An improvement in many ways from it's predecessor. Suikoden 2 boasts one of the best stories of any RPG ever with many twists and turns. Although all 108 stars of destiny don't get equal time in the sun story wise, an amazing amount of them have unique and (mostly) enjoyable personalities that really add to the story. Personal standouts are Viktor, Flik, Shu, and Lucia even though she comes in super late to the story. The battle system is more robust than the last entry although it does suffer from a similar problem that Suikoden 1 had which was there's a "I win" rune that makes all battles extremely trivial. There's a lot of different ways you can build characters, but the most optimal ways to build them are very easy to exploit. If you care to get all 108 characters, (along with saving Nanami) you'll be rewarded with a very touching ending between the main trio of characters. But also, the late game recruits are SUPER busted, so I found it more fun to use lesser used characters (Oulan and Humphrey were outstanding).
The little side things are fun as well, with the personal highlight for me being the cooking competition. One of the most addictive things in the game.
Major downer for me is the letdown of a Final Boss for those who don't seek the True Ending, and the fact that the localization is shoddy at best. Lots of mistakes especially towards the end of the game.
Also, although I didn't necessarily hate the "Fire Emblem lite" major battles, they just dragged on and on when you seemingly should be blowing them away.
Fantastic game though, everyone should play it if you like RPGs, but I do recommend playing Suikoden 1 first, there's a lot of references to the previous entry