Advice wanted.

[Kirian]

I would like some help, if you please.
I would like to know which PS2 titles you believe are 'missing' from my collection. I am mainly searching for less famous titles. Larger title recommendations are also welcomed.

As an addendum, I enjoy 'Magic mushroom' style games more than my collection dictates- most of my 'childish' games (Jak and Daxter is one of my favourite games- best platformer ever released) have been mistakenly sold. Any game should preferably be available in the EU, but it is not a necessity.

Here is my collection, to give you a rough idea of my taste and games I already own (to avoid redundant candidates): Armoured Core 3, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II (?), Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter,Dark Cloud, Dark Chronicle, Devil May Cry, Disgaea, Fantavision, God of War, Grandia II, Gregory Horror Show, Harvest Moon: AWLSE, ICO, Killer7, Legaia 2: Duel Saga, MGS2&3, Onimusha 3 (sold O2- preferred O2), Resident Evil 4, Shadow of the Colossus, Soul Calibur II, Haven: Call of the King, Metal Arms: Glitch in the System, Timesplitters Future Perfect, Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana, and Red Dead Revolver.

Particularly welcome are fighting game recommendations, especially 2D (I am a KoF fan).

Addendum: I have Psychonauts for the PC, and I also had Ratchet and Clank. I traded it (plus cash) for Suikoden II. I might pick it up again- I preferred J&D: TPL, however.
Sorry, Hawkeye and Orpheo.

[Hawkeye Fierce]

You want Psychonauts.

[OrfBC]

Ratchet and Clank, all of them. It seems unlikely that you haven't played them, but they're not on your list. If you think Jak & Daxter is the best platformer ever released, maybe you haven't played R&C.

[Saxman_72]

Particularly welcome are fighting game recommendations, especially 2D (I am a KoF fan).
Guilty Gear X2

[extarbags]

I was going to say Fantavision, but it looks like you've got that one. So:

Guilty Gear X2
Dragon Quest VIII
Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter
Katamari Damacy
Alien Hominid
Phantom Brave

[Gunmetal]

In addition to the Ratchet & Clank series, also try Sly Cooper. The second one is a little more forgiving than the first, but they're all pretty great

[Kirian]

I have Breath of Fire and Psychonauts (PC). I had Ratchet and Clank, but I still preferred Jak and Daxter (just the first one). A small multitude of questions- I am told that Guilty Gear X is better than X2- is this true?
I can only get hold of We Love Katamari- how does it compare?
If I was only able to buy one Sly Cooper, which one should it be?
Alien Hominid- thank you. Any more games at this level of recognition? I am mostly looking for the lesser-known ones.
Otherwise, thank you all. Please, keep posting.

If you wish to know about any of my games, please ask.

[Doug Erickson]

X2 is vastly superior to X.

[Charlatan]

I can only get hold of We Love Katamari- how does it compare?

We Love Katamari is good, but IMHO it doesn't quite have the same zing as the original. The interface for choosing what mission to play seemed clunkier to me (wandering around the field). The music doesn't appeal as much. One problem with the original was that there wasn't a ton of variety from level to level - sure, there were a couple of different ones, but they were few and far between, ELK tries to mix things up quite a bit.

Everything about Katamari Damacy was so spot on in my book - it was super trippy and weird and oftentimes you were scratching your head at the story or the cutscenes or what you were doing, but it was one big bundle of weirdness that worked perfectly. Everybody Loves Katamari tries to follow that same path, but I really don't think you can achieve that same trippy goodness twice - maybe the experience of the first one changes you or something - so while it's pleasant, it's not awesome.

If I had both in front of me, I'd definitely pick KD, but if it was a choice between nothing and ELK, then pick up ELK.

[Jab]

For fighting games, Virtual Fighter 4 evo is one of the best. There is a platformer that I liked, it's like jak and dexter with alittle metal gear stealth in it. Called Kya Dark Lineage, I don't know where you can find a copy of it now though. We love katamari is pretty much the same concept as the first, but with new objectives and such, also expanded multiplayer.

As for sly cooper, I liked all of them, I think 2 was my favorite. Still if you like one of them, then you should get all 3, since they each have some pretty great gameplay.

And here is a quick list of games from me :
Nocturne, Mark of Kri, Makai Kingdom(Phantom Brave was already mentioned),
Devil May Cry 3,

[Kevin Grey]

If I was only able to buy one Sly Cooper, which one should it be?


Most would say Sly 1 or Sly 3- Sly 1 is basically just a pure platformer with very little overhead to it. Sly 2 and Sly 3 add in other mechanics that dilute the platforming. All of them are great and while Sly 2 is my personal favorite, I'm in the minority on that opinion I think.

[RickH]

Another vote for Sly Cooper (the first). And did you try the 2nd Ratchet & Clank? It's the best of the series in my opinion. Also, don't let Jak II put you off of Jak 3. It manages the difficulty level much better than the 2nd game.


If I had both in front of me, I'd definitely pick KD, but if it was a choice between nothing and ELK, then pick up ELK.

Agreed, but if We Love Katamari is the first one you play, perhaps the zing will be there for you.

EDIT: if you liked Metal Arms and Timesplitters:FP, you might enjoy Darkwatch.

[Kitsune]

Do you like shmups at all? Try Gradius V or R-Type Final!

You want fighters? Street Fighter 3: Third Strike is now widely available and no one should be without. Apparently, there's a KOF double pack available over there, and it includes 2002 and 2003, two very strong KOF games, so go for that.

Have you never played the Maximo games? Both of them are rich with excellent level design and oldschool challenge. A smaller platformer that got ignored as also I-Ninja, and it's definitely worth a budget price, as its very solid and quite creative.

Did you ignore the Dynasty Warriors series for a reason? If so, I guess you can skip it, if not, go for one of them, preferably the newest or an Empires game, or Capcom's Sengoku Basara/Devil Kings.

Have you played the Fatal Frame games? If not, three excellent horror games await you, each better than the last. Along those lines Haunting Ground is nice, but not outstanding, certainly around the level of Gregory Horrow Show.

It seems you can tolerate dungeon hacks, so how about the Nightmare of Druaga? It's a very oldschool roguelike with lots of great ideas to deepen the play experience.

Romancing Saga: Minstrel Saga is heavily non-linear, features a highly strategic battle system and all sorts of RPG gooey, crunchy goodness.

That's all I can think of in a brief moment...

-Kitsune

[MrAngryFace]

My favorites:

Breath of Fire V
Shinobi
Virtua Fighter 4: Evo
Dark Cloud 2
Frequency
Guitar Hero
Gradius V
Devil May Cry 3
Guilty Gear XX (but if you own an Xbox get it for that instead)
Klonoa 2
Maximo 1 & 2
Radiata Stories
Wipeout Fusion
Sly Cooper (1st one was the best)
Spy Hunter
Primal
Zone of Enders 2

[Doug Erickson]

Oh, how I loved Romancing SaGa.

[Dave Long]

Oh, how I loved Romancing SaGa.

Ha! It will follow you for as long as you live. :)

I still haven't tried the game and I bought it over a year ago. :(

[Kirian]

Another vote for Sly Cooper (the first). And did you try the 2nd Ratchet & Clank? It's the best of the series in my opinion. Also, don't let Jak II put you off of Jak 3. It manages the difficulty level much better than the 2nd game.

I did not bother trying any J&D games after the first. The apparant bandwagon-leap put me off. I have also kept a wide berth from Darkwatch for the same reason: vampire western. Red Dead Revolver is brilliant, however. Very much in the style of 'Once Upon a Time in the West', 'Unforgiven', and the Dollars Trilogy.
Dark Chronicle is Dark Cloud 2, for the great unwashed.

R-Type Final is on the list, Gradius is a maybe, both have been pined for since release. I recently cleared some of my backlog, so I can finally buy them, and all the above applies to Maximo. I find Dynasty Warriors dull, but I did have a short sojourn with Kessen II.
KoF 2002/2003: I was wary of the quality, but thanks. I will probably buy Alpha Anthology, as that contains the parry system; plus, I preferred Alpha. Horror games do not interest me; I have been looking at Fatal Frame since the first release, but decided no.
I wish I could find Klonoa somewhere.

This is fantastic, chaps. Keep it up- more less-well-known titles, please.

[Dave Long]

Gradius V should come before R-Type Final. Final is a good game, but not a great one whereas Gradius V is among the top ten or twenty shooters all-time.

Also, if you like to shoot things, grab Gungrave and Gungrave Overdose.

[MrAngryFace]

Gradius V is like 20 bucks, its not a maybe, its a must. Do ittttttt!

[Doug Erickson]

Gradius V craps all over R-Type Final, and this is coming from the World's Biggest R-Type fan. R-Type Final isn't a bad shooter overall, but it's nowhere near the glory of the original or Delta.

[Lizard_King]

I second Guilty Gear X. Also, Zone of the Enders 2, and Devil May Cry 3. Those are all excellent games in the bargain bin.

Owning a PS2 without Guitar Hero is incomprehensible to me. In fact, I'm going to go get my ass kicked in expert mode just for the hell of it. Be that guy at Best Buy who tries it out in front of complete strangers, or better yet that guy who tries it at a friend's house and is immediately sold. Especially since it is on the cusp of an even better sequel (Bass guitar...yeah)...it's for anyone who never wanted to learn to play the guitar but still likes to rock. What RE4 does for wannabe zombie killers, this does for anyone who considers a 60gb mp3 player "about right".

Edit: Klonoa 2 for ps2 along with its less excellent siblings is available at various places (http://search.half.ebay.com/klonoa_W0QQ) for reasonable prices. Sure, it's incredibly fruity, but what a platformer...

[MrAngryFace]

Wahoo Stomp is the best song in a game ever. Klonoa 2.

[BDGE]

Since all the usual favorites are mentioned, I'll throw out some obscurities.

-Wizardry:Tales of the Forsaken Land. One of the best First Person Dungeon Hacks ever put onto a console. In many ways I preferred it to Wizardry 8 which came out near the same time on PC. Might be a tough find, but worth the effort. Watch out for Death...

-Drakan: Some subtitle I don't recall. Pretty much an extension of the old PC series but with superior execution. The melee combat is a bit awkward, but the quests and world design are great, and you ride around on a big dragon.

-Samurai Warriors + XL disk. Don't bother unless you plan to get both the original game and it's expansion(which you need for the hefty patch upgrades). IMO superior to the Dynasty Warriors franchise due to the mission subquests, branching campaign progression, and character skilltrees. Wonderful game.

-Tekken 5 is now $20 and is also highly recommended. Stunning graphics, a multitude of bonuses(three older arcade games to be unlocked), and well, the story mode endings are a total riot.

[MrAngryFace]

God if you love Tekken you HAVE to get the new PSP game. OMG OMG

[wildpokerman]

I have over 150 in my collection, Kitsune probably has over 500.

Get collecting dude. Gotta catch em all.

[Theodore Rex DX]

Gregory Horror Show! Respect. Katamari, as suggested and Gradius V. DON'T GET KLONOA 2 IT IS WORSE THAN REZ IF THAT'S EVEN POSSIBLE. Taito Legends 1 and 2, and Capcom Classics as well. Also Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne was kind of okay for an RPG - though BoFV is way betterer.

[Dave Long]

DON'T GET KLONOA 2 IT IS WORSE THAN REZ IF THAT'S EVEN POSSIBLE.

Dude. No. Just... no.

[Theodore Rex DX]

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO BORING. But okay, I'll stop now.

[Theodore Rex DX]

Oh, and Midway Arcade Treasures 1 if you don't already own decent versions of Joust! and Robotron.

[Theodore Rex DX]

Sucks so bad that PAL didn't get the first Katamari. So bad. Just trying to think of magic mushroom games that don't suck like Klonoa 2 sucks and is overrated. Viewtiful Joe and Monkey Ball? Kuri Kuri Mix is very magic mushroom but may be hard to find, and is really more of an interesting novelty.

[Theodore Rex DX]

Say, does anybody know if Earth Defence Force 2 got a PAL release? I ask because a lot of the Simple Series games seem to.

[Kirian]

You said Rez and Klonoa 'suck'*, therefore all your advice is useless. Good day.
I have been looking at Guitar Hero for a while, and it is fun, but it does not interest me enough to warrant a purchase yet.

BDGE: Perfect. I think Drakan is now Drakangard (I remember looking at reviews).

We do not have Nocture- I believe it is known as SMT: Lucifer's Call, which is off-putting as a name. Is Nocturne the SMT game with Dante as a guest boss?
150 PS2 games is utterly ridiculous to me. I don't have enough time to finish that many games, and I tend to only buy the highly recommended games due to budgetary constaints (with a few noticeable slips). Kudos for creating such a colossal collection, however.
Thank you all. I know all of the games mentioned, but if people have more obscure recommendations, that would be wonderful. Again, my gratitude is extended.

*I owned, finished, and loved Rez. I traded it for some moderately rare PS1 RPGs in the end, more fool me.

[Kitsune]

Yep, that Nocturne. It's also very close to the best RPG on the PS2. It's brilliant in every fashion. I believe you would really appreciate it's aesthetic direction, which is stark, angular, geometric, saturated and cold, but has a certain beauty to it. It's story is both subtle and fascinating and the mechanics are in the short realm of brilliance.

-Kitsune

[Robert Sharp]

SMT: Nocturne is iT!!!!!!!! DO BUY IT!!!

I like Romance of the Three Kindgoms X, but you might want to check reviews first, to make sure it's your kind of game.

Prince of Persia:SoT is a brilliant game.

DQVIII has also been mentioned, but I highly recommend it.

I also like the second Maximo game. It has a lot of style.

[KaoFloppy]

SMT: Nocturne == Lucifier's Call. Buy it, and buy the strategy guide online. (Or do EU have the DoubleJump guide?) Then, if you get hooked on the style, follow up with Digital Devil Saga 1+2, Persona 2 (for PSX), and watch for the upcoming Devil Summoner and Persona 3. Hopefully you like lots of random battles, though.

If you liked Rez, wanna try Space Channel 5? EU gets both 1+2 in one package. ***envious***

Another good JRPG to watch for is Metal Saga. However, gamefaqs say that it's JP and US only. This one is relatively unrestricted, compared to things like Grandia II and Final Fantasy X. Speaking of which, why don't you have Grandia 3? Oh right, you'll be busy with Nocturne. I understand.

[Jab]

There is this one game, pretty weird but there isn't anything like it that I could find. called Herdy Gerdy( I have no idea if it's called something else outside the Us). You have to herd different types of imaginary creatures to their specific pens, the catch is that a big foot type creature is trying to eat them and beat the crap out of you in the process. I only played it for about a hour but it seemed pretty neat.

Also if you like horror games, there is one called Siren, it's pretty hard to play, but it looked interesting, and there are zombies who use sniper rifles to kill you.

[Kirian]

I had Herdy Gerdy. It came with my PS2. Fruity, interesting, definitely unique but a little fiddly. It could also be very frustrating to herd thirty creatures into a pen and then come back with more to find a large creature with a fishing rod is finishing the last one, shortly before whacking you into next week. It had charisma.
Thanks for the recommendation anyway- I had forgotten Herdy Gerdy. There have been some good recommendations, so thank you. I do know about all of these games, too, and most of them have been on watchlists. This thread has just cemented their future purchasing.

We might get DoubleJump guides, but I don't buy guides. Piggyback (EU only) are supposedly the best, according to Edge.
I also have all three PoP games, on the PC. Their natural habitat.

[Kevin Grey]

BDGE: Perfect. I think Drakan is now Drakangard (I remember looking at reviews).

Nah, that's a different series. Drakan for the PS2 was a sequel to the PC Only (IIRC) Drakan game that came out back in '99. Developed by Surreal Software who went on to do The Suffering.

[Kirian]

That begs a new question then: Drakan or Drakengard (I had doubts when I remembered 1) it is DrakEngard, not DrakAn..., and 2) Drakan was subtitled, DG was not)?

[Moore]

I can second gradius V and R-type final, lovely stuff. It's like having a 'super DUPER nintendo' in that they are totally classic games but gorgeous.

SMT nocturne and DQ8 as well. Those are probabaly my fav. 4 games on the system. Grab rez if you can find it, dont pay ridiculous prices though (I paid 12.50 or something, check video stores dumping rentals)

if you get SMT (honestly, even if you DONT get smt) get the doublejump guide for it, it's really nice.

[Dave Long]

The game that the Best Damn Guest Ever is talking about is Drakan.

http://www.ebgames.com/product.asp?product%5Fid=938368

[KaoFloppy]

You're in EU? Rent or borrow The Sword of Etheria. It's a DMC-like game, with addition of AI controled partners. Instead of just slashing everything in sight with your sword, you are supposed to juggle enemies with your partners. The Japanese name for this game is "OZ". Now go forth and google!

[BDGE]

Dave's boxshot is correct. Drakan: The Ancient's Gate.

Drakengard is a somewhat abysmal Dynasty Warriors clone developed by Cavia(?) for SquareEnix with the ability to ride a dragon and breath fire on forces when you aren't mindlessly flailing away with whatever weapon on foot.

Drakan is a much better game, but it has been years since I played(and loved) it. I do hope it still holds up.

[Kirian]

I do know Oz. I have not seen it yet. Otherwise, Drakan it is.
Actually, I think we know Drakengard as Drag-on Dragoon. Or possibly the Japanese do.

No PAL release for Earth Defence Force 2, maddeningly.