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Adrenaline Vault has previewed Grandia 2 for the Playstation 2 (of interest to PC gamers as well since the title is currently ported to our system). Here's something about dungeon crawling and combat:
Speaking of dungeons, this land provides you with plenty of chances to muck around in the stygian depths of the continent. While not exactly unique, since Chrono Cross recently implemented the same technique, it's fairly rare to find a game that eschews random encounters entirely. In many ways a refreshing change, the dungeons of Grandia II have monsters wandering their halls, and if you're particularly crafty you can avoid them entirely. More often, you'll want to time a charge carefully so that you can descend upon them from behind. If you can pull off this feat you will be rewarded with initiative, which can equal a huge advantage, as outlined below. Of course, if you're rushing headlong, it's possible for wily monsters to attack you from behind, meaning they get the drop on your hapless party, which, moreso in Grandia II than other RPGs on the PS2, is a very, very bad thing.
The reason initiative can be such a major factor in Grandia II can be found entirely in the unique mechanics of the battle system. The quickest way to describe these mechanics would be to call them a more visible version of the classic Quick Time Battle system every Final Fantasy fan knows and loves, and then leave it at that. To do so, though, would be a total injustice, since these fights play out in real time but afford the same flexibility and control over player moves that we've since seen in Final Fantasy X's turn based combats.
Grandia 2 received an overall score of 4 out of 5 stars... |
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Grandia 2 Review (Ps2) at AVault
