The cel-shaded visual style is strikingly beautiful- it grabbed my attention at first glance, and continued to stun me with consistently strong art design. Unlike its predecessor, Studio Ghibli wasn’t involved in the development of Ni no Kuni II, but some key members from Ghibli still worked on the game with Level 5, and it completely shows. The first thing you notice about Ni no Kuni II when the game boots up, however, is how beautiful it is. There are times, as seems to be the case with most JRPGs irrespective of the developer, when the script feels a bit too cheesy or exaggerated in its style, but these moments are the exception, not the rule. Evan’s friendships and interactions with the people he meets up with throughout the game are extremely well written, and lend the dynamics between these people a lot of believability. Evan’s growth as both, a person and a king throughout Revenant Kingdom’s story is handled incredibly for the entirety of the game, but equally as well-developed and likeable are characters such as Roland and Shani. Much of that is, in equal parts, due to the writing and the voice acting. Where the narrative’s strengths really lie is in the characters it portrays. Ni no Kuni II’s narrative always moves at a brisk pace, and while this is a good thing in the sense that the game isn’t bogged down in sections that can kill the game’s pacing like so many other JRPGs can be, it also means that there are a few sections where important details are completely glossed over, or the game fails to spend enough time on major events or backstories. As such, within the narrative there is a lot of interacting and negotiating with other cities and towns and a lot of conflict-resolution and quest-completion for other kingdoms. The central premise of the game is that Evan seeks to build a new kingdom, with his main goal being to bring the entire world under one, single, peaceful banner. In Ni no Kuni II, you play as a young boy named Evan, who used to be the king of Ding Dong Dell, but was ousted from his own kingdom after a violent coup. " Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom has a lot of the same strengths that its predecessor did, such as its beautiful visuals, characters that you can invest in, and overflowing charm, but it also fixes many of the issues that plagued the first game." And while none of the game’s issues are as annoying as the grinding and the annoying battles of the previous game were, they cannot be ignored. As such, while people were more willing to forgive the original Ni no Kuni’s missteps, since it was a rare contemporary JRPG gem when it launched, such is not the case with Ni no Kuni II. As recently as within the last couple of years, we’ve played some truly excellent games, including the likes of Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Persona 5, Final Fantasy 15, and Nier Automata, so the JRPG genre clearly isn’t in the kind of dire straits it was five or six years ago. Unlike its predecessor, however, Ni no Kuni II has released in a landscape where JRPGs are no longer stagnating- they’re resurgent. Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom has a lot of the same strengths that its predecessor did, such as its beautiful visuals, characters that you can invest in, and overflowing charm, but it also fixes many of the issues that plagued the first game. Though the game had some pretty major issues of its own, it nonetheless felt like a breath of fresh air in a time when the JRPG genre seemed to have stagnated and looked to be moving towards its demise. Its charming world and cast of characters, vibrant and beautiful visual palette, and classic JRPG charm endeared the game to almost everyone who played it. Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch was one of the most well-loved games of the previous generation.
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