This game I have extremely fond memories of. The gameplay is pretty much identical to the first, although this time we have different dragon abilities, shaman abilities for fusion this time around, and actually battle abilities. So there's that out of the way. But how do you get all the abilities. Some are not really explicit to find, and it is really easy to miss all of them, the earth shaman in particular has the most roundabout way imaginable for getting her. And the dungeons are nastier, and the random encounter rate is at an all time high in the extremely long Infinite dungeon. Every major villain here is a demon of some sort too, all with interesting and nasty abilities.
That's not what makes this game memorable, it's the story. A really harrowing story that made my heart lurch multiple times. I still remind myself just how tragic this game is. On the onset, seems like quite a few places are at peace and this church of St. Eva seems all nice and everything. But oh wait, the protagonist is just a defenseless kid up against this HUGE DEMON OH GOD. You can't win that one. Alright, time skip and find out our main characters seem to be doing fine, but how long does that last? This game deals with an egotistical mastermind of an arena chairman, an even more egotistical frog prince who impersonates Jean, the real prince and promptly makes him fail a cooking competition just because he's evil, and a monkey general who's out her wazoo with her tactics. All of these are demons by the way. Really nasty-looking demons, and they aren't the only ones. Perhaps predictably, the head church guy is really evil all along, and therefore it should be obvious that the deity known as St. Eva is also evil. It's a crazed concept of the corrupt church, and this game is one of many that has done it.
That's not even scratching the surface involving character deaths. While none of the playable ones die, we see a lot of tragic scenarios play out. We watch Rand try and hold two walls together, only for his mother to take his place. That same mother seemed bitchy and unlikeable due to her abuse of her son, but she was still a mother goddamnit. And before that was Ray, a semi-important character who has helped out for a few scenarios. Then he is fought due to his status as a high member of the church. This battle is where he gives Ryu the ultimate dragon spell, meaning he must've realized it was the wrong choice to follow Eva and that this is the best way at redemption, even if it kills him. Of course, I don't want to leave out Nina's decision to become the great bird, while it doesn't actually happen to her, her sister does it instead and the results are equally as tragic. The ending just before the final boss just had me lurched back. Watching Ryu's friends all get killed in crystals one by one, and although he brings them back, it was truly a nasty thing to see. And then the prospect of the multiple endings is sad no matter which one you get. The worst may just be the default ending. Ryu is completely conscious about the open demon portal and has to guard it in some sort of eternal sleep like his apparent mother had done. Some of those flashback scenes involving Ganer don't help much either. This is definitely one of the saddest RPGs I've played, good, but really sad and heart-wrenching.
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