and lend you a hand. You do not control them, sadly. You can feed them items so that they evolve and learn new skills. Some of them are quite useless and always run away, but others are powerful when evolved in their final forms.

The game also offers a unique dungeon that you can access at a certain point in the game. The “Ancient Cave” is a lot of fun, but it's really hard. When you go in, you temporarily lose all of your equipment and all your levels. The goal is to go through all of the 100 levels of this place and defeat the penultimate super mega boss down there! The floors are randomly generated and the monsters are getting progressively stronger. You can collect items in regular chests, and sometimes you'll come across blue chests. Most of the items you get in blue chests are powerful, and you get to keep them when you quit the dungeon. This actually gives a use to this dungeon, which is great.

Overall, I'm throwing a 9/10 for the gameplay.

SOUND

First of all, the sound effects are not that good. Some of them even are annoying, but it's not too bad. The music is good. There are a lot of great songs, but the game lacks diversity here. You'll often hear the same tunes over and over, but sometimes it's not too bad.

7/10 here, can't give it more, even if I really like the music


REPLAY VALUE

I'd say the game lasts between 25-30 hours, so that's quite a while. When you complete the game, you can unlock other modes. You can replay the game through “retry mode” and the enemies will give you 4 times the experiences points than before. You can also play “gift mode”. It's basically going through the Ancient Cave with any party member you want. It's not that great, but can be fun.
So yeah, it's more replay value than most RPGs on the SNES, so I'm giving it a 8/10. Anyway, just replaying the game normally is worth it if you ask me.


CONCLUSION

Lufia 2 : Rise of the Sinistrals if one of my favorite RPG on the SNES. Pretty much everything in this game is a whole lot of fun. I'd strongly recommend this game to anyone, even if they do not typically like RPGs. It's just that fun.

I'm giving it overall a 8/10. I tried to stay objective, otherwise I'd have given this game a 11/10, since it's one of my favorite game ever. If you didn't like the first game, don't let it get to you, this is a major improvement over it, on every aspects.

Anyway. Why are you still reading? Go play the game!

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/29/07

Game Release: Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals (US, 02/23/95)