Hey fellow g1s, nemesis274 here Among the games that I have owned on my console of choice, the Playstation 2, there was one particular RPG that I loved so much. It was my very first game which I bought on my own allowance and fortunately, got a good deal out of it. That game was none other than Dark Cloud 2(aka Dark Chronicle in Japan) I cannot add a lot of gameplay footage into this review, but here is a video (more like a series of screenshots) to have a fair idea of what the game is about. And I would suggest that you listen to the song as well. Trust me, it puts you at peace. Moving on: Now from the moment I played the game, I was instantly hooked by it. Everything about this game was just crafted to perfection. I practically fell in love with this game that I played it for over 7 times for the past year as a means of passing the time while waiting for another game to be released. It was just that awesome. But for some reason, nobody that I knew of talked about it. I mean, some would talk about stuff like GTA Vice City, Final Fantasy X or Metal Gear Solid or whatever. And one thing struck me with awe at one point: if there was a Dark Cloud 2, shouldn't there be a Dark Cloud 1? Well, I searched high and low for that game in some attempt to play it and take a look, but to no avail. It was only that I found some gameplay footage on Youtube that I got to see what the game was like, and as far as it goes, it was not that bad for an RPG. But I still need to get the game to find out what the game was really like, if you know what I mean. Now that I got that settled, here is a review of Dark Cloud 2: 1. Story WARNING: THERE ARE SPOILERS HERE. I TEND TO GIVE AWAY A LOT. The plot begins with Monica, a Princess who discovered that her father was killed by a man named Gaspard. Shortly after, she would eventually set out on her journey to uncover these conspiracies that have been going on Now for the next piece of the plot, there is a boy named Max(Maximillian), who is a young inventor who resides in a peaceful town named Palm Brinks who is just about to go to a circus. On that night, he overheard a conversation between the mayor and a clown ringleader named Flotsam (God I ******* hate clowns)about finding a "red stone" which the mayor was reluctant to tell him. Max eventually was discovered by Flotsam and also found that the red stone, the Atlamillia as it is called, that they were looking for was his pendant. Max eventually escapes and retreated to the sewers thanks to his best friend named Donny. He told Donny about everything that he heard and his plans to go to the outside world for a two reasons: one was out of curiosity and the second was so that he can find his mother. After a few minutes of dungeon crawling and a fight against the first boss, Max finally escapes thanks to the train provided by his friend/boss Cedric. However, Flotsam, was on his trail and plans on blowing up the entire train. And it was there that Monica appeared to face-off against Flotsam and defeat that stupid clown once and for all. It was also at that time where Max finally discovered the truth about what is going on in the world: It was all because of a dark ruler who goes by the name of Emperor Griffon who plans to go to the past using his Atlamillia and destroy it to, you guessed it, take over the world. Of course! Now Monica also explained to Max that the Atlamillia have the ability to travel back through time depending on what stone you have. Max's Atlamillia can travel 100 years in the future, while Monica's can travel 100 years in the past. Together, Max and Monica would travel through different locations, namely Sindain Forest, Balance Valley, Veniccio Coast, and Mount Gundor through the train and crawl through dungeons and eventually rebuild the past so that they can restore the future. Eventually, the pair also discovered the whereabouts of Emperor Griffon which is actually a place called Moon Flower Palace 10,000 years in the past. Eventually, Max would discover that his mother is from the future who was sent back to the past to protect Gerald (Max's father) who was the first bearer of the red Atlamillia only to find out that they are in love with each other and bore Max. Shortly afterwards, they found a means to travel further into the past through another train named Ixion where they would fight Emperor Griffon, only to discover that his identity was none other than a Moon Person who goes by the name of Sirus (like a Black Mage but wears a hood instead of a hat). After a short battle with this guy, Sirus would steal the two Atlamillias from our heroes and transform into Emperor Griffon. It was there that he explained his plan to unleash a deadly weapon known as the Star of Oblivion (where the second moon will be used like Meteor from Final Fantasy VII) with the use of the all three Atlamillia, as a means of revenge against humans and their sins against the world. Now he has finally used his power of his yellow Atlamillia to transport himself and his entire fortress back to Max's present time to begin his plans for world domination. Now to combat the floating palace, Max and Monica must gather four special gems from secret dungeons from locations that they have been to to form a Chrono Union in a place called Kazarov Stonehenge where they can call forth there own weapon named Paznos, a flying fortress that can transform into a GIANT ROBOT! Now after sending the Palace to the ground, the two heroes will then crawl through one more dungeon, but not before an encounter with a woman named Alexandra who will ask you to restore the garden on her palace to what it once was to help Sirus remember the goodness in his heart. Afterwards, Max and Monica would face Griffon one more time but then would discover that the true evil behind it all was an entity called Dark Element who has been possessing poor Sirus after all this time. And this mutha****a is finally going to activate the Star of Oblivion and they need to defeat him before time runs out. Sirus then wakes up and realized that he can stop the Star of Oblivion, which he did at the cost of his life. And so, our story ends with Monica and Max talking about what they have done and other stuff and Monica and his Mother traveled back to their respective time period and bid farewell. Or do they???? Upon completing the game, there is another story where the Mayor would ask Max to gather up Zelmite ore to expand the railroad, where he will later meet with Monica one more time to work together. They will encounter Flotsam once again and a new enemy named Dark Genie, from the first Dark Cloud game. And that is about it with the story of Dark Cloud 2 2. Graphics Basically, the game has a typical comic-bookish style which are pretty nice, colorful and all that good stuff. And they are consistent when transitioning from actual gameplay to the cutscenes, especially when the characters are wearing different kinds of clothing. According to Akihiro Hino, the producer of Level-5, this kind of transitioning is effective to increased empathy toward the game itself. And effective it has been. 3. Gameplay I will admit that among the action RPGs that I have played, this one is the most unusual and it was pretty unique. To begin with, there is the dungeon crawling, where you can go to randomly designed dungeons and fight off enemies until one of them gives you a gate key, which will help you leave the dungeon and go to the next stage. And unlike most RPGs where the characters level up, it is the weapons themselves that become stronger, by gathering up a sufficient amount of EXP points and synthesizing other items like crystals to improve it's effectiveness against specific enemies. If you keep on doing this, the weapons will become stronger to the point where they can be upgraded to become another weapon. And speaking of weapons, both characters can equip different kinds. Max can equip a gun and a right-hand weapon like a wrench, a hammer even a frozen fish while Monica on the other hand can equip swords and an armlet to cast magic. However the downside of these weapons is that they need to have constant maintenance since they have an HP of their own which is like the CND of Fallout 3. And to replenish that, all you need is some Repair Powder and Gun/Armband Repair Powder and your all set. Moving on, other than the weapons and skills that your character has, each of them has their own unique skill. For instance, Max can use his Ridepod (a robot) in battle, which runs on fuel and can be customized with even stronger weapons and other parts. Monica's skill is that she can transform into a certain monster depending on what Monster badge she has where she can use their own skills or interact with other monsters of the same species. If you think that this is what this game is about, then think again my friends because there is much, much more at hand. Aside from the kicking ass parts of the game, there are other ways to make you play it even more. One of them would be recreating the past to restore the future a la the Sims, where the characters have to find raw materials and orbs called Geostones to download data of what structure to make and what materials are needed. This part of gameplay is known as Georama. There is like a progression level where it is not mandatory to attain 100% but you can get incentives to achieve that goal Speaking of making stuff, you can also use this to your advantage as well. Since Max is an inventor, you can practically feel like you are him since you need to invent something like weapons, parts, even food. To do this, the player needs to use Max's camera and take a picture of ideas and try to combine three of them to form a blueprint. This can be pretty hard and it would eventually take you to the internet for guidance. There is also fishing where all you do is fish either to keep them as your pet, send it as an entry to a contest, or grill them up to replenish health. And do not forget Spheda, a form of golf where you can get rare treasures if you are able to win. One other feature is that you can recruit other characters to your side to give you some special abilities that is unique to the NPC. But you cannot recruit the NPC unless you accomplish their challenges. The one that I hated the most was the 2-minute challenge where I have to go to the boat and back again. And recruiting NPCs is mandatory since you will need them for Georama construction. And these NPCs can also sell some items for you outside of battle. Well, that about sums it up for my review of Dark Cloud 2. To put it simply, everything about this game was just perfect for me. I could play this game forever and ever. For the score: this game deserves a 10/10 Thank you so much for reading fellow g1s. If you have any questions or something else about this review that I have not talked about, please leave a comment. And I will be posting a new Villains in Video Games review the moment v4 comes out. This is nemesis274....signing out