Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom (PS4) Review

Developer: Level-5

Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment

Release Date: March 22, 2018

Platforms: PS4, Xbox One/Xbox Series X|S, Switch, PC

Overview: Level-5 studio has revisited the world of Ni No Kuni and flipped it on its head. Being a direct sequel to the 2013 hit "Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch", Ni No Kuni II is set hundreds of years after the events of the first game. Players will not need to have played the first game since Level-5 essentially re-booted the entire Ni No Kuni universe. There are no returning characters, but there are some minor nods if you're willing to put the time into exploring. The world map is barely recognizable and the events of the 1st game are hardly ever mentioned besides a puzzle sequence early on. The Tale of a Timeless Tome DLC is for players that have reached the end game and deals specifically with the most important item of the first Ni No Kuni. Outside of these 2 instances, the world is brand new and fresh, the colors are vibrant, and the environments are fun to explore.

Story: The game starts off with Roland, a president of an unnamed country in our world, being driven over a bridge into a city by his chauffeur. He then gets isekai'd into the world of Ni No Kuni just as a missile tears the city apart. He appears in Prince Evan's room inside of the Ding Dong Dell castle. At the same time, the king's most trusted advisor, Mausinger, is staging a coup. Prince Evan reluctantly joins Roland to escape the castle. After forming a student-teacher relationship, Prince Evan vows to start anew and create a new kingdom. From this new kingdom, Evan wants to eliminate all war by making each of the 4 nations sign a treaty. In the shadows, there is a mysterious character taking advantage of Evan's exploits across the nations.

Along your adventures, you'll be meeting interesting characters and tend to the needs of residents in your newly formed nation. There will also be new party members being added as you progress the story. The only real lulls in the plot are the intermissions between reaching each nation. You'll have to research and discover how to reach each nation to form a treaty and take care of any quests to gain access. The side quests are extremely mundane or tedious. Sometimes both! Ranging from fast traveling to a fetch quest location to fast traveling to kill X monster or X amount of monsters. If you're a sidequest maniac, then you will be repeating the same area you already cleared multiple times. The sidequests don't add anything to the overall plot and only serve to give you money, exp, items, and potentially new residents for your kingdom. The main plot, however, is full of politics, solving mysteries, and huge boss battles. The characters you'll be interacting with are just as unique and each has a believable motivation that drives them. The circumstances that take you from point A to point B feel organic, the pacing is generally good, each location is entirely unique from one another, and each nation presents a different plague that ails it.

Gameplay: Ni No Kuni II takes a drastic departure from the Pokemon-Esque battles from the 1st game. Most enemy encounters will be real-time combat with the ability to cast spells/abilities and switch between 2 other party members. Each character gets a close and long-ranged weapon. There are 3 types of melee and ranged weapons, and each party member will have some combination of each. Each character has a specific weapon combination. There are also two types of adventure modes. There is an overworld and an area exploration mode. In the overworld, each member of your party is represented by a chibi version of themselves and there will be monsters walking around the map. If you get close enough to a monster, it will trigger a battle encounter and your party will engage the enemies in a large area. After the encounter's over, you'll be taken to the overworld again. If you enter into specific areas from the overworld, you will get to explore the area in normal size and all enemies will be visible before you engage them. While fighting, enemies will drop health orbs, mana orbs, and Lofty will occasionally throw awakening orbs. The buffs from the awakening will depend on the setup of your cute little sprite companions.

Another addition to the battle system is the presence of Higgledies. Little sprites that assist with combat by doing damage, enhancing certain skills/spells, passive skills for the party, and their ultimate technique that you can use. Higgledies also have elemental typing and a cost system. The total amount of points you can use is 10. Rarer, stronger Higgledies will cost more with the max being 4. These little helpers can be found through main quests, side quests, creating them from your kingdom, and finding Higgledy stones. The stones require a crafting ingredient to be offered, and the Higgledy hiding in the stone will trigger a riddle to help figure out what offering they want. The Higgledies added unique party-building aspects and strategies to get the most out of all the buffs they offer the party. I personally had a team of 2 massive damage-dealing Higgledies, 1 Higgledy that heals over time, and 1 other Higgledy that heals upfront. Higgledies were a wonderful addition that added a surprising amount of depth to combat and team building that I hope will carry over into the next entry in the series.

The final major piece of gameplay is the skirmish battles. Evan leads a unit of 4 infantry groups to fight off bandits, monsters, and conduct joint exercises with other nations. The objective is to reduce the enemy's military might to 0. The skirmishes retain the same chibi look from the overworld exploration. Certain residents from your kingdom will have their own military unit that you can use. Each unit comes with 3 passives and 1 ability. Skirmishes are necessary and will be used throughout the story of the game, as well as quite a few sidequests. The skirmishes are usually short, especially the main storyline battles. Even though they are forced upon you at times, it added a bit of variation and a different type of strategy outside of the main combat encounters.

Final Verdict: 9/10

Ni No Kuni 2 is a worthwhile adventure in any anime RPG enthusiast's collection. The set pieces are engaging, the characters all have their own motivations set in the politics of the Ni No Kuni universe, and there's enough variety in the gameplay to stay glued. The lack of a sprint button was the only real complaint I kept repeating in my head as I traversed the same area for the 12th time, but I'm a maniac that needed to complete all 175 side quests. The character of Roland embodied the player relating the happenings of Ni No Kuni to our own world. Whether it be race wars, the disparity between lower and upper class, or the corruption of political figures. The game was fun and oddly intense at times. The plot twists come at a rapid pace as you learn more about character motivations and the shadowy figure interferes at every corner.