Golden Sun 2: The Lost Age

SPOILER ALERT! Please PLEASE do not read this post unless you've played through the first game or you don't care that much about a few spoilers. Its really hard to talk about this one without giving a bit away. Thanks ^_^

So this game picks up right where the last one left off... but you're not Issac, Garret, Ivan, and Mia anymore... Instead you play as Felix, Jenna, Sheba, and later in the game you meet the water adept Piers. As you know, Jenna is a fire adept and Sheba is a wind adept, and since I told you Piers is water you probably guessed that Felix is the Earth adept.

The game mechanics in this game are almost identical to the last except they added a bunch of really cool stuff. First off, you get instructions on how to transfer data from your old game to the new one. This is really important if you want everything the game has to offer. I won't ruin the surprise, but once you get about 75% into the game this data becomes important ^_~. Anyways, they've of course added new spells and items. In this game Jenna acts as your group healer instead of Mia, and thus gets some cool fire-based group heals. Following that, Piers becomes a main damage character, kinda like Garret, and a new one target, ice-based attack is introduced that acts just like Issac's Ragnarok attack. Felix and Sheba however maintain the same functions as their first game counterparts. About those single target attacks though... They get a really kickass boost in this game. Once Felix and/or Piers equips enough Djinn of their attribute, their attack is upgraded. Not only does it do a lot more damage, it just plain looks cool. Finally, and the biggest thing, is the addition of multi-element summons. These must be found in the world as tablets and all but the most basic are extremely difficult to get. In fact, to get the final two you have to have found EVERY Djinn in the game, traverse one of the most difficult dungeons in the game, and for the final, fight the most epic boss you've ever seen in the world of Golden Sun. The image on the right is Iris, the final summon.

The game expands to the whole world and you even get a ship after a while. The dungeons have been upgraded to make the puzzles more challenging as the game goes on, which is good news and bad. While the challenge is nice, often times the puzzles force you to walk long distances through a dungeon passage just do do one thing then walk all the way back.

As a final note, the developers added the most kickass weapon to the game I've ever seen. Its called the Sol Blade. This thing has the special attack which summons a freaking meteor from the sky, which does I think 600-700 damage if i remember right. Couple this with as much crit hit gear on the character you give it to and holy shit the results are amazing ^_^

If you liked the first game, play the second. You will not be let down.