Growlanser Generations is a Strategy Role-Playing Game that was Published by Working Design & Developed by Career Soft. This game Contains two games in one package. Growlanser II & Gorwlanser III.. Don’t worry thoe, the game comes on two different disk. Both of these games do have some things in common with Final Fantasy Tactics or any other SRPG out their. You will be giving missions threw- out the games and when you pass them you will get a Missions cleared or a Mission complete on how you do things in battle. You will be giving a chart on what you have to do in battle to get either of them. So I’m going to explain how this SRPG sizes up with me and the rest of them out there. Growlanser II introduces you the character Wein Cruz. Wein Cruz is a young lad that joins the military academy to become what he always dreamed of, and Imperial Knight. Before he can become an Imperial knight he has to make it threw the lower ranks of the academy first. You will start of in the academies main office talking to the leader of it all. He will introduce you to this thing laying on his table and he will tell you to try it out. This thing well turn into this large Scythe for Wein( This will not turn into any other type of weapon besides a Scythe). Well after that you will be ducked to a series of questions and a bunch dialog that you will be reading. (If you don’t want to read, you can always skip it by hitting the X button a lot). Then when your finished reading all what you have to you will have to take the exam(Battle Test). During the battle test you be introduced to your new team-mate Maximillian Schneider. Maximillian joins the academy to fulfil is father last wish, but he also want to complete his own wished too. Maximillian would rather solve difference threw peace instead of having to deal with violence and blood-shed... Maximillian will explain a few thing about the battle systems and all of it’s perks. After you win you will have to go back and go threw another series of dialog evolving two countries at war and some things are starting some trouble around in your area. You will then be order you go and settle these events with you and Maximillian. Well after awhile you will be going threw the countries saving and ending certain events of the war, During so you will be counter to lose some of your team-mates and you will gain some new ones. while in Growlanser Generations III you will find that you are in control of Slayn Wilder. He awakens in a bed under the care of Annette Burns.. Slayn has forgotten everything about his past, he cant remember his name or anything for that matter. Well after you get up you will be yet again engulfed into a series of dialog and question that you will have to answer. After that’s out of the way you will be given the name of the city were you were being cared for and you will get a Ring Weapon(Just like you did in Growlanser II. Exactly like Growlanser II the Ring weapon will be able to equip. different ring weapons with certain numbers(only 3) on them. Well after all that the village you are in is attacked my another countries army. And then you will be told why they are attacking and what’s going on in the world today. You will then start the battle against a lot of enemies, don’t worry thoe you will be aided by the towns people. As soon as the battle begins you will be shortly killed. Don’t worry thoe, it’s part f the story. You then will see flashbacks about your past and kinda what happened to you. It goes really quick. One of the towns people will save you from the final attack and then the game will go to a black screen. You will then awake the next morning with the towns people in mourn about the death of the towns mans that saved you. Then you will be requested to see Annette’s father to go on some operation. Well after to long this operation will turn into something big and you will go on whole adventure with your friend Annette along the way you will find new friends and make and see more enemies. Both games have there differences in the battles system but almost have the same leveling system You gain Exp you gain a level, some stats go up and then you get some master points that will be used to master certain magic, skills or techs.. In Growlanser Generations II you walk around in a world map similar to Final Fantasy Tactics for the Play Station. When you get into a battle in will happen randomly. The areas that you will be placed in will be set randomly also. Leveling up as a lot to do with the battles you encounter in Growlanser II. You will fight against so many enemies an then you will have so many characters. In Growlanser II you can have up to eight characters in a single battle. When your Characters goes to attack and hit's an enemy you will gain a certain amount of EXP depending on how higher the other enemies level is. Then after you win the battle you will be giving more EXP(Not that much thoe).... While in Growlanser III it's a little different. Instead of getting this moveable system that was used in Growlanser II you get a World Map. Weird huh ? It is very great. You will also get into random encounters in this game too. But the battle scheme is a little different. When you are walking around the world map you will notice that you can walk into a forest or just stay on the road. If you get into an encounter in the forest you will get a battle with a forest setting, but if you stay on the road you will get into a plain setting battlefield. Well when you start the a battle with only four characters. Unlike it's counter part Growlanser changes it up, when you hit a monster of whatever to you wont gain any exp. Instead you will have to finish the battle you get it. And you get more then what you would in Growlanser II. In both games you have an option menu to pick from when the battle starts, you do have several options to pick from... Attack, Defend, Magic, techniques, Move, & Equip. Choosing ATK(Attack) will allow you to attack any enemy on the field. Choosing DEF(Defend) will have your character defend his or herself threw out the rest of the battle. Choosing Magic will cast a various of things. Magic is kinda like a level it can keep getting better. The level will increase threw out the Remainder of the game and almost based on how many times you use it. There is Attack Magic and there is Support magic. The highest level the magic can get to is Level 9. Then you can cast it on 9 different enemies or you can just cast it on one enemy to do some massive damage. Selecting TECH(Techniques) Will bring you to the TECH screen and let you pick on the Techs you have master threw the game. Some of them you can only use once and other TECHs will increase threw the game. Choosing MOV(Move) will allow a character to move to any part of the battle field and will attack anyone who gets in the way of where you are trying to go. While choosing EQP(Equip) You will be tacking to the equip screen where you can exchange body armor or your gems. So going in battle unprepared can be easily changed... There is also hot key that make it a lot easier to win or if your just lazy... :) Both Games have some pretty good lay backed Graphics. The look clean and very crisp. The character animation looks rather well done and very well put into. The in-game battles are very well drawn out. When you get into a battle in a forest it looks like your fighting in a real forest. When your fighting in a village, it looks rather real. There is some Stella animations of some of the big spells, that could of looked a little better. Even when you are running around the world map on Growlanser III. It looks like something out of a book. To the weapons and two the rivers and lakes in both games. All looks great and sometimes good.. What makes it better with a lot of people on the feild casting magic it never tend s to slow down. Even thos this game was being made back in 2001 the graphics are almost really up to date on what this game should look like. I must say, that they are rather good. While both games have their differences, I can agree that both games shine when it comes to the sound. Both games have this feeling about the sounds that just fits the game perfectly. When there is danger, this eery music will start to play and you know there is something a mist. Even the in game battles have some intense feeling to them. It seems like it was well placed. The voice acting is something great to the game also. You can tell that they planed this out so well.(Thank heaven) It seems like every characters voice is well places and best suits his or her attitude threw out the game. This for me, was the best part about the game. Even some of the boss battles has some nice and great tones to them. This serieously is where this game shines the most. If this game didn't have good voice acting and this amazing sounds to it it would be pretty bad in my book. This game is very fun in every way. You will probably engulfed in this game a lot. There is just so many things to in both game it’s very great. In Growlanser II you will have to at least play threw this game 4 or 5 different times to unlock. There was certain words you could not use During. Now that you have beating the game this game will unlock those certain words. But that is not all you will probably have to play threw Growlanser II again and maybe again to unlock certain characters and maybe even different characters.... You will also have to play threw this game to get different characters endings and all sorts of extra stuff. I rather not spoil it for you cause it’s pretty cool stuff. You will be spending a lot of hours on this game trying to do all that stuff. So far I’m enjoying this game, with a lot of Unlock-able features. Out of all the Strategy role-playing games on the market for the Ps2 this one of the best out there. If you’re a fan of the series then you should go and pick this thing up. If your just a fan of Strategy RPG’s then this is really a must.
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