I ranted and raved about the original, and this one is almost as good.

I was skeptical at first since I hadn't even heard of this game until years later when looking for the wiki article to the first game. I assumed it must have been a dud to fall that far under the radar, but I was wrong.

This game is a bit of give and take compared to the first one. What I mean is that the great card based combo system and gameplay of the first one is more fleshed out and feels incredible in this one. It feels like they figured out exactly how to improve their system without changing anything that worked. Over the long time this game took, I still stayed awed at how much fun combat was the whole way, something that never happens to me over the course of long RPGs.

That said, the story is overall a bit weaker. It's not bad by any means, but the original had one of the better video game stories I've seen, constantly subverting my expectations in well written and executed ways.
This game's story is just a decent RPG story. It's not bad by any means, but it was a bit predictable and overall not on the same level as that of the first Baten Kaitos.

All in all, this is an excellent game, but I do admit the first one had a stronger impact on me.