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Breath of Fire II Capcom - 1996 Breath of Fire. If you have never touched this genre and want a plot, play 4 first. If you like that, play the others. If you want a mindless game, go get 1. It's on the Advance. My order goes as follows: 4,3,1,2. The plots, while could possibly be connected, don't have enough in common to want you to play them in any order. Just remember, while Ryu and Nina are in all of them, they are different Ryus and Ninas, so you don't get more powerful characters, a la Suikoden or Arc the Lad. Now on to the review. Attention: If you want to get your Breath of Fire groove on, and can't find a copy of it for the SNES, or are a sad person indeed who doesn't own an SNES, then you can now find it rereleased for the Advance. Go buy it now, handheld style. Breath of Fire II. Take Breath of Fire I, and add some plot in the beginning and end, add a cat-girl, giant armadillo, and Shamans who combine with your characters, and you've got BoF2. It's basically the same as 1, but they try for some plot in there, every now and then. Seriously though, during the middle, I think that BoF1 had more plot than 2. 2 just keeps the sidequests going over sidequests, over sidequests. So confusing, I couldn't keep up. The plot is as follows. Ryu's mother, the dragon you see at the beginning, (well wasn't it obvious?) we assume stopped the evil Death Evans from taking over the world, but only sealed him away. (Kinda like Tyr/Myria in BoF1.) You somehow get put in a world where people don't know you, and meet Bow. Then you grow up, go on about a bagillion side quests, find out you are a dragon, meet your sister, then find out that the bosses you have been killing all work for Evans, who gains energy when people worship him. He's been posing as the god Eva. You beat him. The end. Yep, it's that simple. Hope you've enjoyed it. On to BoF3, with a better plot. Original stuff: Township. You build your own town, choosing one of three different types of house to build, and collect people from all over the world. The plot, at least the beginning and end, connect and make a bit of sense. The middle is still a whole lot of side quests, built upon side quests, but there is a plot in there. You can also find shamans, hot, scandily-dressed women, one for each element, and "combine" 2 of them for party members. If you find the right combination, your characters will change how they look, and get new special moves, as well as getting more powerful. The problem was you really don't get these powerful shaman-character morphs until really late in the game. What liked: Umm... There wasn't really much more to this game. More plot was focused on, but that is about it. Better graphics, and different party formations that do different things. The combining with shamans was cool too. What disliked: The side quests require many side quests so you forget what you were originally doing. I think this is the game that made people say the jokes, "To use the bathroom, you must find the key. It is hidden in the Yeti's lair, but to get to the Yeti's lair, you must find the flame thrower that will melt the ice. And the Yeti requires a magical bean to give you the key....etc." Yeah, you know what I am talking about. Also, while the plot is better, some dialog is terrible. Just plain terrible. What to expect: More of a plot than the last game, but not a beautiful one, like FFs, or even BoF3. Same addicting gameplay a la first BoF. What not to expect: Masterful plot. Ratings on: Graphics: 6 - Better than BoF1, but still pretty bad. Sound: 4 - Still bad. Controls: 8 - Same as BoF1. Style: 3 - This is the most unoriginal BoF, in my opinion. 1st hour: 7 - Enjoyable, but something is missing. 2nd hour: 6 - Ditto. 1st week: 6 - You keep playing, but know there are better things to play instead of this. 2nd week: 6 - Still playing. 5th week: 6 - Enjoyable, yet not the greatest thing ever. #1 reason I hate this game: Can't they write decent dialog? for the love of all that is good and sweet? |
