It's "quasi" RPG. It's the "Diet Coke" of RPG
The battle engine uses a controlled action engine, identical to the one found in Infinite Undiscovery. If you didn't like that battle engine, you won't like this one, period. The graphics are strikingly similar to Infinite Undiscovery as well, also making use of the Unreal Engine. The war backstory feels like a toned down version of The Last Remnant, not quite as large scale. And, as in Infinite Undiscovery, you'll encounter a runaway princess accompanied by her guardian. (Trust me, I'm not done yet...)
There also happens to be "Kan", which is a form of energy that gives humans extraordinary powers. This is not unlike the energy in Infinite Undiscovery that gave people powers of the moon, since the hero, Strauss, also comes from another planet. But what really made me giggle is the presence of "Doomseeds" in the game...some sort of light shower which seem to be related to Kan in some way and affect Kan users negatively when exposed to it. (Infinite Undiscovery players, does any of this sound familiar?)
Basically...this game really does rip off a lot from Infinite Undiscovery. That's not a bad thing, but if you couldn't stand that game, PLEASE skip this.
=-= What Magna Carta 2 Does RIGHT =-=
- Graphics are quite beautiful.
- Lots of cutscenes, some manually controlled, some static with text, others fully CGI.
- Battle engine is easy to get into (see WRONG below though...)
- 100% camera control in multiple directions, including up and down.
- If you install to the hard drive the load times are almost nonexistent.
- Fairly deep story. It's easy to see that story is what drives this game, along with graphics.
- Music is light, not overpowering, just enough to get you into the environment.
=-= What Magna Carta 2 Does WRONG =-=
- Inefficient use of button commands. I mean, if I need to switch skills, why do I have to press RT, then Dpad, Then RT, then X? Why can't I just have RT cycle through the options and then X when I'm done? That's just one example; don't even get me started on the Drive Chain.
- Drive and Chain and all of the variations are absolutely mind numbingly confusing. It's not explained well in the first place, and given the button inefficiency I mentioned above...
- Quest explanations are stupid. One quest asks you to basically use Fire Tap (Crocell's Special) to generate Fire Kan. Never is it explained exactly how to trigger his Fire Tap, unless I missed it somewhere.
- Forced requirement to go back and "check in" with requesters. I understand this is real and all, but the problem is that the game is structured such that if you proceed a certain length, you will get to a point where you cannot return, thus if there is a quest that exists at the very end of one of these parts, there's usually a single event (which you can't back out of) that is your point of no return. Since you didn't know in advance, even if you did the quest correctly, you can't go back to check in and thus you lose those Experience points.
- A LOT of backtracking due to the aforementioned "check in" requirement. The land is huge, so this gets annoying.
- I find the voice acting to be subpar. Maybe it's just me.
So...do I recommend it? If you liked Infinite Undiscovery, yes. If you never played that game, you might want to play that first to see if you like that direction. It's scary how identical it really is to that game. You might consider renting Magna Carta 2 if you really feel like taking a plunge. I will say though for the record, for everyone who is reading. THIS IS A JRPG. THIS IS NOT OBLIVION, IT's NOT FALLOUT 3. Please don't come in here blasting it for "sticking to the old formula". Yes, it does. And there's nothing wrong with that, for people who enjoy that formula. It's not going to change the face of RPG gaming. Doubtful it'll end up on PS3. But it's a solid addition to the RPG library for 360 and well worth at least a playthrough, as long as you can accept it for being the very basic of RPG.