Review: Lufia 2: Rise of the Sinistrals

And here's the second part of this series, if a little late.


Lufia 2: Rise of the Sinistrals

Lufia 2 is a really solid SNES RPG. It's a fairly typical sword-and-sorcery RPG set in a pretty typical world. First of all, the targetting system from Lufia was ditched (thankfully), using instead the more typical "target anyone you want with anything" system that most RPG's use. A good choice - like I said earlier, just because something is unique doesn't mean that it's good, or even interesting.

Perhaps the most noticable change between Lufia and Lufia 2 (after the targetting system) is the dungeons. Namely, Lufia 2's dungeons are actually interesting and engaging. They accomplish this by (at least to me, and other people that have played it around me) very well-tuned puzzles. Their solutions aren't usually so obvious as to jump out at you, but also not too hard as to keep you trapped in a dungeon until you look up the solution online. These puzzles are really what makes Lufia 2 a great game - it keeps you thinking, and keeps you interested.

Beyond the well-tuned puzzles to keep dungeons interesting, combat was also made much more interesting with the addition of IP's and capsule monsters. IP's are powers that you can use based on the items you have currently equipped - you use a certain amount of your IP bar (which refills as you get hit) to use an ability that one of your items has - which can range from dealing damage to healing to buffing and pretty much anything else. This makes equipment choice more interesting than in many RPG's, as you have to take into account the item's power rather than just its raw stats. Obviously, however, the main advantage is to give physical characters something to do when they're not just using a basic attack - and it gives casters another option as well.

Capsule monsters, while less important than the IP system, also help to spice up combat, as well as provide you with another thing to do outside of combat. Capsule monsters, in combat, are basically just another party member, with a few restrictions - they can't be directly controlled, and you can't heal them. They are automatically resurrected after battle and healed to full. They provide a source of interesting occurances in battle - you go "yay!" when either the monster wastes a powerful attack hitting the capsule monster, or when the capsule monster does something especially awesome - for example, busting out his most powerful attack and owning an enemy. You collect capsule monsters by finding them throughout the world - in dungeons is a typical place to find them, as a reward for exploring an extra corner of the dungeon. A few are also tucked in different parts of the world that you wouldn't otherwise go to, like an underground cave or a shrine on an obscure island.

Out of combat, capsule monsters are an interesting diversion. You can feed them, and they can evolve to higher forms. You feed them your leftover items. Once they are fed enough, they'll evolve. It seems pretty basic, but it really is an interesting diversion, and something to look forward too when your capsule monster is about to evolve. And seeing their fancy new powers after they've evolved is always fun too.

(This game came out quite a bit pre-pokemon, in case you were wondering and hadn't looked it up.)

Another thing that this game fixed over Lufia 1 is the random battles. No longer are they truly random - you can see (and avoid) the enemy sprites in the dungeon, and actually sneak up on some of them if you're careful. Getting in first on enemies in this game is determined by how your sprites are positioned pre-battle - if you get behind them, you get a free round at the beginning of combat, if they're behind you, they get one. If you are facing their side, then there's something like a 50% chance you'll get in first, and the same thing if they are facing your side. Additionally, you can stun the enemy sprites by shooting them with arrows - a nice feature, and one that can allow you to sneak up on enemies more easily, or simply avoid them if you're not interested. Different enemy types also have different movement patterns in the dungeons - for example, bulls will rush at you, but undead might wander aimlessly. This is yet another thing that really helps bring the dungeons to life in this game.

One interesting thing - while in dungeons you can see the random encounters coming, on the overworld they are truly random. I don't think that the game really suffers for this - the overworld encounters are neither too common nor too hard. The only time that this might be considered annoying is when you're sailing, but even then it's quite reasonable. It's actually kind of nice, if you want to gain a bit of xp or gold that you don't have to track down the enemies, but just wander around on the overworld for a bit.

Also, random encounter difficulty was toned way down, thankfully, as was boss difficulty. One of my few complaints about this game might be that the final bosses are too easy, but all in all, this game's difficulty is far more reasonable and fun than Lufia 1's.

The side quests in Lufia 2 are also much more interesting (and, you know, there) - Lufia 1 had a couple, but generally they just weren't interesting. Lufia 2, however, has a very good casino, collectable dragon eggs, collectable capsule monsters, and the Ancient Cave. I won't get into the details of these, but suffice to say that they're all, especially the Ancient Cave, quite interesting.

Last but certainly not least is the plot. Lufia 2's plot is leaps and bounds above Lufia 1's, and the characters are even better. The plot keeps you engaged, rather than being a snoozefest like Lufia 1's There's not really much more to say about that - it's not exactly the best plot ever, but it does its job just fine, and keeps the players engaged to the end. I will say, however, that the characters are really what keeps you watching - they're just fantastically written, even by today's standards.

That said, Lufia 2 is by no means the perfect game. You still can't see a numerical amount of HP in combat, you just get equal length bars for everyone. The monster translation is still bizzarely terrible compared to the main game's translation - "gorem" instead of "golem" is a common one, and there's many others as well. The battle system, while much more interesting that Lufia 1's, could probably use some work - it's still fairly simplistic, if passable, by today's standards.

Lessons to be learned:

The main thing to learn from Lufia 2 over any other RPG (including Lufia 1) is to learn from the mistakes of the past - see what went wrong with previous games, and correct them. See what previous games did right, and emulate them. Don't just make the same mistakes over and over, and don't abandon what worked in the past.

Capsule monsters are an interesting thing – they are collectible monsters that fight along side you, but they are a relatively minor part of the game. Very few games have monster collection as part of the game and yet minor – I like it. It’s a good way to add pseudo party members with an elemental theme and little to no backstory. Plus, they can serve as good and interesting rewards for particularly challenging puzzles or fights off the beaten path.

An interesting combat system and interesting dungeon design are key. Level designers should be given more credit by players than they are.

A game’s characters and good writing can make up for a relatively formulaic plot and gameplay. City, dungeon, city, dungeon… it’s most of what Lufia is, but it works nonetheless. Indeed, you may fail to even notice it (at least in a bad way) until after you beat the game.



In closing, Lufia 2 is just really a great game that took pretty much everything that was wrong with Lufia 1 and made it awesome, keeping the few good things from Lufia 1. If you can, you should really consider picking this game up. It's a pity that Lufia 3 and 4 aren't more like this game - Lufia 3 borks up the combat system to an extreme degree, and has too many party members. Maybe I'll talk about it sometime, but Lufia 3 seems to have forgotten that just because something is unique doesn't make it good. While its combat system is better than Lufia 1's, it tries to be too interesting and just ends up being less good than the admittedly relatively formulaic Lufia 2's. Additionally, its characters (perhaps because there are so many PC's) just aren't as fun or interesting as Lufia 2's, nor is its plot as good. I've never personally played Lufia 4, but I've heard that it's little more than a mediocre Pokemon clone with a Lufia name and a few characters from Lufia 2.

Next week, I think I'll talk about a couple of genres of games in detail.