Haven't had regular internet in a bit, and have been very busy with life things before then, so plenty of time to play games and think about them, not much time to post... until now!
Suikoden 2 - Finished a run of this where I counted up all the lines. Science!
Suikoden 2 is one of those games I tend to think of as one of the great video game stories. It’s not my singular favourite even in its own series (that’d be 5), but it’s still pretty darn good. Playing through the game again (for the fourth time in the last two decades) and reflecting on it, here are some of the things I think it does very well:
1. Very effective use of dialog to develop its characters.
It’s funny, because Suikoden 2 has, on one level, terrible dialog, thanks to the translation. Gratuitous punctuation marks everywhere, poor word choice, misattributed lines, etc. But where it matters, the game shines through. With Jowy, for instance, the game shows rapidly and subtly that he has intelligent and resourceful, that he’s willing to do some morally questionable things to attain his ends (e.g. lighting the fire in the mercenary fort), that he feels he doesn’t belong (to his family, his country, etc.), that he feels a strong desire to (over)protect those he loves regardless of their wishes, from Riou at the start of the game to the entire nations of Highland and Jowston later. Sometimes it’s even through lack of dialog; his ellipsis-filled pause at the Jowston Council scene certainly communicates his feelings on what he witnesses there. None of this is rubbed in your face, and a lot of the characterization is relatively subtle if you aren’t watching for it, but it’s remarkable how on a replay pretty much every action the character takes is amply foreshadowed by his earlygame characterization.
I don’t think any other single character in the game is this effective overall, but certainly the same broad strokes apply to other characters, mainly Shu and Nanami, who again receive plenty of consistent characterization which informs their choices later. Viktor, Flik, and Apple aren’t as major players, but again you get a strong sense of them. Luca Blight, though he does occasionally veer a bit into cartoonish (in spite of the praise of the game’s subtly effective character work above), is certainly overall effective and memorable; he makes sense in his own twisted way, as do the ways other characters react to him. And so on. All of this combines to make the plot flow more smoothly, and make the characters fan and interesting to watch even on replays.
2. A good, coherent setting which connects to the plot, characters, and themes of the game
This is of course a strength of the series generally (although it must be noted that 1 is not nearly as good at it… 2 really got the balled rolling). Jowston is a patchwork of city-states which don’t really see eye to eye, often suspicious of each other. Highland is fanatical and deeply patriarchal (they “sacrifice” their queen for fortune in battle!). And despite the temptation to paint any one nation as just good or bad (and there’s a lot of bad in Highland), the game goes to great lengths to show that things are complicated. South Window is kind but weak. Matilda prizes honour but is very self-serving about the way it does so. Tinto is industrious and pragmatic; quick to abandon its allies as Highland invades but equally quick to admit that doing so was a mistake and sending help once the Dunan Army does a favour for them. Through Annabelle’s competence and good nature we form a naturally high opinion of Muse, but the game acknowledges that its strength is partly built on the slimy actions of her predecessor. And Highland… as mentioned, it’s an unpleasant, patriarchal mess of a nation, doubly so as we realize that one of the most unpleasant, bloodthirsty true runes is at its core. But damned if the game doesn’t also sell you on how its ideology can be seductive; Jowy seeks to harness it to do good while also minimizing the bad. And you understand how the likes of Seed and Culgan can come to love the place as their home that they have always served, and how good people can be caught in its machinery.
My main knocks on the game are the same as always. One, silent mains suck. The plot really wants to draw a contrast between Riou and Jowy, but when Riou is an poorly-characterised player stand-in, it doesn’t work as effectively as it could. The Peace Conference scene is a hell of an effective scene just because of the gutpunch it represents and how it reframes the rest of the game. But it could have been
even better if Riou had been able to articulate his own beliefs there, or the next time they met, and make the stakes of the conflict clear. The game tries to work around this issue by giving Nanami a lot of the dialog that Riou might otherwise have, but Nanami is her own person with her own ideas (in particular, she
hates any conflict with Jowy while Riou appears sees it as sadly necessary, and a talking Riou would have done great service to this difference).
Two, far too much of the story is driven by men. Nanami has the most lines, but to a large extent she’s an observer, only rarely shaping events. Apple is largely in the story to be replaced by the thoroughly more competent Shu and then carry out the more menial parts of the strategist’s role. Jillia and Pilika are largely characters that things happen to, and at best we get their opinions on them afterward. Otherwise, this is the story of Riou and Jowy, of Shu and Luca and Leon, of Viktor and Flik. It’s a place where the game shows its age; I would like to think that the game would have a few more major female players and voices if it were made today, or at least that there’d be more of an outcry about this issue (it feels like it went virtually unnoticed when the game was new).
But it’s a great yarn overall, no question.
I have less to say about the rest of the game, obviously. The gameplay is quietly competent, which is better than I would say for Suikoden 4 onwards and certainly “good enough” considering the game’s other strengths, though not something I’d ever play the game for in and of itself. Enemies have enough teeth to be worth paying attention to and the rune system is pretty fun. The soundtrack is solid. I’m not a huge fan of the game’s sprite style but it does some great work with their animation details at times. Really, though, the rest of the package just rounds the game out in a nice way, leaving you with a very overall satisfying product. I was never the game’s number one fan back in the day (I’ve always preferred Suikoden 3), but it’s a game I respect a lot, and a game that has aged very well despite its obvious flaws.
8/10
Paper Mario 2 - Played through and beat this.
Gameplaywise it’s really rather shockingly similar to the first game. HP/FP/BP and the way you choose your levelups, the badge system, the partners (the first two partners are even the same first two from PM1 with a new coat of paint), jump/hammer and the way each upgrades, the enemy design... I’ve seen all this before!). There are just enough differences to keep me interested (the fact that partners take damage, and the action order of Mario and the partner determining who gets targeted more makes for some interesting decisions at least), but overall it’s more of the same. And that’s not bad considering PM’s gameplay was always a strong point in its favour.
There are a lot of badges which raise your damage, and naturally I used as many as I could. I feel like the game would be a lot harder if you didn’t; there were so many random formations (not to mention bosses who summon support) which I could take out in one round because of my power-twinking and I often feel like if I couldn’t I would have a bad time. As is none of the bosses killed me, though a few (Chapter 1 boss, Chapter 7 boss, and the final) came reasonably close. (Chapter 2 and 6 bosses stand out as bad on the other hand.) Certainly a game with lots of potential for challenge runs, like the first.
The writing is more engaging than the first game… and certainly more surreal. PM1 is honestly probably the most generic of the Mario RPGs writing-wise. This one isn’t anything amazing, but it’s probably in the upper half, and has more of those crazy moments I associate with Mario RPGs. Highlights (spoilers abound):
-The Peach sequences from PM1 are back but they don’t involve Bowser so to make things interesting her main interactions are with this computer (self-described as the perfect computer) which develops a creepy crush on her.
-After you beat a certain chapter boss (unusually early, too!), you get the big celebratory end-of-chapter music… and then Mario leaves the screen and you realise you’re in control of the boss’s old body now. Yes this game does Chrono Cross’s big scene better than CC does it.
-There is one scene where one character demands another says “I love you” 100 times. He actually does it, and the game counts.
-There is one sequence where you are told repeatedly not to look at a certain book. If you do it anyway, the game warns you three times to see if you are sure. Then it plotkills you. There’s also a non-standard game over in the endgame which amused me too.
-The main villain is unceremouniously crushed by Bowser who falls on him randomly, after the latter spent the entire game bumbling around ineffectively. (Bowser remains a joy in these games.)
The game does have some negatives compared to the first… mostly it feels a bit slower in a few ways (walking speed is too slow and the spinjump which allowed faster movement is gone, not enough fast travel / dungeon escape options) and some parts are definitely a bit gameplay-light for my tastes (such as the train chapter). But overall I think I enjoyed it more anyway, though both end up as 7/10 to me.
Partner notes:
Goombella: Benefits more than average from all the power-boosting you can do, tends to end up with incredibly high damage if the enemy has low defence. Later she can also transfer turns to Mario who has more damage still, so hey, that’s nice. Whereas Goombario didn’t really stand out, Goombella is in the running for MVP.
Koops: The other character in the running for MVP, just because he has a 3 FP MT attack. He also has 1 def, which is cool, and a crippling weakness to jump attacks, which isn’t, but doesn’t come up too often at least. Early on the defence is nice, later on his MT gets better and better relatively. The other character in the running for MVP.
Flurrie: Flurrie plays a role that only PM2 could allow, the party tank. Good HP and Lip Lock is an incredible draining move: high damage, works on spiky/flying/etc. enemies, ignores defence, so it has a pure offensive niche on top of basically keeping Flurrie alive indefinitely and allowing you to relentlessly troll enemies who can’t target your back character.
Baby Yoshi: Probably the weak link of the party, he appears to specialize in damage to zero defence but isn’t as good at it as Goombella. His real niche is probably Gulp which does def-ignoring damage to two targets, so when you’re up against exactly two high-def enemies, he’s your guy.
Vivian: They nerfed Outta Sight! And y’know it still manages to be quite useful in certain situations. Otherwise she has a 6 FP attack which can hit everything except fire immunes, so that’s good. The best partner against the final boss as both those moves were really valuable, which makes sense narratively I suppose.
Bobbery: Can blow himself up for the strongest MT attack available to any partner. It costs 9 FP but sometimes it’s just what you need. Also has high HP. There’s not much else to say about him, but he’s solid.
I missed the mouse PC.
Super Mario Bros. 2 - Also replayed this again.
