back on the video gaming wagon after not feeling into them for a while. not that i swore games off or never played or anything, but instead of coming home and diving right in, i had to think of what i felt like playing, and nothing was ever coming to mind. guitar hero kept me occupied during this span and it still get more play time than most games.

however, i'm back into rpgs...not the newest, mind you, but it's still a good one: grandia II for the sega dreamcast. i'm far enough into this one that i can say with conviction that it's a pretty damn good game. the story follows ryodu, a "geohound" that has been hired to escort a songstress of granas (the god of light) to a ceremony that is supposed to stop valmar's (the god of darkness) rebirth. stuff happens during the ceremony that gets ryodu mixed up in the battle between light and darkness.

the plot is ok and it has a few interesting points, but it ends up going cliche about halfway through. that's not necessarily a bad thing, but if the story was the only thing this game had going for it, it would have fallen by the wayside. luckily that's not the case. what keeps my attention is the battle system. it's turn-based+. if you played the first grandia on the playstation, then the battle system is familiar. each participant in the battle has bar for timing attacks. the time it takes to go from "rest" to "command" is based on stats. at the "command" stage you choose your attack and then the turn progresses to the "act" stage, where the character does what you commanded. it's hard to describe, but it allows you to time your attacks so that they cancel your enemies' attacks, among other things.

as far as aesthetics go, the music is good and the graphics are great. one thing i had forgotten about this game is that it came with a soundtrack. being the video game nerd that i am, i actually used to listen to this cd quite a bit...right along with the soundtracks to the lunar games, final fantasies 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. even though the view is overhead 3/4, the world is nice and colorful and the sprites are pretty top-notch. during battles, special attacks and magical effects are nicely represented, but i sometimes want to skip the sequence on the more drawn out ones.

all in all i think grandia II is a well-rounded game. i'm having fun playing it and the battles are something i don't begrudge. in fact, i've actually cleared every "dungeon" i've gone through so far. that probably explains why my characters are pretty high in level already. i'd give this game a solid 9.

the other game usurping my time? shadow of the colossus for the ps2. this game is nice. the perpective is sweet, the graphics look better than xbox360's offerings as of late, and there aren't any regular enemies...just bosses. you even get to ride a dumb horse (i have a somewhat humorous anecdote about said horse....ask me about it sometime). i'm looking forward to finishing this one as well, so more dialog is probably coming (as per usual). out.