Review cover Grandia II Anniversary Edition (Computer)
User Review

Product Information:

  • Release Date (NA): August 24, 2015
  • Release Date (EU): August 24, 2015
  • Publisher: Gongho Online Entertainment
  • Developer: Game Arts
  • Genres: J-RPG
  • Also For: Retro

Game Features:

Single player
Local Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer
Co-operative
Grandia II was probably one of the best games you could get when you had a Dreamcast back in the day. However the PS2 and PC ports of this game always were flawed in one way or another which resulted in players from this generation being unable to fully enjoy this game. Grandia II Anniversary Edition is supposed to celebrate Grandia II's 15th birthday and provide a widely accessible version of the game that that everyone can pick up and play.
Introduction

The first Grandia for the Sega Saturn and PS1 was my first J-RPG ever. When I was a kid I loved the sh*t out of it and still do to this day. However I never liked Grandia II when it came out. It was just so different to the predecessor in every possible way. Almost everything that made the first Grandia special was simply not there anymore. But as I grew older I started accepting 'change' as a part of my life I found Grandia II to be actually a pretty good game. However PC gamers had to deal with a broken mess back in the day. The old PC port was filled with technical difficulties and aged so poorly that It's almost unplayable nowadays. To celebrate Grandia II's 15th Birthday Gungho Online Entertainment decided, after overwhelming response from a survey, to re-release Grandia II on PC "Enhanced and better than ever". This won't be a simple port report though as I will review the whole game.

Story

In the ancient times the good and evil clashed together. Valmar, the god of darkness, and Granas, the god of light, had fought over the world in a huge battle that left many scars.
Valmar was defeated but not destroyed and his body parts were sealed away to prevent another apocalypse from happening.
People started worshiping Granas and built an religion in his name. However the sealed body parts need to be resealed from time to time by the sisters of the church of Granas.
Ryudo, a geohound accepts a job where he has to escort one of these sisters, Elena, to the Garmia tower. Unfortunately the sealing ceremony fails and the wings of Valmar posses Elena, causing her to transform into Milenia from time to time.
Not knowing what to do the father of a local church decides that Elena should be escorted to the Cathedral where she could hopefully be purified by pope Zera.
However he's unable to do so but he sends Ryudo on a mission to find the Granasaber to kill Valmar fast enough before Elena gets completely possessed by the wings of Valmar and Valmar potentially ressurected.

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Let's put a smile on that face​

The story isn't particularly complicated and is very straight forward. Some crazy reveals can be seen from a mile away but that's not the strength of this story.
What is the Strength of this game however are it's characters and the group dynamic. Over the course of the adventure Elena starts becoming quite attached to Ryudo but Milenia keeps coming in between them.
It's also very cool to see a demon lady actually not being purely evil since Milenia will act demonic when it comes to Granas and absorbing other parts of Valmar but her attachment to Ryudo forces her to do good things... in her own evil way.
Ryudo himself also has a dark past with his brother who got possessed by the horn of Valmar, turning into a cold blooded murderer. Mareg, a beastman, and Tio, a automata, also have a very interesting dynamic.
Tio sees Mareg as her master/owner after being rescued from the claws of Valmar. Mareg however want's Tio to develop a soul and keeps teaching her what it means to be free and take actions on your own.
The game has the smallest amount of protagonists in a Grandia game but each character feels equally as important as everyone else, which I can't say about the other titles, especially Grandia Xtreme, and it hurts even more if one of them has to go.
In some Areas of the game the atmosphere is also really eerie. Coupled with Noriyuki Iwadare's great soundtrack makes for some really good video game moments.

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Gameplay

The Gameplay is the exact same as in the previous Grandia titles.
It's turn based but incorporates many action time elements. Your characters aren't planted to a spot on the map, they have to run around the field if they want their attacks to reach the enemy (with the exception of spells but these often are bound to AoE).
If a unit charges an attack, a special move or a spell, you can cancel him out of this attack by using abilities that allow you to do that. Not only that but you can see what attacks your enemies are going to use so you can plan your moves accordingly.
Sometimes it's more optimal to use the block function, and Grandia so far is the only J-RPG where I see that a viable option that does not require crazy prediction work, and sometimes it's better to simply command your character to move out of the way because many spells have an area of effect. Preventing your entire party from being hit is key.
Level progression is very different compared to Grandia 1. In previous the Grandia game each character had a element/weapon level. Using said element/weapon would level it up and you would learn new special moves/spells that way.
Now after each battle you get Special Coins and Magic Coins additionally to your regular EXP that you can spend on skills, special moves and spells. It's a much better way to power up your party without sacrificing too much resources into a character that might or might not leave your party at some point, which was a huge issue in the previous Grandia. However it also doesn't feel very original and was further improved in Grandia III and Grandia Xtreme.

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How to kill an enemy with style~
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Presentation

The game looks alright for it's time.
It's an early Dreamcast game so it's not particularly the prettiest game but for it's time and coming from Grandia 1 it was really good. This new port however brings along a new shadow engine and AA to make this game look at least a little better.
During a battle, spells and special moves will often make use of overlayed transparent video files to make more impressive looking spells/moves with the hardware limitations the game had to work with.
The soundtrack really makes the scenery alive. Like I said before, Noriyuki Iwadare is a great video game music composer and his Grandia battle themes are some of my favorite tracks.

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Just a example of the overlayed transparent video's in action
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So how is the new port then?

So far it leaves A LOT to be desired.
It promises visual upgrades to textures, lighting, and shadows although I haven't noticed improved textures.
It has original Japanese voice option however the text and voices are not synced, it just replaces the voice files without changing the timing of the text, which is rather lazy.
It has additional difficulty level but I found it not to be that hard. Even on Hard party Members often end up one shotting the enemies.
There is gamepad support, mainly for X-input gamepads because my D-Input gamepad won't work. And because this game features a launcher, instead of in-game options menu, x360ce doesn't work. I have to play this game with keyboard or accept the fucked up button placement which makes me a sad panda.
Steam trading cards, Steam achievements and Steam cloud save support which are nice additions.
Selectable video options which are very lackluster.
Remapable keyboard & gamepad support which shouldn't be considered a feature but rather a must have on PC.
100 save file slots even though I have no Idea why you would need that many.
Dreamcast VMS save file support which is a little side effect of this game being based around the Dreamcast code. You can import your Dreamcast save files if you want.
The game is locked at 30 frames per second however. Even the old port ran at 60 FPS during battles. Not that this would be a big deal in turn based RPG's but I know a few PC gamers who find this kind of frame rate inexcusable.
The game also doesn't support 16:9 resolutions. You can choose to stretch the game, which would make it look really ugly but other than that you will be seeing 2 black borders on the left and right.
The 2D assets also were not redrawn making everything looking very blurry on 1080p resolutions instead of crispy and sharp.
Also I'm not entirely sure what's wrong with those PC spec requirements. 4Gigs of ram, 2.5Ghz dual core processor and Direct X10? For a early dreamcast game? Something went wrong.
Also other users report many, mostly tame, bugs but the developer does check the steam forums and assures to release patches to fix it. To be honest with you I didn't encounter even the half of what's listed on the list.
It was also confirmed by some Neogaf users that this game is easily mod-able so you can expect some mods in the future that might improve your experience.

Final Toughs

While this port certainly is an improvement over the last one it is not perfect.
If you are a veteran Grandia player look at what this port doesn't do and decide whenever you care or not.
If you never played the game I would strongly suggest you trying this game out. It 25% cheaper until the 30th August on both Steam and Good old games.

Verdict

What I Liked ...
  • Great game
  • Great characters
  • Great music
  • Great battlesystem
What I Didn't Like ...
  • Lazy port
  • Predictable story
  • Low difficulty
10
Gameplay
7
Presentation
7
Lasting Appeal
8
out of 10

Overall

This is a score for the game itself. The port sits at 6.5/10.
I really liked Grandia 2! I instantly bought it as soon as I saw it was on Steam. Hopefully it'll be possible for someone to put together a high res texture pack for the HUD. I also noticed all of the animations in battle and when the over-world switches to battle mode are gone. As soon as you pull aggro, it doesn't do that fade effect. When an enemy dies, it just disappears into thin air right away, like they're trying to make time.
 
Still a better port than the PC version, which actually suffered from extra animation frames in the spells :D I should also note the PC port back in 2002 (?) had a low sampling frequency of 22 kHz instead of 32 or 44 kHz. PS2 port also dipped below 30 fps in large towns and dungeons, so while this seems better than the other ports, it's not quite as good as the DC port but still decent :P I should also note the PC port locked up right before you fought the last boss, pretty bad.
 
Still a better port than the PC version, which actually suffered from extra animation frames in the spells :D I should also note the PC port back in 2002 (?) had a low sampling frequency of 22 kHz instead of 32 or 44 kHz. PS2 port also dipped below 30 fps in large towns and dungeons, so while this seems better than the other ports, it's not quite as good as the DC port but still decent :P I should also note the PC port locked up right before you fought the last boss, pretty bad.
I run a Grandia dedicated youtube channel so I wanted to record old PC port footage to make a comparison video.
During installation the game forgot to copy over the .exe file. Not that it needed to because as it turned out I needed a no CD crack that was optimized for Win 8 anyway otherwise the game wouldn't even start. But the port is so bad Fraps couldn't even record footage of it killing my comparison idea in the process.
And that's pretty much the point at which I gave up with the old port. It worked okay on windows XP, when you're not recording it, but on more modern systems its just junk.

I wonder if my name is still in the credits... I worked on that game 15yrs ago... was amongst the first games I worked on...
I actually wouldn't be surprised if your name was still on there.
They used the Dreamcast code for this port and so far all they changed were the company logo's, title screen and opening cinematic (with the anniversary logo) anything else is unchanged.
 
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I run a Grandia dedicated youtube channel so I wanted to record old PC port footage to make a comparison video.
During installation the game forgot to copy over the .exe file. Not that it needed to because as it turned out I needed a no CD crack that was optimized for Win 8 anyway otherwise the game wouldn't even start. But the port is so bad Fraps couldn't even record footage of it killing my comparison idea in the process.
And that's pretty much the point at which I gave up with the old port. It worked okay on windows XP, when you're not recording it, but on more modern systems its just junk.

Use OpenBroadcasterSoftware! Much better! I'd like to see the video when you post it!
 
nVidia Shadowplay is also a very good program, can record up to 2160p I believe, 60 fps and 50 mbits/second if you're insane lol, anyways, FRAPS is such a resource hog and not really that great compared to other screen capture software. The only caveat is you need at least a nVidia 6xx series GPU to run it.
 
nVidia Shadowplay is also a very good program, can record up to 2160p I believe, 60 fps and 50 mbits/second if you're insane lol, anyways, FRAPS is such a resource hog and not really that great compared to other screen capture software. The only caveat is you need at least a nVidia 6xx series GPU to run it.
And that single caverat is enough to kill this option for me. OBS is really my best shot. It worked alright when I was live streaming the anniversary edition. If it won't work with the old one then the port is literally bonkers.
But really Fraps is alright with resources on small resolutions. Sure it's outpaced by the competition, since the last time they updated that software was a decade ago, but I like it's user friendliness. I'm just getting used to OBS, it might replace Fraps for me at some point.
 
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OBS has a built-in plugin that allows to use the ShadowPlay codec, actually! :)

And that single caverat is enough to kill this option for me. OBS is really my best shot. It worked alright when I was live streaming the anniversary edition. If it won't work with the old one then the port is literally bonkers.
But really Fraps is alright with resources on small resolutions. Sure it's outpaced by the competition, since the last time they updated that software was a decade ago, but I like it's user friendliness. I'm just getting used to OBS, it might replace Fraps for me at some point.

If you can play the older port in windowed mode, you can use Window Capture rather than Game Capture. :yaysp:
 
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And that single caverat is enough to kill this option for me. OBS is really my best shot. It worked alright when I was live streaming the anniversary edition. If it won't work with the old one then the port is literally bonkers.
But really Fraps is alright with resources on small resolutions. Sure it's outpaced by the competition, since the last time they updated that software was a decade ago, but I like it's user friendliness. I'm just getting used to OBS, it might replace Fraps for me at some point.

It was merely my opinion, my deepest apologies if I came across as imposing...sorry.... :(

OBS has a built-in plugin that allows to use the ShadowPlay codec, actually! :)

Interesting, never tried OBS actually, wonder if it works with emulators in full screen.
 
Nah it's alright man. No need in apologizing.
Actually I wished more PC gamers would be like you. One of my ex-class mates couldn't shut up how great his PC was. Really grinds my gears.

I like PC games as much as the next guy, but even I know my PC isn't the best, and I play console games too. While I know this port ain't perfect, I'm still a big fan of Grandia 2, I'm very tempted to pick it up and I've wanted to try OBS too :P
 
Okay the old Port is simply bonkers.
If you can play the older port in windowed mode, you can use Window Capture rather than Game Capture. :yaysp:
OBS doesn't recognize the old port at all. The game doesn't pop up in game capture and window capture.
The only way for me to record it was via monitor capture while it was in windowed mode. That i had to force out by DXWnd first because the old port doesn't natively support windowed mode, like the new port does.
 
Okay the old Port is simply bonkers.

OBS doesn't recognize the old port at all. The game doesn't pop up in game capture and window capture.
The only way for me to record it was via monitor capture while it was in windowed mode. That i had to force out by DXWnd first because the old port doesn't natively support windowed mode, like the new port does.

I've been meaning to ask about this new port, things I've been reading on Steam forums that bother me deeply, that cause me worry. Is this truly a new port or is it a souped up port from the PC version back in 2002? The reason I ask one, the number of bugs present in the graphics (animations, lighting, textures), two, the audio department. I seem to recall the PC port using a 22 kHz frequency for its music files, but this version seems to use OGG as a container, does it sound worse?
I guess what I'm saying is, should I splurge 15 bucks to get this game since I can't find my Dreamcast copy and how the PS2 port is worse? I guess I'm trying to find out if this is as bad as the other ports is all. Thanks :P

And the old port doesn't work with OBS? WTF? :blink:

BTW, uh, should I get this game @XrosBlader821 ?
 
Is this truly a new port or is it a souped up port from the PC version back in 2002? The reason I ask one, the number of bugs present in the graphics (animations, lighting, textures), two, the audio department.
No, it really isn't. It shows many similarities, yes, but seeing the differences in the folder structure alone makes me believe that it is really a new port from the ground up.
Also the before mentioned Dreamcast save file support. The old port couldn't do that.
I seem to recall the PC port using a 22 kHz frequency for its music files, but this version seems to use OGG as a container, does it sound worse?
It sounds better. Now playing both ports with just few seconds in between the old port definitely had more noise in it. Very clearly hear able during the voiced dialogue.
The audio balance is a little weird with sound effects. Wished there was an audio slider.
I guess what I'm saying is, should I splurge 15 bucks to get this game since I can't find my Dreamcast copy and how the PS2 port is worse? I guess I'm trying to find out if this is as bad as the other ports is all. Thanks :P
I think it's worth the 15€ but I would have my doubts at 20€.
The PS2 port had terrible frame drops in certain places to a point where the game would freeze. Also on the PS2 emulator the floor textures during battle load incorrectly but that's an emulator issue not a game issue. I own the PS2 version so I know. I suddenly realized that I own this game 3 times now.
 
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No, it really isn't. It shows many similarities, yes, but seeing the differences in the folder structure alone makes me believe that it is really a new port from the ground up.
Also the before mentioned Dreamcast save file support. The old port couldn't do that.

It sounds better. Now playing both ports with just few seconds in between the old port definitely had more noise in it. Very clearly hear able during the voiced dialogue.
The audio balance is a little weird with sound effects. Wished there was an audio slider.

I think it's worth the 15€ but I would have my doubts at 20€.
The PS2 port had terrible frame drops in certain places to a point where the game would freeze. Also on the PS2 emulator the floor textures during battle load incorrectly but that's an emulator issue not a game issue. I own the PS2 version so I know. I suddenly realized that I own this game 3 times now.

Well, okay, I mean, it's not perfect, no, and PCSX2 does have those weird ground texture issues in battle and yeah, I remember big towns and dungeons. As for sound, I'm sure there will be a patch as the devs seem to be pretty active on the Steam boards, that's also a good sign as Ubisoft didn't really do much with the PC port. Thanks again :P
 
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Before I stopped pirating, I downloaded and burned the discs of the Dreamcast version, didn't have a job then. I've also played the PS2 version, but not the old PC port. I remember the PS2 port was pretty bad. The Dreamcast version is flawless. Though that's not surprising since it's the original version. :P

It seems it was a direct port of the Dreamcast version, since the buttons on screen never changed. (X is still yellow rather than blue) I hope a modder figures out how to apply texture mods. I would totally attempt to make a HUD retexture, since those were never enhanced.

EDIT: Hmm... I think it's possible already! The DATA folder has DDS textures everywhere! Though I don't want to assume it would be that easy, since increasing the resolution might break it ingame.
 
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Yeah, it seems this game will be able to use mods that can fix/improve the game. I played about 30 min so far, it's not as bad as people on Steam are making it out to be. Not perfect, no, but helluva lot better than the PC and PS2 ports :P
 
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Yeah, it seems this game will be able to use mods that can fix/improve the game. I played about 30 min so far, it's not as bad as people on Steam are making it out to be. Not perfect, no, but helluva lot better than the PC and PS2 ports :P

I agree! I'm looking for similar fonts to the UI and I'm going to see if an HD HUD retexture mod would be possible! :)
 
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My only real beef is the lack of sound effect volume control, which shouldn't be all that hard to add via modding ^_^
I probably wouldn't do that, because that would require listening to EVERY SINGLE OGG file and using an editor that supports OGG to lower it's volume. That could take ages, since I don't have much free time. lmao If I'd actually try to make an HD HUD project, I'd be choking my time as it is!
 
I probably wouldn't do that, because that would require listening to EVERY SINGLE OGG file and using an editor that supports OGG to lower it's volume. That could take ages, since I don't have much free time. lmao

It's not the soundtrack necessarily, but rather the sound effects, which i assume are also OGG. Music itself is fine, but I know Audacity has a way to equalize and lower sound to more tolerable levels. Can those files even be edited? Tedious, sure, but it would help the experience a lot as the PC port had that problem XD. I mean, I can try a few OGG files, where are the stored? :P
 
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It's not the soundtrack necessarily, but rather the sound effects, which i assume are also OGG. Music itself is fine, but I know Audacity has a way to equalize and lower sound to more tolerable levels. Can those files even be edited? Tedious, sure, but it would help the experience a lot as the PC port had that problem XD. I mean, I can try a few OGG files, where are the stored? :P
With a seperate plugin, I think it'd totally be possible with something like Audacity! Uhm, if you go to Steam, right-click on Grandia II then properties, go to the Local Files tab and you would click Browse Local Files or similar. It'll open up explorer. Just look around the Data folder. I'm working on the DDS file that has the numbers that pop up during battles and exporting it as a 1280x1280 image with high-res font rather than it's native 128x128. so it would be the quickest way to test textures.
 
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With a seperate plugin, I think it'd totally be possible with something like Audacity! Uhm, if you go to Steam, right-click on Grandia II then properties, go to the Local Files tab and you would click Browse Local Files or similar. It'll open up explorer. Just look around the Data folder. I'm working on the DDS file that has the numbers that pop up during battles and exporting it as a 1280x1280 image with high-res font rather than it's native 128x128. so it would be the quickest way to test textures.

Found the OGG files in the data/sound folder, and there are quite a lot, heh, yikes. So looking at the music, I wonder if they can be replaced with higher quality files, as these seem to be at 134 kb/s, which is a really weird bitrate. Of would the game get all freaky if you converted a better quality soundtrack and used the same names, etc.
 
Found the OGG files in the data/sound folder, and there are quite a lot, heh, yikes. So looking at the music, I wonder if they can be replaced with higher quality files, as these seem to be at 134 kb/s, which is a really weird bitrate. Of would the game get all freaky if you converted a better quality soundtrack and used the same names, etc.

Crap, while the numbers in-battle worked, I get disappeared textures with the other stuff I edited, so an HD HUD is a no-go. :(
 
Crap, while the numbers in-battle worked, I get disappeared textures with the other stuff I edited, so an HD HUD is a no-go. :(

There's another way to do it for sure, don't give up :) That being said, I found a way to convert high quality MP3s to OGG at a much higher bit-rate, I just don't know if they'll work in-game. Encoded them at 300 kbps.

Edit: Yup, OGG files can be replaced
 
I'm sure you would have to edit some code to make the game think it needs to use a 1024x1024 texture rather than a 512x512 texture but stretched out.
I didn't expected a simple texture replacement to work properly.
 
Review cover
Product Information:
  • Release Date (NA): August 24, 2015
  • Release Date (EU): August 24, 2015
  • Publisher: Gongho Online Entertainment
  • Developer: Game Arts
  • Genres: J-RPG
  • Also For: Retro
Game Features:
Single player
Local Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer
Co-operative

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