Record of Agarest War 2 Limited Edition PS3 Game - Collector's Edition with Bonus Content | Perfect for JRPG Fans & PlayStation 3 Collectors

Record of Agarest War 2 is the official sequel to the first Agarest game released in North America in 2010. Like that game and its prequel, Zero, the story follows an amnesiac protagonist whose only purpose in the game is to atone for a grave sin he forgot he committed in the past. While this plot element is nothing new to this series, or any jrpg for that matter, it is a key component to the generational gradient in which the story unfolds and also the character relations, which are well thought out, interesting, and many times comical.A tremendous change to the series is the revamped battle system, which borrows heavily from Cross Edge. Instead of choosing six main characters to fight with and level up, you now choose four characters and everyone levels up equally whether or not they participate in battle. Skills and combo compatibility remain the same, and you can still link characters to perform combos and larger attacks, but the manner in which this is done is very different. It's all planned beforehand in a menu where you assign all your skills to the four face buttons and during that process you can see which combos you can execute. Now, I know I'm only summarizing combat but believe me when I say that it is much, much more detailed than is worth getting into right now. Agarest vets might grasp it easier than first timers simply due to familiarity with the menus and the high level of customization, but if you've ever played (and enjoyed) a Disgaea game, none of this should seem too difficult either. It really does depend on your familiarity with strategy rpgs, or at the very least, your willingness to overcome a relatively high learning curve.Moving on, then, what truly makes the Agarest games unique is that you get to play through generations of the first hero's lineage, meaning in gen 2 you command his son, and in gen 3 his grandson. Making this aspect even more impressive is that in each generation the hero can choose one of three select women to bear his son, and depending on whom you choose skills, weapon proficiency, and physical appearance will vary. As you progress throughout the story you will engage in conversations and events with the heroines and your subsequent actions determine their affection levels towards you, which also affect the aforementioned stats. A high affection with one lady will yield stronger progeny, that is unless you created the initial hero (Weiss) with abilities that align to the heroine.As you may assume from that last line, character creation factors into your heroes' play style. You choose from three basic classes (warrior, sorcerer, and battle mage) and then customize that base in various ways that you think would best suit your preferences. This is a similar process to Zero but it seems to be a bit more streamlined and intuitive here. Once you're done you'll get to see your Weiss and be able to go back and change whatever you want in case you're dissatisfied. Some people spend hours on this alone, and admittedly it is pretty fun.Maps in this Agarest game come in three flavors. A free roam field is a nice departure and is made even more enjoyable by the ability to activate random encounters at the push of a button. The second type is the traditional Agarest layout where you navigate various points on a field by connecting the dots, as it were, but in Agarest 2 this layout has been reserved exclusively for "dungeons" since the world map is now free roam. The third type is town maps, which are really neat this time around. Unlike previous Agarest games which only had four or five points of interest (item shop, blacksmith, etc.), Agarest 2 has several, each with its own purpose in advancing the story and building on character interactions. Not only do you delve deeper into the hero and heroine relations but also the townsfolk, which is really nice, and as an added bonus it even overlaps with side quests.As for side quests, the title system has evolved into a "commission" system, which is essentially a job list posted by Agarest's denizens. Upon completion of a commission you get useful rewards and occasionally you get to meet the people who posted the job and earn secondary rewards and witness additional character/world development.Two complaints come to mind, the first of which isn't so much a complaint as a personal gripe, and that is Agarest 2 doesn't seem to contain the same comedic value as the previous games. Jainus, for example, has been toned down incredibly from past games' equivalents, Winfield and Eugene, and there seems to be an overall paucity of humorous events scattered between the "serious" ones. For a series known for its humor this is sorely missed, especially since the story, admittedly, isn't profoundly interesting or groundbreaking.The second complaint is that the game, upon initial loading of a save file, suffers from horrendous lag. It's inexcusable because not only is this a sprite based game, but also combat is time based, approaching a QTE semblance, which means accuracy takes a frustrating backseat until the game catches up to itself. Lag even plagues the menu screens, which again is inexcusable in a game that derives much of its playability from menus. A simple install feature would fix this problem but mysteriously the developers omitted one, unlike previous Agarest games.Overall, Agarest 2 is so different from its predecessors yet it retains a lot of features that still make it worthy of its moniker. I don't even necessarily miss the old battle system, as much as I loved it, because the new one is fresh and fun despite being in many ways overly complicated. "Overly" because the game doesn't do a grand job at explaining its mechanics but once you grasp it you'll be switching out characters like crazy and stressing over which skills to learn, and in this case "stressing" is used positively because it is absolutely addictive. And that pretty much sums the game and the series for that matter. Addictive because there are tons of stats, weapons, and characters to manage. The developers have opened up the interactive portions of the game as well, adding more things to do such as bathhouse mini games, while streamlining combat in what might appear to be a better balanced game. Keep in mind, though, this is still very much a hardcore strategy game despite the fresh coat of paint. New players might do better to try a previous entry in the series, but if you're determined to play this one first, try reading my brief guide in the regular edition review, as it will help tremendously to understand the meat of the game (combat). With that said, enjoy!