Grandia II for Sega Dreamcast
Developed by Game Arts

As a console RPG virgin, I have no real basis of comparison to fall back on when reviewing this game. I never got into any of the Final Fantasy games or any of the zillion other games in the genre that have come out over the years. Invariably, some of these games would be made the object of frantic masturbation by critics and players alike. (In the case of the Final Fantasy series, the fan worship has gone to extremely ridiculous extremes, resulting in marvelously incoherent and hilarious "erotic" fan fiction.)

It was never enough to really move me or get me all that interested, since there were always great games in other genres to keep me occupied. On the Genesis, it was primarily the EA Sports games. On PlayStation, it was sports and adventure games.

That said, I'm not sure why I decided to try this one game out after so many years never bothering with any of the other supposed masterpieces in the genre. Maybe it was the critical praise the game received, although the critics didn't seem to be unanimous in proclaiming it a truly great game. Maybe it was the fact that I needed a new game to get into.

Maybe it was the fact that I had a gift card to Circuit City burning a hole in my wallet. Maybe it was the fact that the store didn't have a copy of Skies Of Arcadia Regardless, I bought it, so I damn well am going to review it.

Grandia II follows the same basic plot as nearly all of the other RPGs in history, at least based on my sketchy knowledge. A band of misfits, led by an incorrigible rogue, come together to fight the ultimate evil. After overcoming their initial differences, they become friends, and the leader undergoes a stunning transformation into a selfless hero, and falls in love with the resident heroine in spite of himself. That's pretty much all of them in a nutshell, isn't it? Even if it isn't, that's basically what happens here.

You start off with only the incorrigible rogue, who in this case is a Geohound named Ryudo. What exactly a Geohound does is never explained, but it seems like they're supposed to be murderous mercenaries. Ryudo is always accompanied by his talking eagle, Skye. After a lengthy introduction sequence involving these two, Ryudo finds a message tied to a tree, which opens the real story.

Ryudo travels to a nearby village where he meets up with a young woman named Elena. He has to accompany her to a religious ceremony, where she is supposed to sing. (I'm being purposely vague here, in deference to the 3 people in the next 18 years that will read this review and want to play the game.) Unsurprisingly, things go poorly at the religious ceremony, and you begin a lengthy adventure.

Interesting characters are perhaps more vital to an RPG than any other genre of game. There aren't a huge amount of "main" characters in Grandia II, but the ones that are here are suitably colorful. Ryudo is brash, rude, and uncouth – he doesn't hesitate to sprinkle his conversation with some "damns" and "hells" either. Elena is sheltered and naïve, water to Ryudo's oil. Along the way, you meet other people who will join and leave your party during various stages of the game.

There's Roan, a young boy on a quest for knowledge; Mareg, a giant beast-man searching for the madman that destroyed his village; and Tio, an android seeking to gain an understanding of what it means to be human. There are a handful of other characters as well, but these are the major characters, and these (save for one I'm intentionally leaving out) are the only ones you ever actually control.

Your adventures take place in two different types of areas – towns and dungeons. While in towns, you have a number of options available to you. You can go to the general store, where you can buy or sell items. You'll constantly be upgrading your weapons throughout the game, and the game ingeniously makes this easy. While you're in the general store, you can look at any of the various types of equipment, like weapons, armor and accessories. Each of your characters appears in a picture at the bottom of the screen. When you highlight an item, like a sword or a suit of armor, an up or down arrow will appear over each character's picture telling you whether or not any of their attributes will be raised or lowered by equipping that particular item. It makes the process of upgrading idiot-proof.

While you're in town, you can also visit the town inn, where you may rest for the evening (thereby restoring all your hit points) and also save your game. Finally, while you're in a town, you may walk from one end of the town to the other, speaking with the dozens of people walking about. They don't have a whole lot to say, but occasionally one might give you a bit of helpful information.

I'm generalizing the term "dungeon" to include anywhere that you can find yourself in battle. There are the expected underground types of dungeons, but you also will spend a lot of time above ground walking around. While a lot of RPG adventures are filled with totally random monster battles, in Grandia II it's usually entirely up to you whether you enter battle or not. Monsters are seen on screen wandering around, and if you avoid them, you don't have to fight them.

Also, if you manage to sneak up on them, you gain the initiative, giving you the right to the first moves in battle. However, the reverse is also true – monsters can surprise you, and you may take a severe beating before you even have the chance to retaliate.

Since you'll be involved in hundreds of battles by the time you've finally finished the game, it's a damn good thing that Grandia II has a battle system that is quite easy to use. When you enter battle, you flash to the battle screen, which shows your party and your enemy close up. At the bottom right of the screen there is a set of two bars. The bar is labeled with tick marks, starting at the left with "WAIT" to the right center where you reach "COM" to the very far left where you find "ACT."

Along the bars are small icons representing each member of your party, and each enemy you have remaining. When the battle begins, all the icons begin to move to the right. While an icon is in the "WAIT" portion of the bar, the character does nothing. When the icon reaches "COM," you are presented with a set of options.

Your options here are plentiful, and they give great opportunity to exercise strategy. Your character can execute a "critical" attack, which may not do much damage, but it will either delay or entirely cancel an attack an enemy is preparing. A "combo" attack will do much more damage, but it will not cancel your opponents attack, and it can leave your character open to take some serious damage.

You can also use a special move, which will do massive damage, but it will use up some of your character's limited quantity of "special points," and these moves can also take quite a bit of time to execute. The same holds true for magical attacks – they can do huge damage, but you lose some of your limited amount of "magic points" and some spells can take even longer than moves to perform. During the battle, you can also see what moves an enemy is preparing to use, which can be incredibly helpful in planning your next move. This feature becomes vital late in the game when you meet enemies with powerful magical attacks that can kill your entire party with one spell.

Some of the most impressive graphical splendor the game has to offer will be found in your spells and special moves. Most are rendered in FMV, and many will superimpose the FMV over the game engine graphics, so you can see your enemies being burned to a crisp by a massive "Hellburner" spell, or electrocuted by a "DragonZap" spell. I find myself using even the most mundane spells from time to time, just to see them used.

But the graphical beauty of the game is not only limited to the battles however. The towns you travel through are exquisitely detailed, and each town has its own distinct style of architecture. The monsters are also well designed and suitably fearsome, particularly the bosses.

The sound is hit-and-miss. As with most RPG's, there is plenty of voice acting to be heard. All the main characters have a significant amount of spoken dialogue, and for the most part, it ranges from fair to good. Considering the laughable quality of the voice acting in some games over the course of history (Resident Evil anyone?) the actors in Grandia II do an adequate job, even with some of the goofy quotes they spout when the characters cast spells. The sound effects are also fine, if somewhat limited.

The music is very grand in the expected spots, and subdued in others. To my uneducated ears, it all sounds like synthesized instruments; if so, the music is an even more admirable achievement.

Even if it did begin to feel a bit like it was never going to end, I'll definitely suggest that Grandia II is well worth a look. I enjoyed it for the most part, and I found the story to be quite intriguing, and I was legitimately stunned by a certain twist in the plot. I found myself thinking that one could make a really cool movie out of this story with enough effort (Yes, I realize I am kidding myself.)

Suffice to say that after 46 hours spent playing Grandia II, I'm glad I expended the effort. That's more than I can say about spending 46 hours under Gillian Anderson's bed. If she'd only been willing to talk to me, instead of hitting me in the face with her Emmy® and kicking me in the young'uns, I know that she'd see that we're perfect for each other!

Review by ICE