Definitely should've been Kuro 1.5 but what else is new with Falcom. Although it got a bit silly at times, I can appreciate that they tried to make the game more interesting than Kuro 1. Which is why both of them shouldve been one game or this one be a large DLC for the first game.

Combat is the peak of the series at this point, they've really hit their stride on character animations, with highlights being Shizuna, Swin, and Renne's crafts. They are so stylish and fast paced that this feels like what Falcom games would be if they had any budget.

Music is more consistently good than the previous one, but with less standout tracks. Overall I'd say that is an improvement over listening to the singa boss themes of Kuro 1 a million times. Koguchi's boss theme is one of the best boss themes of the series, and the Marchen Garten battle theme is my favourite of this game, I hope Falcom gives him more battle tracks.

One of my favourite parts of this game was the addition of the Marchen Garten, similar to the reverie corridor but the environments in this one are seriously gorgeous to look at. It's also a really fun place to just get your fill of combat in between long story beats or side quest hell.

The prologue is literally the best prologue of the entire series, the tone and writing is honestly great. It was an amazing way to begin the game. The rest of the story feels quite self contained in the Calvard Arc, and there is very little progression for the overall Kiseki story, which I was disappointed about. I look forward to the lore dump that is coming in Kuro 3 that will make me appreciate the first two games more, thanks falcom.

LASTLY, the final boss, wow. The most fun and insane final boss fight in the series, I love how creative they got with this one.

Im not really a big fan of the Calvard Arc so far, i already had problems with Kuro 1 and when i got into Chrimson Sin i was at first fairly intrigued with the story and the new time travel mechanic, sadly it didnt took long to notice how poorly this is implemented. My biggest Problem with it is that it happens way to often and you have barely any option to prevent that, i think the only time you can is 2 times in Act 2, if it would work like there i wouldn't mind it at all but the way it is it takes any meaning from the horrible things that the game shows me especially in Act 3. Oh boy Act 3 while i really enyoed Act 1-2 and the finale, Act 3 really takes this game down for me. Its like the same as CS4 but worse and it drags way to long, i dont get why it has to 6 times the same thing rinse and repeat, at this point van and crew must be the most incompetent chars in trails on how often they would have died this is just frustrating.

The rant aside Kuro 2 does a great thing in giving characters more time to develop not only the Calvard cast but also the returning chars have very good character arcs, Story wise Act 1 and 2 were very good and if Act 3 wasnt that bad that would be a 4 or 4.5 Stars for me, fishing is back which is always a plus, great gameplay as always and very hardwarming finale which might be my fav moment in the arc so far.

Kuro no Kiseki II is a sequel that exists for the sake of existing. The game is padded out because it’s essentially one chapter that could’ve fit in Kuro no Kiseki 1 and is padded out to over 60 hours by reintroducing past character arcs and building on them, or exploring side characters that might have been half-baked in the first game. The game’s main focus is less on the progression of where Kuro will go next, and more on developing the current cast and past existing characters. As a result, you can find a lot of great character scenes, for main cast, side cast, and even the NPCs, but it doesn’t contribute to the Calvard arc on a grand scale.

The gameplay is improved with EX chains which are basically Team Attacks brought back but with two characters only, and the ability to use Arts in field combat. That’s essentially it. Very minor tweaks.

I was excited for this game and wanted to love this game as my other diehard friends, but just actually being able to read and understand Japanese, therefore the plot which nobody really talks about on backloggd, that the honeymoon phase quickly ended around 25 hours in when I hit Act 3, which is possibly the worst thing that has ever graced the Kiseki franchise. The characters die every five steps they take in the story, character betrayals through CS4’s “The Curse 2.0” is in full effect, and then the entire 15 hour journey throughout the chapter is retconned and never happened, and instead of clapping that it was great and had you on your feet, it would make you say “Thank god, it’s over” and then the game follows up with a small break and then the finale concludes the game within like two hours with a very short final dungeon. I’m just shocked how they handled that because The first 40 hours or so of this game was extremely solid and the world building is so strong and all the hints were there to who the main villain was, who the secondary main villain was, but they needlessly padded out the game with the third act.

I still like the game as I like the Kuro cast, but I think Kuro 1 is honestly the better game story-wise. Emotional-wise, this game is built on top of Kuro 1’s strong foundation and Hajimari/Reverie’s foundation.

I have a full English summary of the game’s plot, sidequests, and NPC journeys here:
https://www.tumblr.com/yuki-boshi/698247856523460608/

But for anyone who comes across this backloggd and wants a truncated summary, I can explain it here too that you can share with friends:

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Van investigates a serial killer case with Elaine involving the Desire Gang group, leading them to meeting a red Grendel (Grendel-Zolga) with its own Hollow Core AI named Altera and he proceeds to kill the two. Agnes’s Genesis triggers and rewinds time, letting them live by choosing different decisions based on the premonitions of their upcoming death. Swin and Nadia join to fight against Grendel-Zolga and join the Spriggans as proxies for Van in Edith as he leaves the city to investigate “Almata’s Legacy.”

Meanwhile, Maribel from Marduk reaches out to everyone that their new virtual reality space, the Marchen Garden that can fully recreate and replicate locations, smell, sound, and touch was hacked by an unknown entity, and Van and his helpers are tasked with clearing and fixing it floor by floor from time to time.

In Chapter 1-A, Messeldam, Van meets with Judith, who is filming a movie with her rival actress Nina, and brings Quatre along with them. Van runs into a boy named Luka who is being chased by the mafia and his suitcase reveals photos of a Genesis, and that it belonged to his father. The father went missing and the boy wants the group to find his dad. Meeting up with Judith and Quatre, they raid a building owned by Zect Arms, who supplied Almata with its weapons and find nothing related to Almata’s legacy, but find incriminating evidence of the company. The group also has two Gralsritters join their team, Celis and Rion. They discover that Almata’s Legacy is actually the Eighth Genesis, and the father, named Glasgow used to be a former Almata member who drove the truck that contained the Reactor Weapon. Driven by guilt, but inspired by Van and his friends, he intends to pay his time in prison by using the knowledge he has on Almata and other groups for good, but is killed by “Luka” who reveals to be a boy by the name of Ixs.

In Chapter 1-B, Edith, Swin and Nadia team up with Elaine and investigate constant Orbal power outages. Their investigation leads them to an abandoned sector in the Darklight District where they find a reconstructed Aurora from Kuro no Kiseki 1 that summons reject Grendels called Demi-Grendels that can’t be defeated normally. The team is killed countless times no matter who they bring in additionally to help, but eventually they team up with Walter from the Society and Zin from the Bracer Guild and destroy the Black Aurora. The Hollow AI accompanying Grendel-Zolga named Altera is thought to have stolen the data code that makes up Elysium, sharing the same code base as Lapis, who had recently fallen into a coma and she vanishes from the scene.

In Chapter 2-A, Langport, Van helps Aaron deal with the Heiyue Civil War by stopping the Lai family rebellion. Shortly after however, Fan Lu is arrested on reports of “tax evasion” and Gien Lu is poisoned. To make matters worse, a new martial artist from the Lai family is seen leading the remaining remnants of the family named Gouran serves as Spriggan’s antagonist. Shizuna appears before the group, asking for their help to take her to the Sea Cave for an odd job she picked up, but they refuse. Kasim from Marduk teams up with Van as they investigate the Sea Cave as well, claiming that the Marduk AI has deemed the area to be a Red Zone Area and to intervene. The group find Gouran holding a Genesis fragment, and Shizuna aids Gouran as part of her contract against the group. The fragment, however, is taken by a third party from a girl named Jolda who can slip in and out of the darkness to teleport. The group realizes that Cao Lee is in fact behind everything and with the help of Society Anguis Lucrezia and Shizuna who decides to join the team, they raid the Langport Station to stop Cao as he holds Ashen hostage. When they arrive, Cao reveals that he planned everything so that he could reinstate the Lee Family back into Heiyue and the other Heiyue heads (Fan and Gien) are unable to stop Cao due to concerns of dividing and weakening Heiyue further in the public and underworld eye. Cao however does give the group the Genesis fragment.

In Chapter 2-B, still in Edith, Towa Herschel joins Aramis temporarily on an international exchange. Swin and Nadia use their connection to join Aramis High as short term exchange students and Agnes tours them around the school, and everyone gets acquainted with Odette and Albert. They receive an e-mail from “C” who tells them to explore Aramis. Initially, they think it means Aramis High School and do a bunch of side quests to help the school out. However, Odette and Albert are killed by a C4 planted in the Science Lab room and the timeline is reset, allowing the Swin to stop the threat. However, a group of anti-immigrant radicalists take over the school and hold immigrant students hostage. Towa attempts to leverage her position in the “Zemuria Opinion” to have their concerns be heard, but a terrorist unswayed shoots at Shinyon, a black-haired student. Towa tries to protect her, but is killed, and Shinyon is killed as well. The timeline is reset, and Swin is able to prevent the mass shooting from occurring by taking out the radicalists the night before. However, upon arriving to school, remnants of the Organization “Garden” attack them. With Renne and Kincaid’s help, the group discover that C’s message literally meant a statue of Aramis and they discover an underground ruin and previously undiscovered landmark that was pivotal in the Calvard Revolution. They reach the Basement and find Altera hiding out and summoning Demi-Grendels. The group defeat her and realize that she didn’t steal Lapis’s power or code base, but she is Lapis herself, but they are unable to reach her as a masked man claiming himself to be the Garden Master appears and is revealed to be Nadia’s deceased brother, Ace, who leaves with Altera.

In the following chapter intermission, both teams combine and are invited out to a resort on Nemeth Island with every organization, both good and bad. After beach activities, the group discover strange altars not used in the typical Aididos worship and discover an abandoned Church not too far off from the resort. The next morning, the group find Ixs and is lured into a trap meeting Elroy Harwood, who betrays the Society and kills everyone on the island through Poison Gas. In the reset timeline, the group manages to outwit Ixs and ask Harwood his intentions, but is put through a death game where since they know of the poison gas, they can’t tell anyone or he will detonate it anyway. He tasks them with doing a tour of Nemeth Island to discover its origin and secret. The group gets killed countless times but is saved by the timeline resets and discovers that the island was the base of operation for the previously dangerous DG cult, a satanic cult that denounced the current religion of worship and wished to recreate the world with demonic god entities. Renne is subjected to a Pieroma Grass, and her suppressed trauma surfaces, along with a dormant personality of a boy in her abused youth, taking control of her body. Together with the other Society members, the group push Harwood back and Renne is given back control of her body and is able to fully move on, and is a little embarrassed that Agnes now knows the truth behind her past. The group find tombstones and decide to create a proper burial spot for all the children that were previously kidnapped and experimented on for the DG cult’s scheme. In addition, Quatre’s past also comes to surface as he is brainwashed by Harwood and is empowered by the altars on the island, taking an angelic form known as Quatre-Angelis. Harwood explains that Quatre is a Vessel of the Gods, meant to house the demonic god entities as he was experimented on to have his sense of self and personality inhibited and removed. The group is able to stop him and bring him back to his senses and delve into the undergrounds of the island, discovering the Gate of the Ghost World, with Harwood using the Genesis fragment to trigger a summoning of a demonic god. The group is able to stop this thanks to Renne’s strategy and are barely able to stop it from manifesting into the world. Swin then double crosses the team and steals all the Genesis except for one, giving it to Ace, as his promise with Ace is more important than his relationship with Nadia and the Spriggans and they all depart.

In Chapter Three, Nadia leaves on her own to search for Swin and the group receive a tip from Bermotti after doing sidequests with Towa to head into the Darklight district. The group find Ashen with a Genesis, who is distraught and has her memories eroded into thinking Van and Aaron killed Cao and they’re both killed by an unknown assailant. In the timeline reset, they get the help of Shizuna who tells them that Kurogane is on a secret mission unknown to even her and they discover that he’s aiding Ashen in killing the group. They manage to snap her out of the erosion with Shizuna’s Spirit Unification and take the Genesis off her hands. Van receives an e-mail from Bergard asking him to meet down in the ruins, but he is killed by Celis who is distraught that Bergard died trying to save Van. In the next timeline, he tries to enter the subway through other means, by Ashrad also is eroded and has a mission against Van. Rion, the only one uneroded, aids Van in escaping.

After more countless timeline resets, they are saved by the other Spriggans and fight against Ashrad and Celis in a recreation of Oracion through the Marchen Garden. Celis, eroded, is swayed by her sense of justice and responsibility and attacks the connection between her and the Garden Master, freeing herself. Together, Rion and Celis activate their stigma and escape the Marchen Garten with the group with Celis apologizing to Van. The following day in Van’s office, the group is ambushed in his office and he suffers gun wounds before being killed by a C4 being thrown into his room. Time resets to two days prior, and instead of looking into what Bergard has sent him, he investigates the anti-terrorist remnants who demand to have their forces released from custody. They find out their next attack is the Grand Prix race at the Grand Circuit where they witness Maxim racing against Athrun, and both are killed when their vehicles blow up shortly after the race. They reset time and find out that Athrun’s car was bugged and they handle the terrorist group, but discover that Athrun and Maxim still die. Lastly, they find out that Maxim has been corrupted, and is led to believe that Athrun is Paulette’s boyfriend and has been domestically abusing her, intending to kill him. They prevent this and he drives away to the Dirke Memorial Park. They stop Maxim and it’s revealed that Yume was the first person eroded and the cause for everything as she didn’t like Athrun, and drops the Genesis she’s been holding on to. The next day, Van survives the office attack, and finds out it is Marduk who ambushed the office. Van also discovers that Kasim, Feri, and Risette have been eroded, and is subsequently killed in many time loops trying to find a way out. They manage to eventually get through to Risette and Kasim, while Feri needs encouragement from the memories of Aida to break out of the erosion. T the group can talk to Walter and Lucrezia, who tell them that Harwood rejoined the Society, and that Walter is in charge of watching over Ixs and Jolda. That evening, the city is under fire by the army, and an airship crashes into the group, killing Van and the others.

Time resets back to after the Maxim incident, but before Feri and Risette go rogue. The group discover the source of the erosion for the army going rogue at the Hotel in Saiden, where Naje and Esmeray are eroded into believing that Sherid has colluded with President Gramheart and that he needs to be brought to justice. The girls kidnap Professor Hamilton and Princess Zita and escape on an airship. Through Professor Cronkite and Hermes’s help, they are able to snap the two out of it and discover that their distortion was just a relay point, and another source has been detected at the 11th Army Division’s base. They find Demi-Grendels there and Bracer Alvis and CID Agent Kaela, both eroded claiming that they were ordered from the higher ups to arrest Gramheart for treason. The group stop them and find out that Cody is leading a coup to take out Gramheart. Meanwhile, Zin and Kilika are eroded and create Shard Bodies separate from their main body and are revealed to be the ones who helped stage the coup. The group manage to defeat Zin, Kilika, and Cody with the help of basically everyone, including Cao, Gien, Ashen, and Gouran coming to their aid. However, they are too late and the Garden Master completely envelops the city with the Crimson erosion which disintegrates everyone affected by it. Nadia appears after being missing for the entire chapter, giving Agnes the 7th Genesis before dying.

Time resets all the way back to the beginning of Chapter 3, effectively erasing everything that had happened up to this point, but the cast somehow find that all the Genesis have been returned to them minus the one that the Garden Master has. They head to Ventaille District and inspect the Dirke statue and get a weird sensation from it with Agnes mentioning that the Aramis statue had a whole ruins underneath it. The group go to the Dirke Memorial Park and with Lucrezia’s help is able to cut through space and find themselves inside the “Vanity Garden”, the Garden Master’s true hideout. Swin is revealed to not be erosion at all and is doing this out of his own free will as long as he recognizes that the Garden Master is Ace.

The group push back the Garden Master and Grendel-Zolga, who reveals that Zolga is in fact a nobody, and is simply a simulated being that was within the Eighth Genesis. The Garden Master himself tries to kill Nadia and Swin betrays him thanks to Zolga’s help, and doesn’t recognize him as Ace. The Garden Master’s true identity is Auguste the Thinker, one of the four pioneers that were pinnacle to the Calvard Revolution. He reveals that a civil war resulted in him dying, but that a certain cult existing at the time (The DG Cult) had revived his consciousness and he had been able to witness everything up to the modern day. It is said he received a body to inhabit from Melchior, based on the data of the Garden’s strongest, which was the Ace of Swords. The group defeat Auguste who laments being unable to rewrite history and redo everything from the past hundred years and the Vanity Garden start to collapse. Swin and Nadia are sucked into a hole when they try to save Altera, and the real Ace appears to save them and purifies Altera back into Lapis for them before saying his goodbyes and thank you to Swin and Nadia. In this new timeline, Cao and Ashen are able to reconcile properly with Aaron’s help, Maxim and Athrun race fairly with no biases, and Celis, Rion, and Van meet up.

In the final act, it’s revealed the Genesis have stopped functioning and technically, Agnes’s request is now fulfilled, but she stays along as Van’s assistant because there are still mysteries that need to be solved regarding the Genesis’s connection Mare and Grendel and he needs the extra help. Shizuna offers to be his assistant too, but Van immediately rejects her. Going downstairs, Agnes, eating breakfast is thinking of Van, potentially trying to confess, but she doesn’t and Van asks what’s on her mind but she doesn’t say anything. The Aramis art festival finally happens, and Van is given the choice to either spend it with Elaine or Agnes. When the schoolplay starts, Van leaves and heads to Triton Mall, responding to an e-mail from “C”, but he finds Nina, the acting leader (they don’t actually have one) of the Iscarions, who intends to take out C herself. However she relents and lets Van handle it and the group is transported to him. Agnes tells him to reflect on his actions for trying to burden everything on his own again.

The group enter a portal, discovering that the Genesis stopped functioning because its very “concept” and power was being used to sustain the space known as the Octradium. They defeat Harwood, Ixs, and Jolda who have snuck in and Harwood tells the group that the two kids have joined as Enforcers of the Society.

Van and the group reach the top and figure out that the identity of the man in the black coat, “C” is an existence between the letters B&D, or rather the reverse, D&B, aka Dingo Brad. The Eighth Genesis is a device revealed to observe humanity’s sin and faults, and that the past deleted timelines through the resert were merely a byproduct of its observational abilities and that Dingo was the person who was “stored” in the core of the Genesis before he died due to the Eighth Genesis being connected to the Orbal Network to monitor it. He thanks the group because the Eighth Genesis fell into the Garden Master, Auguste’s hands, and he became a puppet in his quest to redo history. However, he states he can do his original purpose now, and turns into Grendel Zolga Sin who intends to defeat the group, and by doing so, will be able to converge all the dead end timelines into the present as that is what the Eighth Genesis wills because it will reach the “Final Observation”. Grendel-Zolga is able to transport the users all throughout time to fight recreations of past villains, but he is ultimately defeated by the group. Lapis is able to bring Marielle in thanks to a certain someone (Rufus). Dingo reunites with Marielle before telling the group that this observation the Eighth Genesis was looking at isn’t the final one, and there’s one more after. Agnes realizes it has to do with the notes she saw in the beginning of Kuro 1 asking someone to obtain all Eight Genesis before it’s too late.

The game ends with the group rushing to the last act of the schoolplay and a surprise visit from Fie and Rixia join the performance. In the basketball court, Agnes wonders what their next move should be because the connection with the Genesis, Mare, and Grendel is still unanswered. She also attempts to convey her feelings to Van, but knows she will lose to Elaine and essentially doesn’t.. Yume wishes to dance with Agnes, and then with Van afterward, with Shizuna asking that Van dance with her too, and Renne asks for one after. Fie jokingly tells Elaine that she has it rough as there are so many opponents she has to deal with. Elaine denies Fie’s teasing and Van goes running at everyone, concluding the main story game (without DLC).

In the free-DLC update which is accessed through NG+:

The group are at the Marchen Garten, still surprised it’s still hacked. Elaine is uncertain about the cause. Agnes says that it should’ve all stopped because it was the Garden Master and the Eighth Genesis’s fault.

Mirabel comes through as a projection to the party, testing the mic if it’s working, and saying that new areas have been unlocked and she’s analyzing the Garden with Lapis. Nadia is surprised and Lapis tells her it’s because it seemed intriguing to her, and Mirabel bribed her with sweets. She explains that she learned two things, one is that outside hacking influences are no longer affecting the Marchen Garten, and that there’s some kind of unknown information structure in the virtual world. Mirabel explains that it’s the direct cause for affecting MK’s system and Renne thinks it must be Auguste’s backup plan by planting this. Van and the group decide to start investigating and are surprised that they have two additional guests joining them, Zin and Fie. Fie had just come back to the Republic and made it in time. Zin says he’s arrived to make up for the fact of orchestrating the coup during Act 3, indicating he remembers the events now.

At the end of Floor 16, they discover the origin point of the hacking. They find a space, or a gap between the Floors. According to Lapis, these coordinates are unmistakably the origin point. A voice enters all their heads, saying “Van Arkride, The False Demon King”, and the antitheses of the Final Boss from the first game during the events of the Pandemonium appears. A being that is its opposite. It calls Van again the false king and that it is the real one, the “Faceless White Demon King Metatross-Zion”. Van says that it can complain all it wants about him being the fabrication all he wants after it goes down and the group fights it.

After it’s defeated, it loses its color and darkens, and Rion says it’s incorrect for it to be considered the Demon Lord as it calls itself the true existence of everything. However, Van calls it simply just a recreated existence that’s an irregularity within the Marchen Garten. Celis follows up saying that the real one was used once by the DG cult and Rion calls it the Apocryphal book Ezeru, with Judith saying it was a forbidden tome that contained madness. Van knows it very well because he was forced to read it every single day as a prisoner when being experimented on by Gerard. This forbidden book was used by Auguste as the basis to hack Marduk and gain access to the Garden. Mare appears also to confirm that it is the unknown information structure and it has lost its purpose as it has gone berserk.

They defeat it again, and it vanishes with Lapis confirming it. Agnes apologizes to Celis and Rion for being unable to retrieve the Ezel book, but she reveals that they already have the one real one from the DG cult and it was in Bergard’s hands.

Mirabel appears as a hologram congratulating everyone, asking what the rundown was. Van asks if he can explain later and if they can all go. The group comments that the technology for the Marchen Garten wasn’t bad as they could meet with anyone from any distance as if it was the real thing if it didn’t fall in the wrong hands. Mirabel says they can have the place to themselves now that it’s all done until they can reset the Garten back to its original and update it.

April 12th, at Triton Mall, specifically, Triton Tower, a radio discusses the Aramis Art Festival and that there will be an important announcement by the President the following day. Professor Hamilton can be heard talking that things have gone a lot sooner than expected, thinking it’s thanks to Cronkite, or rather President Gramheart. She is seen watching what happened in the Octradium where Dingo says he’ll leave everything to Professor Hamilton. On the radio, there’s an announcement of eastthe ern expansion of Calvard to create a Space base. Professor Hamilton is shown holding Dingo’s hat and is revealed to have picked it up shortly after Van left the Octradium, thanking him for his contribution, and now they’re on schedule to being able to make it to “that time”

To be continued… Kuro no Kiseki Final Chapter!