Vandal Hearts 2 Review

If a great rpg is define by a great story & characters and lots of magic and special attack then Vandal Hearts 2 must be a great rpg. I knew beforehand when I brought this game that is would be great since the original one was so good but I had no idea how much better it would be when compare to the original one. Vandal Hearts 2 is bigger, longer, and more in depth gameplay than the original. You could clearly see what they had added to the game from others strategy rpgs that had come out after Vandal Heart 1. FF Tactics storyline and somewhat gameplay is heavily influence in this game. Overrall this is the best storyline of any rpgs that I have played. In fact it is my one of my top 3 favorite rpg games right now. It would take you about 43 hours to finish this game. If you want to find and play the 14+ extra battle maps then it would definely take an extra 8 or more hours. Overrall, a 9 out of 10. Let's break this review down now.

Like most strategy rpgs, the story usually consists of civil wars that involve class warfare between the rich and poor. What I love about this story is the mature subject or plotline. Vandal Hearts 2 plotline/outline of the story is a mix between FF Tactics and Tactics Ogre with great results. Here is a summary of what the plot is about without any spoilers.

A country named Natra is in chaos from civil war and class warfare. On one side, the East claim that their Royal Monarch is the real ruler of Natra while the 2nd side, the West claim their King is the real ruler of Natra. These two sides are the main players of this civil war. The third side, the Centra party (which by the way is your party), has decided to become a player in this civil war as well. Then you have the fourth party, the religious fanatics who has declar war on all three sides in the name of god. While all 4 players are fighting one another, an outsider (the real main bad guy) is manipulating all 4 players as his pawns to reach the end goals that he has planned on all along. Hence all the players in this war are actually pawns in this game. What is amazing about this game is all the plot twists that keeps you coming back for more. Just when you think this person is a bad guy, it turn out that he/she might be a good guy after all and vice versa. It is the story that makes this game so addictive. No matter how many times you say," enough is enough I'm going to stop playing right now and take a break." You just keep coming back for more to see what's in the next plot twist of this story.

The sound and music in this game is pretty average. But then again most strategy rpg music are pretty average. I believe there are maybe only 2 or 3 different tunes in this game. Music is definetly not the reason as to why you should play this game. A score of 5 is being generous here.

The graphics in this game is definetly a big improvement over the first Vandal Hearts. But is it better than FF Tactics? No. FF Tactics uses better colours. The little picture of each characters during the text reading is pretty dull. It's a cross between real life picture and drawing. They should have just kept it a drawing. But what I like is the fact that instead of the small story scene background as seen in Vandal Hearts 1, Vandal Hearts 2 uses a much bigger background scene like in FF Tactics. They still need to improve on the coloring though. Next time try to use brighter colors instead of dull ones.

The second strongest part of this game is the characters. In strategy rpgs, story and characters are the two most important thing. Vandal Hearts 2 doesn't fail here. I just love each and everyone of the characters involved in this story. I also love the interaction between party member. Some of the dialogue can be pretty funny. What is very good is the in depth developement of all the main characters and the way they act. With up to 9 members in a party, everyone who plays this game should have a favorite fighter to choose from.

The one thing that changes in the sequel is that instead of turn base strategy rpg, you get a mix of duel and turn base strategy rpg. Everytime you move a character in a battlefield, the computer moves it's character as well. This makes things a little harder as the guy you want to attack may not be standing in the area you were planning on attacking him at. You have to plan ahead and anticipate where the enemy may move next to counter his movements. Another thing that changes is the way the computer attacks you. The CPU doesn't just randomly attack any of your characters anymore. In fact it's pretty smart now. It will seek out and attack any character that has the lowest Hps just like what you would be to it. You can anticipate who the CPU will attack next with this knowledge. This is a very innovative and cutting edge battle system. I like it very much. Makes the game more challenging to the average players.
WEAPONS/ARMOURS: In the first Vandal Hearts you get very little weapons and you can change fighter's fighting class. In Vandal Hearts 2 there are tons of weapons and armours. And I really mean tons. Each weapons and armours has it's own classes, magic and special attack. Everytime you upgrade in weapons you have to transfer all the magic/special attack that you have already learned to the new weapon. This can be a pain in the ass sometimes. The only disappointment here is that weapons can only hold from 3 to 5 magic/special attack per weapon so you have to choose carefully as to what magic you want. Mages have to be equipped with 2 canes to give you a better selection of magic attacks. The overrall party is to have 1 mage, 4 flying scouters, and 4 heavy armour fighters. The scouters can help open chest and look for secret marking on the ground for extra battle maps and items. Fighting classes are now decided upon what kind of armour the fighter wears. If you wear a flying armour then you fighter becomes a flyer class. In the first Vandal Hearts, you have to choose and change classes to decide what fighting class you want instead of it being base on what kind of armour you wear. Very innovative.

In terms of extra stuff, you can find and get extra battlefield maps by finding maps on special markings in the ground or inside chests. Each battle map is number 0-14 and the highest number is 14 so there are 15 extra battlefields to be found. If you can find all 100% weapons in the game, you get a code that will give you an advance mode of the game for replay value.

The replay value comes from the multiple endings that this game has. There are 4 main different endings plus the advance mode. It is said that in the advance mode, you get a hidden boss at the end game plus you have to fight a Vanderliar to get the Vandal Hearts sword instead of simply just retrieving it. I can't confirm this yet which is why I haven't added this part in my Vandal Hearts 2 faqs. Still there are lots of reason why you would want to play this game a second time.

Bottomline: if you want a strategy rpg to sink your teeth into then Vandal Hearts 2 would be it. With so few strategy rpgs out there and good ones too, Vandal Hearts 2 becomes a must buy for any strategy rpg fans.

Vandal Hearts 2: The Players and The Pawns

Vandal Hearts 2:
The Players and The Pawns