A little while ago I reviewed Shining Force on this blog and now it’s time to look at the sequel…
Gameplay: 4/5 – The controls are more or less the same as the first game’s but with a few minor upgrades. For one holding the C button now doubles as a speed-up and auto-fire meaning you can skim through menus and dialogues a lot faster.
You also now get a headquarters which follows you around, but also you have fewer members in the force which means you don’t have to pick between members as much as the last game (albeit this maybe leads to a slight lack of variety).
I think my biggest gripe is less gameplay related and more related to the fact of how useless your Knights are in this game versus the last one. It does mean you get to use other characters more, but it’s still a bit annoying.
Graphics: 4½/5 – I’m a little mixed on this. On one hand, the towns and character portraits are a lot more detailed than the last game and your characters also change appearance quite a bit after promotions. However, like I said, you don’t have as many force members to choose from as the last game. This is sort of nice since it felt weird how you kept getting new party members even very late into the game (especially since I didn’t like benching characters I’d been playing through the whole game) but it unfortunately does make your party a little stale. Certain characters (the knights) just stop being useful at some point which is when you end up replacing them anyway.
Also, it feels like you’re fighting the same enemies more in this game than the last. Granted, Shining Force 1 also had several battles where you faced off against the same enemies multiple times, but it felt like there was a better variety of settings (not just fields and caves like in this game). Also, it feels like in this game they just had more variants of the same enemies which is weird.
None of this means the game’s graphic look is bad, but weirdly a bit underwhelming compared to its predecessor.
Animation: 4/5 – I rank this about the same as the first game. There are more cutscenes than before but they’re not that much more impressive.
Music: 4½/5 – The game reuses a few themes from the first game which is nice but for instance the battle and map music are different. Also, I feel there’s way more music. I wouldn’t say it’s better than the first game’s soundtrack. One cool feature though is that your characters’ attack theme changes after they get a promotion, so I’m willing to give the game an additional ½ point for that.
Sound: 3/5 – The sound-effects are about the same as the last game.
Replay value: 2½/5 – I really hate to say this, but I really don’t enjoy myself as much with this game as the last. Most of your party members aren’t as interesting as the last game. I like May, Peter and Slade – the rest of the characters are just super bland (really miss Zylo, Pelle, Khris and Gort from the first game).
Secondly, due to the smaller force this time, you really don’t have a lot of attack options. Also, Sarah took forever to get high enough level to promote after which she became slightly more useful, but she’s still so slow she misses out on most of the action. I notice that you have way fewer spellcasters but you’re more reliant on your special units more since the Knights(/centaurs) are just weirdly ineffective against many enemies (whereas they were your tanks in the first game).
Also, while this game is slightly more plot-driven than the last, this didn’t make the game more fun but rather quite the opposite. I kept getting stuck doing dumb things like back-tracking to locations I thought I didn’t have to return to. Yes, the plot of the first game seemed to almost be on-rails at times but you could at least save between chapter breaks which was nice in my opinion.
Also, the over-world is way too huge which I also didn’t like. Using the raft was a pain because pressing a direction that wasn’t water caused your party to automatically disembark.
Also, enemies drop WAY less money than the last game (albeit this gets slightly fixed closer to the game’s end). Resurrecting dead party members wasn’t a huge hassle in the previous game, but here I ran into a situation for the first time where I lost a battle so many times I couldn’t resurrect all of my party for the final (successful) attack. It also makes getting gear for your party more of a hassle, but once you permanently bench your useless members (i.e. knights) your budget issues ease up a bit.
However, combat is still fun to a degree, especially whenever you get some new enemies – but maybe less so than the first game.
Score: 73% – While Shining Force 2 has some features which makes it a slightly improved experience over the first game, it just isn’t as much fun. The game offers fewer strategy options and fewer party members. Its mechanics are more restrictive and the plot honestly feels very restricting as well. If you like the improved presentation, I suppose you might enjoy it, but I honestly found myself pining for the characters and the more straight-forward nature of the first game.
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