RPGs You Shoulda Played vol. 1

[Fuyumine]

GRANDIA II

In this volume, I will be talking about Grandia II by GameArts for the SEGA Dreamcast, PC, and PlayStation 2. Now, let me just start off by saying that while I know that the Grandia games are a relatively well-known franchise, you would be surprised to know how many RPG fans haven't played a single on them. The number borderlines on blasphemy! So, for the uninformed (more like "the UNWASHED") I will make it my duty to tell you about the awesomeness of this game, and why you should be playing it.

Grandia II (the indirect sequel of the PSX title of the same name) is your classic JRPG set in an unknown world in a rather ambiguous time period. It tells the tale of Ryudo, a young swordsman that works as a sword-for-hire called a "Geohound," who is hired by a priest of Granas to escort Elena, a Songstress of Granas, to Garmia Tower for a special ceremony in which she is a vital part of. Once the ceremony takes place however, it goes awry, as it appears that the Granas Seal has been broken, and the Wings of Valmar, the evil God of Darkness, has possessed Elena.

Only managing to get Elena out of there alive, Ryudo returns her to the priest that hired him and informs him of the details, and is hired once again to escort Elena to meet the Pope, His Holiness Zera, in hopes of exorcising the demonic wings from Elena's body. And so the two (or three, if you count Skye, Ryudo's talking eagle companion) venture onward, traveling across the country to meet the Pope, unraveling bit by bit the truth behind the God of Light Granas, the God of Dark Valmar, and their role in this whole ordeal.

One of the things that I love most about this game's story is its dialogue. About 85-90% of the time I found the dialogue in the game to be consistent and entertaining, although the voice acting kind of killed it at times. Don't get me wrong, though. The voice acting all that bad either, especially considering that voice actors in video games don't have a lot to go on like they would if they were acting for an animated show of some sort. The plot is pretty decent. It isn't stellar by any means. It definitely may be something you've played before (especially if you played a lot of RPGs during its time), but it's entertaining all the way through. Speaking of a game you may have played before, the characters aren't all that fresh either, but they're fairly developed and interesting and, most importantly, likable.

The gameplay is where this game shine's I think. Taking cues from older games such as Star Ocean and Tales of Destiny, the game features a semi real-time battle system that allows characters to have limited movement on the battlefield, making combat tactical and damn fun. Characters can attack using two hit combos (or more, depending on what you have equipped), or single hit critical attacks that have the ability to cancel your enemy's attacks. This is critical in a lot of battles, especially when you want to keep those bosses from using certain moves.

Characters also have Special Moves, which are techniques unique to every character, ranging from devestating attacks or moves that increase movement on the battlefield. The speed in which these moves are executed are determined by their level, which can be increased by distributing "Special Coins" gained after every battle.

Magic is used by equipping "Mana Eggs." Yeah, I know that sounds... stupid, but that's what they're called. Different Mana Eggs contain different kinds of magicks. For instance, the Holy Egg specializes in Healing and and Status magic, and the Chaos Egg specializes in fiery, explosive magic. Magic eggs can also be powered up by distributig "Magic Coins" found at the end of a battle.

One of gripes with the gameplay in the game is the fact that the combat suffers from a trend sooo prevalent in a lot of RPGs during this time: SIX HOUR BATTLE ANIMATIONS! Yes, we know, the game was created on a Next Generation system and you want to do all the things you couldn't do on the PSX, but JEEZE! Tone it down a little! One of the things that makes the Final Fantasy battle system work so much is that doing something as simple as attacking with Ice magic doesn't require a twelve minute FMV scene.

Another gripe of mine is that the PS2 version of this game suffers from massive slow-downs whenever there is a lot of heavy graphical data going on. Fans of the first Grandia may be familiar with this, and may even be OK with it. But I assure you, friends, it is worse. It's much slower, and happens a bit more frequently. It feels like it takes ages for a scene to play out sometimes, and before long you're tapping X to skip through the dialogue just so you won't have to sit through it anymore. I hear that the Dreamcast version doesn't suffer from this problem (as much), and that the PC version runs damn-near to perfection. So if you plan on getting this game, you might want to consider playing it on a platform other than PS2.

Overall, this game is pretty cool. It gets a tad chaotic towards the end, but it's an enjoyable experience and worth investing some time into. I am not sure how rare this game is, but I don't think you're going to find this game with a full price sticker in GameStop any time soon (for the PS2 version, at least). I say the easiest place to get a copy is EBay. Found a lot of great deals for this game there, and some folks are selling it for less than $5! A steal! So yes. Go out, get this game, and have some fun!

Peace!

[Recycled Human]

What an awesome review! Where's volume 2?! Mad rep + bump for posterity!

I will say this much, I played this game back when it was full price and I thought it was 'aight'. My only complaint was the stomach of valmar character and the fact that the plot didn't move as fast as I wanted it to. I enjoyed battle enough though...

Your right though, it's a steal at 5 bucks!

[Fuyumine]

Hahahaha, I appreciate it! Vol. 2 shall be arriving soon, actually. Though I can't decide on which one I want to do first.

[Ryvius]

You know, I saw Grandia III at gamestop and almost bought it based on how much you praised Grandia II in this thread. Okay that, and the main character had goggles. In the end I decided I needed to finish the RPG's I had before buying more. Plus, who knows if Grandia III is the terrible Grandia that's nowhere near as good as II or something. I have the luck where I always buy the worst installment of the series without knowing it.

[Fuyumine]

LOL I know exactly what you mean. From what I've heard though, Grandia III might be the best in the series. I think it's the only game that doesn't suffer from slow-downs, and the story is supposedly better than the stories in the first two games. A lot of folks might tell you otherwise, and that's because, well, Grandia I & II are games that a lot of guys like me played when they first came out, so there's some nostalgic bias there.

[Unclesatan]

You picked another great game. I played Grandia 2 until I got to that boss who was inside some huge stomach or whatever. I just kept dying and I had no HP and was just overall fucked. I had to take it back to the rental store after that.. but it was still an awesome game.

[BlackJack]

I've never played this game, or even heard of it. But I might see if I can track down the PC version.

[Fuyumine]

I've never played this game, or even heard of it. But I might see if I can track down the PC version.

Yes, yes, do that!

And if you're interested definitely check out the first Grandia. I'm not sure if it's possible to find one for too cheap, so you might end up emulating it. *Nod, nod.*