Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness - Playstation 3

Overview: On the outside this game would just seem to be another disgaea game. Being the only sequel to the series the game does not disappoint with a simplification and expansion of options in the game. I wont go into too much detail as Jack Fox, Badgerlord was kind enough to go into great detail explaining certain facets of the game. Characters: Being a disgaea game the characters are generally over the top funny, vicious and petty. I have to say that they don't dissapoint and outside Leharls voice seeming a bit more fast paced then before the characters have their normal personality. I was surprised at how well a sequel 10 years later could keep the same thought process and story writing. They did a great job here. Mechanics: Much of the game mechanics have been overhauled and simplified to allow new and old players to enjoy the game while not trying to figure out "This Disgaea's new mechanic for X". They took a good bit from the first game and simplified things like items, character creation, grinding and combat mechanics like "Team Attakc, Lift and Throw, Mounting".The Master and Apprentice system is simplified and frankly should be used constantly. Base of operations: More of the castle is accessible, with fun little activities, like double jump, finding the cheat shop, and Etna's not so secrete chamber. overall the fact they added treasure per episode and a cheat shop make exploring worthwhile. Overall they release access to things like Item World, Demon Dojo and the Demon Assembly in a nice way with explanations to allow you to not neglect certain important aspects of the game. As a rule you generally want to always keep people training something in the Dojo and don't forget to test the chat shop out when you wanna grind, experiment with what may help speed leveling. Plot: As with any Disgaea plot, you always start off slow and doing semi minor missions when the netherworld just goes to hell. In this case the new story offers some fun, and interesting encounters. By far its the plot that may drag many Hardcore Disgaea fans back. the simplification of mechanics helps you easily adjust while the story has just enough nostalgia between bickering Main Characters with new plot to keep you locked in. Difficulty: Honestly this game is going to be as hard as you make it. Generally a little grinding in the item world between chapters when it becomes available is enough to make it through the story. There are several maps that you can abuse mechanics that let you farm off of too. It is important to realize nothing really benefits after about a 3 to 4 level gain. Item World excluded of course. There is a cheat shop option that can turn some of the most simple encounters in the story into very deadly encounters. you have the option very early to adjust difficulty via the cheat shop. If your trying to grind out while getting the most bang for your buck, you can increase the difficulty slightly and adjust EXP gain to help level up for the next chapter. Be warned, they "Will" let you make it impossible to kill enemies. Tips---------- Thief: Get a Thief very early Stealing can net you HL, Items Stats or can be used to defensively mitigate threats by stealing their armor or weapon. They are weak in DEF and RES. This can be slightly mitigated by stealing DEF from enemies, its perminent outside a reincarnation. So you can steal from enemies. Take not as what words mean what type of effect, they have a lot but memorizing lets you just slide over everyone on the field and pick your target. Book vs Staff: Books are stronger in INT then a Staff at the cost of range, if your using a mage you will likely opt for the Staff due to practicality, you don't have the HP to walk up and cast a point blank Fire Spell. I also recommend your healers have Staffs, Honestly the book is great AFTER your mage is established, but nothing really beats the range for heals so you will likely never opt to give a healer a book. Always do Something: in combat its very important that you have healers heal even full HP targets, also top them off whenever you can with Flonne, if she heals a target to full HP she gets 10% stat increase. The AoE's of spells are unlocked the more they are used, This means you need to heal ALOT just to unlock some practical healing AoE's... for each heal too! This also builds likability and you DO get XP for healing people when they are hurt!. Same goes for magic spells, if you cant use them on an enemy farm it up on one of your prinnies, then have flonne get XP and stats healing the prinny to full HP. Lift, Throw, Mount, and Explode!: Prinnies are great assets and with the new evilties you get to choose how they explode, Keep this in mind as in any map you should use them. They are great for hurting clusters of enemies, or being mounted to protect your low HP units. They cost 1 HL to restore no matter what and the damage is good. Mounting your Mages or other ranged is a practical way of saving them from enemy onslaught, The Prinnies take all the damage if attacked. so they essentially have to kill you twice to stop you from getting off that Spell! -------------- Closing: This game is a great addition to the Disgaea series, will provide hours of entertainment, and relatively easy to start. Make sure you have time to devote to the game though as it gets addicting and before you know it a few hours have passed. The game has streamlined and taken good aspects from the other games and has done a great job of making it a 5 out of 5 game. I highly reccomend the game, It was money well spent on my end.

Been a fan of the series since pre-Disgaea (the La Pusomething tactics game), and this is truly their culmination of a bunch of great work. Gonna do a brief summary so I can go back to playing it (Note: This review is written while on chapter 4 after about 18 hours of play mostly in item world and having not finished the entire game yet, so no spoilers capable and more so just some general mechanics commentary) ~Item rarity levels removed. Just streamlined down to Common, Uncommon, Rare, and Legendary (might be another in there). No longer will I be upset I have a level 3 legendary sword and need to find a level 1 or 0 one. That honestly saves a ridiculous number of hours of item world diving ~Item world ships required. Starts you off with one that goes down to level 10 and you quickly get one to go down to level 30. You're very likely to encounter a smaller ship from the cat pirates that also takes you just as deep as level 10. Means you have more searching to do than just immediately farming the basement of item world. ~Character promotions. Now you can have your rank 1 version of a toon just be promoted to the higher rank version of him/herself. Makes life easier at the lower levels of trying to maximize your character stats, instead of having to wait to power level them significantly later in the game. ~"More expensive stuff" rationed by chapter level. So you'll have to find your awesome "You shouldn't have this on your first playthrough" stuff in item world, instead of just diving for a few hours, passing the "more expensive stuff" all the way through, and using your item world money to buy the highest tier items. Game balance issue, makes going through item world a bit slower as well, but more enjoyable. ~Pirates either show up before your turn 1 or not at all. Don't have to spend 2 turns waiting to see if they arrive if you're hunting for pirate ships, you know from the start. This REALLY saves a lot of time. ~Character specializations: Each character type gets 3 specializations. Like one of the healers has the Evility choices of "When you heal others, you heal yourself", OR "Heal for an extra 20%" OR "Regain 5% of SP at end of turn" (those aren't all on the same guy but you get the idea). Makes for some extra customization. Ultimately this is my favorite game out there, and other than playing on the 3DS while at work, this has completely trumped all my other PS3 games (including FIFA and GTA5) and I'm playing nothing else while at home than this. And 18 hours in, my guys are only in the 50s.

Und mehr das Spiel hat sich wirklich gelohnt wer sich mit der Serie auskennt wird nicht enttäuscht sein der "Cheat Shop" ist eine super neuerung Die story ist echt lustig und etwas besser als bei Disgaea 4 wie ein Disgaea teil sein soll ^^dood

It is good to see that Laharl, Etna, and Flonne reprise their roles as protagonists in a new instalment of the Disgaea series, as well as an all new tag-along story character. There are some mechanics that I feel have improved since the first game. I like the apprentice system they have in this one. In the original, it felt a little bit backwards that the Master learns from the apprentice. Now they fixed that having the master teach the apprentice their skills, but a character's position in your army isn't fixed at creation. A character can switch masters, and the main characters can even become apprentices to learn skills. There is also a friendship system that adds another level of depth battles. Characters that are friendly towards each-other will be more likely to join in combo-attacks, and will help finish off enemies that they don't kill. If characters dislike each-other, the likelihood that they will join in a combo will drop to 0%. I find it adds an extra dynamic to the army that makes things more interesting. There is now more thought into creating new characters, with personality and evilty and choosing their colours. Once they gain a few levels, characters are now able to move up to a higher tier of their class as they get unlocked. Reincarnation is still an option, but Promotion is much easier when they're not yet ready to go that route. The addition of the tome weapon type also allows for more customization. I like a few of the abilities that come from gaining ranks in tomes. If I had one disappointment, it is that Rosen Queen seems to be a little bland in this game. They no longer seem to have random equipment. It has a fixes stock of weapons and armors that you can buy at your expense level. There aren't rare or legendary items among the list, and they never have residents on their items. All the good items are to be gained through battle bonuses, leaving little reason to spend all my HL other than for healing.

Hallo, kann das Spiel nur empfehlen. Jeder der auf JRPG's steht sollte sofort zugreifen. Es macht eine Menge Laune. Peace

Following along in the footsteps of all the previous Disgaea games. The only reason I didn't give this one 5 stars is because there were several times that the game froze. I've never had this happen before. So, I suggest you save as often as possible. There were some improved features I really liked. The ability to throw people in any direction without having to push your button and hope they went diagonally like in previous games was really nice. The many, many levels of upgrades in the dungeons was great. And, although it took me a long time, I finally did use the cheat shop which makes a whole lot of replay value by adjusting certain things. (you can find out for yourself) Now, when's the sixth game coming out??

Love the series. Endless fun to be had and a unique entertaining story. Haven't had a chance to play this game but if it is anything like the other titles, I'm sure it will be good.