Nis America has been bringing the anime RPG series called Disgaea for the Playstation owners. And it continues to do so with the latest game, Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness, this time for the PS3. Is there more brightness or darkness to this new title inclusion?
The plot for Disgaea D2 goes like this: a young demon named Laharl eventually becomes the Overlord of the Netherworld. But that doesn’t mean that it’s all smooth sailing from here. On the contrary, a group of demons called the Krichevskoy Faction wants Laharl to step down as they want the throne to themselves. While this is happening, the Celestial Flowers are beginning to multiply at a speedy rate. This is very bad news in the Netherworld. With that in hand, Laharl, along with his friend, Etna, as well as an angel assassin, Flonne, must fight to keep his throne.
In case you never played any of the games in the series, Disgaea D2 will have the player engaged in turn-based strategy. Specifically, you’ll direct your characters one by one along an isometric grid-based map and make your attacks accordingly. Afterwards, your opponent will do the same, and then rinse and repeat. As you play more into the game, you’ll get to see your character upgrade in their levels, thus leading to a better type of abilities and powers. Eventually, you can change your characters into new classes.
You’ll want to take note of the team dynamics behind Disgaea D2. To illustrate, your characters can work together to perform a combined attack to leave a more powerful effect on your opponents. Additionally, there’s an added feature that involves the friendship statistics. If your team members are standing right next to each other, their friendship level can increase, which translates to either better offensive or defensive attacks.
Disgaea D2 also allows characters to ride on a monster, which is a new thing that was just introduced in this game. This too can also increase the effectiveness of your attacks. But as well, both characters in this case will increase their skill level separately. You’ll also be able to dismount whenever you see fit. As a result, such gameplay helps give some variety and excitement as gamers are entitled to the joys of mounted attacks.
The Cheat Shop is where some players may get a kick out of Disgaea D2. Here, you’ll be able to adjust the amount of EXP and skill level that you can acquire each time. So for those who find the default leveling up system to be too slow will find this particular shop to be godsend.
If you try to play Disgaea D2 straight to the end, you’ll find that you’ll need to spend more than 100 hours. Each time you play the game, the levels are different, even if you play the same levels. That’s because the worlds are randomly generated, thereby leading to increase in replay value in the players’ eyes.
Disgaea D2 looks simply gorgeous with the amount of color flowing through the screen. While the characters and environments may have some choppy textures, the anime style helps to showcase its visual appeerance. The music behind Disgaea D2 may or may not sit well with you depending on whether or not you prefer to understand the lyrics behind the tunes. That’s because there’s some japanese in the soundtrack, which could be catchy while at the same time end up being lost in ambiguity. Disgaea D2 does suffer from the cheesy voice acting which should be common for games that attempt to do some english dubbing.
All in all, Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness is a must-buy for those of you who loved the series. Its gameplay remains as exciting as its predecessors while the strategy-type mechanics are as engaging as ever.
