As a big fan of the first game, I didn't really know what to expect going into this one hearing a lot of negativity about how it's not really as good as the first one. But now having beaten the game I wonder.... Why is everybody lying!?
While I am definitely not going to use this game to downplay how fantastic the first one is, because really it is still amazing, I found that this game built off of that game in the best way possible. With more demons, skills, and a lot more content, and a bunch of new mechanics that fit in almost perfectly with the loop that the first game established, this game feels like it truly lives up to, and even surpasses the original in more ways than one.
I do completely understand however, if someone were to prefer the tone/story of the first game. It is very tonally different, and not all of the story beats hit as hard, just due to the overall nature of trying to show a different side of the tragedy here. I don't find it to be necessarily worse however, frankly it would have been bad if they just tried to tell the same story again, or relied on the same beats, but if I'm being completely honest I really wasn't as immersed as I was in the first game, but I still definitely enjoyed it all the same. The last act here however, I found to be infinitely more interesting/engaging than the original games.
And another thing I really like about this game over the original is how its sort of structurally designed. In this game you get access to a whole bunch of party members pretty early on, all with different strengths and weaknesses, and you're given ample time to use everyone and figure out who you like in your squad. Very unlike the first game where you're kind of stuck with the same 3 for first half, a fourth for a little while, and then right at the very end they drop so many more on you, but its almost like what's the point at that point, I'm already set.
And bosses here are MUCH better. The first game pretty much shoved in every single boss fight in the last 15% of the game. Which I found to be a downright bizarre design choice for an rpg such as this, but this game thankfully has fun and interesting boss fights sprinkled all throughout the game, which created a more interesting day to day gameplay loop.
But both of these complaints from the first game, a la characters and bosses, were backed up pretty heavily by the excellent narrative, and it all did make sense within the story it was telling, and I will never try to undermine it for that. But at the end of the day from a purely mechanics standpoint this game no doubt takes the cake in my eyes. Tl:dr, play both of them NOW.
While I am definitely not going to use this game to downplay how fantastic the first one is, because really it is still amazing, I found that this game built off of that game in the best way possible. With more demons, skills, and a lot more content, and a bunch of new mechanics that fit in almost perfectly with the loop that the first game established, this game feels like it truly lives up to, and even surpasses the original in more ways than one.
I do completely understand however, if someone were to prefer the tone/story of the first game. It is very tonally different, and not all of the story beats hit as hard, just due to the overall nature of trying to show a different side of the tragedy here. I don't find it to be necessarily worse however, frankly it would have been bad if they just tried to tell the same story again, or relied on the same beats, but if I'm being completely honest I really wasn't as immersed as I was in the first game, but I still definitely enjoyed it all the same. The last act here however, I found to be infinitely more interesting/engaging than the original games.
And another thing I really like about this game over the original is how its sort of structurally designed. In this game you get access to a whole bunch of party members pretty early on, all with different strengths and weaknesses, and you're given ample time to use everyone and figure out who you like in your squad. Very unlike the first game where you're kind of stuck with the same 3 for first half, a fourth for a little while, and then right at the very end they drop so many more on you, but its almost like what's the point at that point, I'm already set.
And bosses here are MUCH better. The first game pretty much shoved in every single boss fight in the last 15% of the game. Which I found to be a downright bizarre design choice for an rpg such as this, but this game thankfully has fun and interesting boss fights sprinkled all throughout the game, which created a more interesting day to day gameplay loop.
But both of these complaints from the first game, a la characters and bosses, were backed up pretty heavily by the excellent narrative, and it all did make sense within the story it was telling, and I will never try to undermine it for that. But at the end of the day from a purely mechanics standpoint this game no doubt takes the cake in my eyes. Tl:dr, play both of them NOW.