 Yeah, Konami used to make games, good games, like some of the best ones ever, now they make Pachinko machines. But once upon a time Konami put out quite possibly one of the greatest Japanese role playing game series of all time, one that rivaled the very best the industry had to offer. Now we're talking about Suikoden, more specifically Suikoden 2 for the PlayStation. For a while I thought this franchise would just be forgotten forever, however Konami is now making some steps to come back to the industry and they're starting off with none other than a remaster collection of Suikoden 1 and 2 which honestly looks really good. I'm going to talk about Suikoden 2 mainly because that's the one everyone cares about but I feel like you can't really have a conversation about the second game without at least mentioning the original. Suikoden 1 was a game that was very early stage. It was really rough around the ages and introduced a lot of good ideas that were just flushed out and improved in the sequel. In fact pretty much every issue I had with the first game was addressed and fixed in the second one. And the first game had its issues alright. For starters the menu system was super clunky, there was limited inventory space so you had to constantly throw things out. You had to equip an item to do basic things like running and the game often forced you to use some boring ass party members you might not even like constantly which seriously impeded any kind of creative teams you might have wanted to make. All of these issues were fixed in the second game. The first game definitely has flaws and it's clear that they were still figuring things out. So with that said it might seem really tempting to just skip this game and get straight to the main course. But I actually think it's still worth playing the first game for a few reasons. For starters Suikoden 2 is a sequel to Suikoden 1. And by that I mean it's an actual sequel it's not like Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy where none of the games have anything to do with each other. These two games take place in the same world only a few years apart. A lot of major characters that show up in Suikoden 2 are actually older versions of characters from Suikoden 1. In a lot of ways the first game feels like a prologue to the second. Events from the first game are often referenced you'll sometimes see two characters in Suikoden 1 catching up like oh hey how are you doing it's been a while. And if you haven't played the first game you'll just be thinking who the hell is this guy. Suikoden 1 does a great job of introducing you to the world and lore of Suikoden and you can even do a save transfer of the first game to the second one. Which will carry over some recurring character stats, it will modify some dialogue to reference events from the first entry and there will even be bonus quests added to the game. So yeah while I think the second game is an improvement in virtually every way it makes the first game look sluggish in comparison. I still think it's worth getting Suikoden 1 a chance. It has a lot of heart and makes the sequel feel a lot more special. Plus it's only like 10 hours long so you can just get it out of the way and move on to the next one. So with that said, Suikoden 2 is amazing. This is the best RPG on the Playstation and it doesn't get the respect it deserves if you ask me. Suikoden 2 is a turn based JRPG that sets out to fix all the problems that JRPGs often have starting with the narrative. The game's main plot centers around the war between the Highland Kingdom and the city state of Jouston. The game is all about war but unlike other JRPGs where the characters just kind of go ooh war is bad you guys without actually showing it, this game actually showcases a very realistic and mature portrayal of the horrors of war. The game lets you see with your own eyes atrocities being performed and lives being lost and it handles these themes in a very mature fashion that is complemented by its great writing. Suikoden 2 does a really good job of driving home the steam mostly thanks to story central antagonist Luca Blight, the prince of the Highland Kingdom who is by far the most evil villain I have ever seen in an RPG. He is a genocidal maniac who slaughters innocents right in front of you and burns down every village he comes across as he tries to control the land, leaving behind a trail of destruction that just feels so real and permanent. A village you were just in a while ago might be burnt down to rubble when you get back later. His empire's grip and impact on the world can really be felt. And the game's world really is massive. You have this huge open world with a very complex and well thought out political structure. Various kingdoms with different races, societies and customs that all have a nuanced relationship with each other. The cities in this game have culture and history. NPC dialogue is interesting and gives important details that help flesh the world out. Dialogue choices give you more agency to shape your character and there's some actual consequence to being defined where most RPGs start you through an endless loop. For example, this dude wanted to join my cause and I told him to pay me a bunch of money to join and he actually took time gathering the funds and gave it to me later. You can be a huge jerk to people in this game. But the game above all is about adventure. You basically explore the game's world as a travelling mercenary meeting new people and leading your own troops to fight against the Highland Kingdom. So we can too is all about being a leader and building your army. This game is awesome because you can have your own castle that you steal from Dracula and it feels like your home. There's so much to do here. You can go fishing at the docks, you can gamble, you can cook. The castle is just huge and fun to explore. At first it may feel a bit empty but that's where the game's biggest feature comes into play. In this game you can find exactly 108 different characters in the world to recruit to your cause. These characters are all located all over the world in every town and they each have a unique name, personality, design, backstory. They're all fleshed out like actual characters. Usually you have to convince them to join you and that sometimes requires a bit of work but it's worth it because soon they all start to populate your home base and make it begin to feel alive. Every character has something they bring to the table whether it be goods and services, a unique skill or serving as waifu material. And over half of them can join you in battle. Yeah it's a game with over 70 unique party members and there's just so much customization the game offers. For starters you have 6 party members on the field at a time as opposed to the usual 4 and this makes a huge difference when it comes to selecting your lineup. Each party member has their own unique weapon that can be upgraded, there's special runes that you can equip that grants them each unique abilities, some characters have their own exclusive runes and some character pairs have these unite moves where they do an attack together which incentivizes pairing certain characters up. There are so many possibilities and strategies for different party setups that no two people will have the same team when fighting enemies. Which brings us to the battle system. The battles in this game are smooth and designed to make grinding more efficient. Instead of slowly waiting for every character to take their turn and attack like in your typical turn based RPG, the characters and enemies in Sweden move quickly and they perform their actions simultaneously. So much shit is going on every second. Like two characters will attack different enemies at the same time, enemies will attack all at once, people are dodging, healing each other, changing positions all at once and before you know what a dozen actors on screen will be done with their actions. Everything here is so satisfying. The battles are fast, the boss fights are challenging and the dungeon designs have so much variety. The battle animations are also extremely well done and very unique. The game's graphics in general are amazing. So we can too make some of the best use of pixel art I've ever seen in a game. See, this is what a 32 bit RPG is meant to look like. People always used to go on about 3D games on the PS1 like Final Fantasy 7. Look, that game looks like a dog's turd compared to this one. So we can too has a timeless look and I don't think people appreciate how good the graphics are. The game blends 2D and 3D together perfectly. You wouldn't even notice it sometimes. They also did a tremendous job with the sprite work. The characters in this game look great with dynamic lighting when they walk in and out of shadows and the NPCs have so much variety in their designs. You won't just see the same exact guy over and over again in every town. It actually feels like a real city with different kinds of people. But the main attraction here is how stunning the sprite animations are. This game has so many animations for the characters that give the scenes life. There's all these animations where the characters perform various actions. For example, there's transitions for getting onto a ladder. There's drinking animations. When you talk to a character that's sitting, they actually turn their head towards you with just insane attention and detail. And there are so many animations they made for just one scene never to be used again. The team behind this game was so dedicated to delivering the emotion of each and every scene that they made unique character animations that depict what each character is doing just for that scene. I cannot think of another sprite RPG that has this kind of expression, this level of detail and the sprite work. They really deserve some praise for what they did here. Swicken 2 is honestly a really great RPG with a ton of great ideas. However, not everything about it is amazing. A few of the choices in this game are somewhat questionable. You actually have to recruit a map maker in order to get a world map. So until then you're just blindly wandering the game world and you have to remember the names of every city and where they all are. And honestly I think that's kind of cool. It really drives home the idea that each character brings something important to the table. However, they couldn't give me this feature way sooner. It takes like 10 hours until you recruit the map guy, so that's 10 hours of getting lost frequently and it takes even longer to find the girl who lets you fast travel around the world. Also characters in the game have a tendency to briefly mention your next objective before letting you go and not mention it again, which is a nightmare if you're like me and don't ever pay attention to anything anyone is saying. If you take a break from this game for a week, when you come back you will not have a clue what you were doing or where you were supposed to go. This game needed some kind of reminder system or quest log because there is so much going on and you need to somehow keep track of it all in your head, which requires too much effort for me. And probably the worst thing about Sweden 2 are the grand army battles. These strategic tactical battles where you fight against a highland army with your own troops. This whole thing feels like an afterthought. It's like fire emblem, but shittier. That's the best way to describe it. The first few battles you don't even control the characters, you're just watching the computer fight itself and when you finally get to take control, you realize just how awful they are. They don't explain how anything works. Sometimes your units do damage, sometimes they don't. It seems random. I tried looking it up and it still makes zero sense. It's a big unclear guessing game and it is very scripted. There are some units you just cannot defeat for story reasons and you'll waste your turns trying to fight them and of course the game doesn't tell you about that. Half the time these fights end with someone retreating so you don't ever really win them. These are just glorified cutscenes to move the story along. There's no actual strategy going on here. It's all predetermined and just overall an annoyance. If you're going to do something like this, I say do a right or don't do it at all. It is crazy that such a good game has such an awful mandatory minigame. But even with these few setbacks, Suikoden 2 is still a masterpiece in every other regard. It's very rare for a game to feature such mature writing and flesh out so many characters in such a huge complex world that feels alive and has a lived-in history. And recurring the many unique characters to build up your army to take on the Highland Kingdom is both satisfying and fun. If you haven't played this game yet, you definitely need to soon. If you enjoyed this look of Suikoden 2 and want to hear about more RPGs, be sure to check out this video right here. I think you'll enjoy it. I'll see you there.