A mythical role play beast-raising adventure with some crazy replay value, but doesn't quite stand as a sequel.
(-) merging process not as dynamic as its PS1 predecessor
For better or worse, Jade Cocoon 2 is nothing like its predecessor back in 1998 on the first Playstation. The gameplay of raising beasts and fighting other wild ones is still in tact, along with the graphical atmosphere of adventure and spirituality, as well as beautiful forests and magical spells, but the core gameplay has been tweaked significantly,
You play as Kahu, a boy who is turning into a monster. Not the most creative of a story, I know. You meet an opinionated fairy named Nico, which her presence really grew on me after a while. Your mission is to stop Levant, the protagonist of the first game is now the villain. I know, it's pretty hard to follow. There are a lot more supporting characters added to the cast in this sequel, along with the demonic beast hunters you challenge from time to time, there are also numerous woman with food names like the British accented Vanilla who seems pretty emphatic about Slimies (???), and the apathetic and awkwardly blunt Cinnamon.
You raise monsters that you catch from cocoons that you can find scattered through the forests you explore. Combat is done in a more strategic style, fire representing strength to take down water, water representing healing to protect against wind, wind representing magical spells that create conditions with break defenses of earth, earth which blocks against the powerful fire attack. You only use one of those sides at a turn in the battle.
Merging is also done quite differently which may turn off people mesmerized by the original. As your beasts gain experience they get older and change size and form, then you merge them to become the baby form again with larger stats and a new attack. You can only have up to two attacks, which depends entirely on where you place your monster in the order which it will be.
The artistic beauty in the graphics are mind-blowing, as you walk through brightly colored and richly detailed forests it is enough to slow down and take a look. Because these forests are not only colorful, there are plenty of special effects that add to the experience, like some smoke that gently breezes through some corridors, and some weather effects like fog in the Earth forest and raining in the water forest. The special attacks during battles also have some very dreamlike and flashy particle effects, which makes for some very delicate visuals. The characters themselves are also better animated than they were in the predecessor, with young and innocent faces and some pretty vivid outfit detail. The woman in Jade Cocoon 2 look perhaps the prettiest, with very beautiful faces and elegant robes and dresses. Ra is still the beast tender who heals your beast, and she looks as pretty as ever before. And although Sassy, Mu as your beast tournament manager is still flaunty and gorgeous in her own way too.
The sound all around has been improved vastly alike the visuals. The music you hear through the forests and the menus are still down with that spiritual, spacious soothing orchestra that gives the game its magical feel. Another thing that the predecessor suffered with was some pretty hammy voice acting, and that was improved significantly in Jade Cocoon 2. The brief text-read cutscenes between Kahu and Nico with other characters throughout the forest are still at times uncomfortable to sit and watch, but the voice overs are made much smoother this time around and are also much easier to hear and comprehend than the first game. The battle sounds themselves are pretty standard though, with explosions for special magical attacks and thwaks for skill-driven physical blows, but they serve their purpose at least.
The game is not short by any means. There are four different forests for each element, and each one has four different categories for difficulty level and four areas per forest with a boss battle at the end. These levels really stretch on time, because not only are you looking for battles where you can bring special cocoons to earn the rights for certain attacks during merges, you'll be having a lot of sometimes even un-necessary encounters with beasts. You probably won't mind though, since the game won't by shy to suck you into its own little trance. And as soon as you complete the different forests, you are placed in a new area with corridors that possess boss battles, meant for training your minions, then you fight Levant at the end. Once you beat the game, there are two different levels for each element forest as well as some alternative beast tournaments, but there really isn't much to do once you beat the game, which may take you from two weeks to a month depending on the degree of your addiction to it.
Although the core gameplay has added depth and less flexibility than the original, the basic principle of Jade Cocoon 2 is true to the franchise. But still, Jade Cocoon 2 may fail to impress people who were fond of the original if they liked its unique dynamic monster customization. Though this game still seems to be as fun and addictive as that one was.