Why you should play Suikoden (A sort of retrospective)

[Wolf Kanno]

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I've been replaying this series a lot and just kind of want to talk about it with someone. The Discord is a wall of noise that consumes any voice that isn't the topic of the moment, so I figure I could get all my thoughts out here in a thread instead.

So as the title says, this is going to be just one long thread of me trying to convince someone here to pick up and check out the series. I'll likely be highlighting each game, give an overview, chat about my feelings and spill some tips for newcomers. This will be an ongoing series as I don't quite have the time anymore devoted to this long write-ups like I used to. I will only be covering the mainline series (Suikoden 1-5, Tactics, and Suikogaiden 1 and 2) so I won't be touching on the reboots or the Card Game entry because I have neither played them and two of them were Japanese exclusives of which only one of them got a fairly recent English translation.

Feel free to chat and leave your own comments. I'll start with some talking about the first entry into the series next time.

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[Quindiana Jones]

I played the start of Suikoden 2 but never got into it. It was really cool, though; it was just time that prevented play! Maybe I should have a looksie....

[Jowy]

The local tattoo parlor my sister works at refused to put a Black Sword Rune on my left hand because they weren't "experienced enough".

Play Suikoden II, my man! it has (in my opinion) the best jRPG boss fight EVER.

[Wolf Kanno]

Alright, I know I said I was going to start with an overview of the first game, but instead I'm going to start with an overview of the setting and terms you'll need to know in order to follow along.

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In the beginning, there was "darkness."
Then, the "darkness" shed a "tear."
From that "tear," the brothers Sword and Shield were born.
Shield claimed it could defend against any attack.
Sword claimed it could slice through anything.
The brothers began a legendary battle.
At the end, both Sword and Shield shattered.
Sword became the sky, Shield became the earth, and the sparks from the battle became the stars.
As for the jewels, they fell to the ground and became the True Runes--The runes that all other runes were born from

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At the heart of Suikoden's setting lies the 27 True Runes. While it is unknown if the story of sword and shield is true, the true runes are very real in the world of Suikoden. These runes each govern some aspect of the world. The Soul Eater governs Life and Death, the Gate Rune allows traversal between different worlds. The five elemental runes allow the existence of fire, water, earth, wind, and lightning. The Dragon Rune allows for dragons to exist within the world. You get the point. These 27 Runes are the closest things to gods within the setting, as it becomes abundantly clear the runes each possess a will of their own and a terrible destiny for their bearer. In some ways, it's almost safe to say the runes are cursed, but people still seek the runes out. In addition to access to their powers the runes also grant immortality and agelessness. The only rule of the True Runes is one rune for one bearer. If you gain a true rune you cannot carry another, though it has also shown that if you are one who is chosen by a true rune, then the other true runes will accept you as well. The runes can be transferred to other people and objects by either the bearer's will or from the use of Sindar techniques, but the rune will always respond to the call of it's living chosen master.


In the course of the series, players have encountered or were told of 18 of the 27 True Runes names. They are:

• Circle Rune - Rune governing order and stagnation. It is currently in possession of the ruler of Harmonia.
• Gate Rune - Governs portals to other worlds. The rune was split in two centuries before the story began and the Front Gate Rune is currently lost.
• Dragon Rune - Allows Dragons to exist within the setting outside of their actual World of Scales, as well as the power to control them. It is protected by the Dragon Knights of Toran and is passed down through the leaders of the order.
• Rune of Change - It's powers are unknown, but it's likely responsible for the erratic history of the Sindar civilization. We only know that the leader of the civilization possesses it.
• Eightfold Rune - It's powers are also unknown but is owned by the mysterious Yuber whose origins are still a mystery within the series.
• Moon Rune - The rune of compassion and destruction, allows the existence of vampires in the world. This rune will actually take over the users mind until they learn to overcome it. In addition, a vampire in possession of the rune will be immune to weapons and spells that normally destroy their kind.
• Sun Rune - Rune of prosperity and also destruction, this rune grants the owner the powers of the sun, but tends to corrupt the users mind into a god complex leading to the use of its more destructive properties. This meglomania is often cited as the source of the Ancient Armes Kingdom's destruction. The Rune birthed two special runes, the Dawn and Twilight Runes which are required to keep the rune in balance. The Rune if the royal treasure of the Queendom of Falena.
• Night Rune - Allows for the existence of creatures of the nights like werewolves, zombies, and other creatures associated with it. The rune also has the power to destroy these creatures. This rune transformed itself into a blade called the Zodiac Sword to cut itself away from the Sun run of which they were originally joined together. Unlike the other True runes which often never directly communicate with its owner, this rune actually talks and has the personality of an incredibly short tempered and arrogant old man. So yes, it's a talking sword. It also has a habit of getting ''lost'' a lot when the current owner gets too sick of him.
• True Earth Rune - Controls the very earth around them. This rune is in possession of a Bishop within Harmonia
• True Wind Rune - Controls wind and air. This rune is currently lost.
• True Lightning Rune - Controls lightning. Last seen in the Grasslands
• True Water Rune - controls water and ice. Last seen in the Grasslands, it was partially sealed away in a Sindar temple using an imperfect technique.
• True Fire Rune - controls fire. Stolen from Harmonia and used by a brigand who led the Fire Bringers. The rune vanished somewhere in the Grasslands.
• Rune of Punishment - This rune governs punishment and forgiveness. Considered to be the most cursed rune. This rune powers itself with the life force of the user, slowly killing them so it can consume them. It will even warp fate around its user to force them into situations that will make them use it. Most wearers never get to experience the immortality part of the True Runes because of it. Once its user dies, it will jump to the closest living person it comes into contact with. The former owners souls are also trapped within the rune until a current user releases them. The rune is strongly associated with the region of the Island Nations.
• Sovereign Rune - This rune gives the bearer authority and immunity to all lesser runes. It was stolen from Harmonia and became the royal family treasure of the Rugnar family line. The rune was embedded in an ancestral sword. It is currently missing.
• Beast Rune - Rune representing animalistic rage and passion. It's abilities are not clearly explained but it's derivative runes curse the user with lycanthropy. This rune is considered to be uncontrollable and needs to be satiated with blood sacrifices. The rune was ''gifted'' to the Highland Kingdom by Harmonia but in truth it left Harmonia of its own will and settled there instead. Its whereabouts are currently unknown, but it may have possibly been reclaimed by Harmonia.
• Rune of Life and Death - More commonly known as the Soul Eater, this rune will feed off the souls of the owners closest loved ones in order to grow more powerful. Forcing them into a life of isolation. It is the other rune often claimed to be the most cursed. The rune will even warp the fates of those around the owner so that they will die tragically near them. It is considered to be one of the most powerful of the true runes. The current whereabouts of the rune are unknown.
• Rune of Beginnings - The rune of ''initial chaos of birth'' or creation and the power to judge war. This rune represents the very legend of the origin of the True Runes as the rune often splits itself into the Bright Shield and Black Sword Runes. It will usually seek out two people of close relationship and then force them to re-enact the conflict of the two brothers of sword and shield. If the conflict between the two is resolved, the rune will merge back together into it's true form for the victor. It's current whereabouts are unknown.

As one can tell from their descriptions, these runes have enough oomph that their appearance in a region is enough to cause a war over it, when the rune itself doesn't purposely cause the war to happen. The last nine true runes are unknown but since all most runes in the series are derivatives of one of the true runes, there are a few runes we've still haven't seen their parent rune from.


Likewise, in addition to true runes and their magic derivatives their are also technique runes, which allow the user to use special moves. The most famous is the Falcon Rune, which is a fencing technique created by the famous Roundier Haia of Kanakan who has famous fencing schools. Special martial arts techniques and weapon techs are also part of this sub-division but only a few of them have a history behind them.

The Setting

The Suikoden series takes place in a fantasy world that mixes Romance of the Three Kingdoms era China with western fantasy and other real world elements ranging from Egyptian, Native American, various European cultures, and Japanese elements. Most of the games take place on one main continent, of which players have yet to fully see.

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The Holy Kingdom of Harmonia

The main continent is dominated by the Holy Kingdom of Harmonia. It is the oldest nation within the world and takes inspiration from Rome, the Byzantine Empire, the United States, ancient China, and Russia. It is a theocracy that was formed two years before the current series calendar of which Harmonia popularized. The leader of the nation is High Priest Hikusaak, a man who obtained the Circle Rune and conquered the lost Kingdom of Aronia who was likely the greatest power of it's time frame. The country has a strict hierarchy and caste system with native citizens being the First Class Citizens who are often the aristocracy of the country, Second Class Citizens are people born from conquered territories that have been naturalized into Harmonian culture. They are restricted from the aristocracy but have their own political faction as the People's party. Third Class Citizens are people from recently conquered territories and are often treated like serfs or slaves. Their children will often be taken at a young age to live in the capital of the empire as servants of first class citizens so they can be indoctrinated into the culture. Once a conquered territory proves their loyalty and adoption of Harmonian culture, they can apply for Second Class Citizenship. The final class are the sub0human class and these are for the various non-human races who find themselves within the empire. They are often treated poorly and serve as slaves for the human citizens. Their best reprieve is to either leave Harmonia or serve as mercenaries in their frontier military forces that border neighboring kingdoms.

Harmonia serves as a sort of boogie man within the series and is surprisingly the least explored setting despite its reputation. Hikusaak has made it a goal of the empire to collect all of the true runes and it's kind of staggering how many they have managed to acquire over time only to lose them. The vast majority of info on the place comes from the Suikogaiden games, Suikoden III, and supplement material within the series. When they do show up in the story though, things usually go bad for the opposing side. A testament of their strength is their general overwhelming strength in the series war battles and how they are often dealt with more often in story means then fair combat. Despite the fearsome reputation of their military might, the empire is also well known for it's great library and schools. Most of the prominent strategist and thinkers within the series have studies in the capital city of Crystal Valley.

Likewise, Harmonia usually doesn't get anything significant done because of political situation within. There is a five way, possibly six way conflict going on within the empire. It started when Hikusaak sort of vanished from public life within the empire about two hundred years into his reign. This fueled speculation that he may have been assassinated and now the two main political forces, the Temple Faction backed by the aristocracy and the People's Faction backed by the second and third class Citizens are fighting over control and direction of the country. The priests of the temples play both sides against each other and all three of them use the Howling Voice guild, a secretive assassination guild within Harmonia that knows the secret to gunpowder, to kill off political rivals. But even the Howling Voice Guild has gotten into the act and are manipulating things to get a greater foothold in the power vacuum. Meanwhile the military stays out of the conflict and seems to be still trying to fulfill Hikusaak's goal of acquiring all the True Runes, and there is strong evidence from Suikoden III that Hikusaak is actually alive and simply experimenting with a way to acquire all 27 True Runes for himself. Sadly, we'll probably never see how this plot thread ends.

Anyway, Hikusaak's absence did cause several rebellions and civil wars erupting within the empire and places like the Scarlet Moon Empire and the Highland Kingdom are former territories that became independent of Harmonia. Likewise, Harmonia still actively invades territories to go after true runes or simply to acquire more land as they did make a push into the Grasslands and managed to conquer some major territory from the Six Clans that rule that region, even managing to conquer one of the clans. So yeah, Harmonia is a place that has its fingers in the background of a lot of places and events within the series and for the first three games and the two gaiden titles, was being built up as the series big bad before the main creator left.

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Sindar

The only other nation/race that has vastly influenced the setting as much as Harmonia is the mysterious Sindar civilization. This group of people are one of the biggest mysteries of the series as they were/are and ancient civilization that had vast knowledge of runes, including the True Runes and how to seal them. Very little is known about them accept that they are a nomadic civilization that built ruins all over the Suikoden world. The reason for their nomadic tendencies is due to the leader of the group having the Rune of Change, which caused the civilization to wander the globe until they found the ''eternal city''. It is speculated by some fans that the Blinking Rune (teleportation magic) is a derivative of Rune of Change and that the people were being massed teleported across space and time. While the largest amount of ruins they left behind are found in Falena, ruins have been found in Dunan and the Grasslands as well. These ruins usually serve as plot points when dealing with the True Runes.

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The Scarlet Moon Empire/ Toran Republic

One of the other more prolific nations within the setting. The Scarlet Moon Empire has quite a reputation and thumb print on the history of the world. Originally a part of Harmonia located to the south of it. Kranach Rugner, the Knight of the Scarlet Moon, stole the Sovereign Rune his family guarded and proclaimed independence from Harmonia with the help of Julian Silverberg. They conducted a bloodless secession from Harmonia which established the Rugnar royal line and made the Silverberg family one of the most famous strategist families in the world.

Despite the origin of the nation the Scarlet Moon Empire seemed to have no real conflict with Harmonia after the secession. Instead the empire dealt with conflicts with both the Jowston Alliance to the west and the Kooluk Empire to the south. The Kooluk Empire eventually collapsed due to a civil war and was implied to be absorbed into the Scarlet Moon Empire. The Jowston Alliance on the other hand proved to be a bigger thorn in the countries side as the JA tried to expand it's territory into the Empire. The empire is well known for the Six Great Generals who proved invaluable in the Succession War, the Gate Rune War, and the Dunan Unification War.

Also of interest is that Toran is one of only two nations (the other being Falena) that actually has a Dwarf community. The nation also has an elven society and a kobold group as well. The two most famous groups from Toran is the Dragon Knights, an order of knights who control dragons and protect the borders of the nation from foreign invasion. They also have the famous Warrior's Village which creates some of the strongest fighters within the nation and hold a tradition of naming their chosen weapons after the person they love. Another famous group from this region is the Maximillian Knights, an order of knights that travel across the land to smite evil itself in whatever form they find. The group has technically been disbanded, but has a tendency to either reform during major wars or simply has enough splinter factions from the original group that gets around. Funny enough, Maximillain is loosely based on Don Quixote

It is the setting for the first game and becomes the Toran Republic afterwards.

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City-States of Jowston

Located in the region of Dunan, the city states are a left over alliance of republic city-states that are in a formal alliance to protect each other from the threats of Highland Kingdom, the Scarlet Moon Empire/Toran Republic, Grasslands, Hamronia, and honestly each other. Despite the alliance the City-States are fairly dysfunctional as an alliance with too many of the regions caring more about their own self-interests. The City States include:

• Muse, the largest city of the alliance and the main buffer and antagonist with the Highland Kingdom in the past. Muse serves as the closest thing to a de-facto leader among the alliance. It is a wealthy place due to all the trade it gets and how large it's territory is. The mayor's of Muse have had a long feud with Highland Kingdom and the Blight family leading to the frequent wars between the two.
• Greenhill was once a part of Muse but split off 100 years ago due to cries of separation of politics and education. This is because Greenhill is where the Greenhill Academy is located which is a major education spot for wealthy and influential people within Jowston. Despite this higher cause of education, Greenhill has a nasty history of conflict with the Karaya Clan of the Grasslands who border their territory. The former mayor invited the Chief of the Karaya to attend a peace conference between them and the Matilda Knights, but was instead poisoned by the two leaders only adding to the bad blood between the groups.
• South Window is the oldest political power of the region being the former seat of the Dunan Monarchy that predated the Jowston Alliance. South Window is largely the perpetrator of the conflicts with the Scarlet Moon Empire and Toran Republic as the two factions are bordering on each other with only the Badland desert serving as a natural barrier between them. When you hear about the Jowston Alliance invasions in Suikoden 1, they're mostly just talking about South Window. They are also associated with the ghost town of North Window which was destroyed by the vampire Neclord.
• Two River Principality is a city state that is actually a combination of three different communities that are separated by the two rivers that flow through the large city. It dates back to the Dunan Monarchy when it was a Kobold and Human community. In recent times, a third community of Wingers have settled into the dilapidated parts of the city thanks to the hero Genkaku but the other two groups look at them with suspicion. The city-state if rife with racism and political in-fighting.
• Matilda Knightdom was once an order of knights created to help the Jowston Alliance fight off Highland and the Grassland tribes but gained enough political power to eventually be counted as its own nation. They are three separate groups within the order with their own leaders but the White Order is generally considered the de-facto leader of the Knightdom. Despite being an order for defense, they are also bad about petty assassinations and playing the City-States against each other for more power.
• Tinto, just smurf Tinto. A mining centric city state that forced the Wingers from their native lands. They scheme with all the other factions to engage in reckless wars with the Grasslands and the Toran region for land grabs, and honestly don't even seem to want to be part of the Jowston Alliance unless it serves their self interest. They manage to somehow be the most unlikable faction of the City-States despite the fact the Matilda Knights have Gerudo. Suikoden III tries to soften their image a bit, but reading between the lines shows they're still a nation of greedy opportunistic assholes.

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The Grasslands

Not necessarily a nation and more a region with a collection of factions. They are collectively just referred to as the Grasslands by the more ''sophisticated nations''. The Grasslands compose of the Six Clans and the Zexen Federation. The feel of the region is fairly reminiscent of the early colonial era of the North Americas but the Grassland tribes take their cultural cues from various tribal cultures around the world.

• The Karayan Clan is the most well known Grasslanders. A tribe of warriors who lie off the land, they take inspiration from mid-western Native American tribes with some elements of Africa mixed in as well. They are the most war like tribe and clash with the City-States and the Zexen Federation. Their fighting ability is good enough that they are often hired as mercenaries for foreign wars like in the Dunan Unification War. Interestingly, they have no gender role distinction within their clan. The current head of the clan is a woman and all the woman are expected to be powerful warriors just like the men.
• The Lizard Clan is you guess it, a clan composed of lizard people. They take their cues from Meso-American groups like the Aztecs and Mayans. The other hardcore warrior race among the Six Clans. They can be very hospitable and nice when you approach them with respect but they have also the quickest tempers and hold the longest grudges. They get along the best with the Karayans and clash with the Zexen Federation a lot.
• The Duck Clan, but not necessarily that one, is a clan of Duck people who are also surprisingly a warrior clan though generally more laid back than the Karayan and Lizard Clans. They are surprisingly the best war units of the Six Clans as well since they don't overspecialize. They are both the most ridiculous and best part of Suikoden III. Their clan is the most mercantile of the Grasslanders.
• Alma Kinan is an all female clan that take elements of some ancient Japanese clans that predate the Yamato imperial era. They are a deeply spiritual clan that lives in harmony with the woods they live in and they are powerful archers and rune casters. They have a strong connection with the True Water Rune and are the most spiritually inclined of the Clans.
• Chisha Clan is a pacifistic clan with strong ties to the Flame Champion and Fire Bringers surprisingly enough. They are more agricultural than the other tribes and they take inspiration from what I'm guessing is Eastern European, likely Hungarian or one of the Baltic states.
• The Safir Clan is never seen as they were wiped out by Harmonia but are still referenced. My head canon is that the original Flame Champion was from this clan.
• The Carna Clan was taken over by Harmonia in the first Fire Bringer War and are a third class ethnic group within the empire. There claim to fame is their close to relationship to a species of insects called Mantors that are basically massive beetles the clan have learned to tame and ride.

The Zexen Federation is a small nation to the far west of the Six Clans territory and borders the sea. They are a relatively new nation in Suikoden by the time of their introduction but they are a mercantile nation ruled by a council controlled by the merchant guilds that founded the nation. To protect themselves from the barbarian tribes to the east, they created an order of knights to serve and protect the territory. The Federation is constantly creeping into Clan territory and this has caused years of bad blood between the groups, specifically the Karayan and Lizard clans that border the Zexen territory. While Zexen feels distinctively Western European (mostly War of the Roses era France) it's relationship with the Six Clans takes most of its inspiration from Colonial North America.

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The Island Nations

A fierce federation of seafarers located south of the Scarlet Moon Empire and bordering the north of the Queendom of Falena, in the past they were a loose alliance of different island nations that would occasionally unify when their former neighbor the Kooluk Empire tried to invade. They have a tentative relationship with their northern neighbor or Toran and a fairly warm one with Falena. To the west is the Gaian Dukedom which expanded it's territoried within the Island Nation territory through the cities of Razril and Middlport but the Island Liberation War saw these territories abandoned by the main land and absorbed into the Island Nations proper.

Like Toran and Harmonia, the Island Nations are known for producing serious badasses (though you wouldn't know it from the game focused on it) and the nation tends to be more nonchalant and less formal than other nations. What is interesting is how their influence changed between games and lost of the main creator. The first person you meet from the Island Nations is Amada from Suikoden II who has a very distinct Japanese fisherman flavor to his design. But in the actual game its set in, the new team decided to change the culture to reflect the Caribbean era of piracy as its inspiration. With that said, Obel seems to take some cues from Hawaii and other Polynesian cultures in their formal clothing wear.

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Kanakan

Oddly enough we've never actually seen this region but it gets named dropped quite a bit throughout the series. Fans will know it as the small nation that houses the school of fencing by Roundier Haia and they're infamous Falcon Rune technique, but in-game world, it's actually best known for the wine that is made there. Suikoden has a lot of alcoholics and heavy drinkers in it. While we've never seen anything about it, I always like to think it would have a Spanish/Mediterranean vibe to it.

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So that's all for the important places and runes you need to remember. I wanted to do something about recurring characters but I may leave that for the end.

Next Time: "...I believe your name was Schtolteheim Reinbach III

[WarZidane]

I tried multiple times to get into Suikoden 1 but never managed (and by extension never played 2) and Suikoden 4 had its..issues, but I loved 3 and 5.

That reminds me of the time we had to write a screenplay for an English assignment in college and I wrote an adaptation of Suikoden 3 (which was allowed, didn't have to be an original story), I put so much effort into it the teacher blindly accused me of plagiarism as my classmates who saw me typing that thing up for hours stood up for me. I took it as a compliment

[Wolf Kanno]

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Now to begin talking about the first game in the classic franchise. I will warn you now, I am not going to be quite as vague as I was in my other threads and blogs, so expect spoilers and way more info dumps. You have been warned.

So let's start this from the beginning. In the mid-90s, Konami got the terrible idea of trying to get into the console market. They wanted to take a stab of the new CD-Rom format and started development which required a few games to be made for the secret project. It was here that Yoshitaka Murayama and Junko Kawano worked together for the first time on a game for the new hardware. When Konami discovered Sony was going to throw it's towel into console market ring. Konami cancelled the project and opted to have the development teams work on the new console instead. The were given a choice between a few select genres to make a game and they opted for an RPG, though Murayama has stated that he would have preferred to make a side-scrolling shooter if he had been given the chance. Murayama was a huge fan of manga and wanted to make a type of story where there was a large supporting cast who got as much spotlight as the main character. He cited Captain Tsubasa as an example of what he meant. But he was worried the higher ups wouldn't quite understand the idea without him having to explain the manga he was reading; so he opted to compare it to the Chinese classic Shui Hu Zhuan (Suikoden in Japanese).

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Shui Hu Zhuan, or roughly translated to The Water Margin and All Men are Brothers in English, is one of the four great classical Chinese novels along with Romance of the Three Kingdoms. It was written somewhere between the 14th and 16th century China. The story tells a tale of 108 Stars of Destiny, reincarnated in the Song Dynasty as people of different walks of life who band together in the Liangshan Marshes as bandits to stage a war against a corrupt government body. The story mixes historical events and folk stories to create a powerful fictional work that is a cornerstone of Chinese literature. I've read parts of this book, and it's honestly pretty cool with the first half of the novel largely being the backstory for the majority of these 108 characters. The book is fairly dense and sadly, there is no perfect English translation.

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Unfortunately for Murayama, his pitch went a little too well, and the higher ups thought he was actually pitching an idea to make a video game adaption of the novel, so they green lit the project. This caused a bit of a panic with the development team who now found themselves at the helm of a very ambitious undertaking for a company and team new to RPG design. Looking at the 3D animation demos, Murayama and the staff walked away unimpressed with the early 3D design. They opted to stick to Konami's strong point of 2D sprites, though they did utilize some 3D effects in the battle system. Instead of making a 1:1 adaption of the novel, the team opted to tell an original story with an original cast that took inspiration from the novel. Murayama and Kawano decided to add more western fantasy elements to the game to appeal to a wider audience outside of Asia. Meanwhile, Murayama's love for card games served as the inspiration for the Rune magic system, and eventually the True runes themselves since he borrowed the play mechanic from a game he loved to play. Murayama's biggest contribution to the game design side of things was streamlining the process. Anyone who has ever played Suikoden will know that it is not a terribly difficult game, and this was on purpose as Murayama remembers growing up and being frustrated with early cRPGs that often had difficult and obtuse puzzles to figure out. Kawano was tasked with helping to design characters and being the game's main illustrator designing all the characters and overall world design. For music, the team managed to snag the underrated Miki Higashino, best known for her work on the Gradius series, as well as the TMNT arcade game and Contra III soundtracks. Higashino saw the game's setting and character designs and knew she needed to use a blend of world music to properly flesh out the world. Thanks to utilizing simpler 2D sprites and backgrounds, Hihashino was able to make full use of the CD-Rom technology for the musical score, giving the game a richer sound than anything else on the market including several voiced tracks and live instruments. In the final months of 1995, Gensou Suikoden was released on the Sony PlayStation in Japan and the following years in the North American and PAL markets. Being one of a handful of RPGs available for the console before FFVII and the RPG boom it brought, Suikoden managed to garner a lot of praise and fans in both sides of the Pacific, despite the hideous NA boxart.

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The Story
Gensou Suikoden is set in the Toran region of the main continent where the Scarlet Moon Empire resides. Originally a part of the Holy Kingdom of Harmonia, the region broke free from the empire during the Harmonian Civil War and in a bloodless coup, became it's own kingdom in Solar Year 230 thanks to the noble Kranach Rugner, the Scarlet Moon Knight, and the brilliant tactician Julian Silverberg. Taking the Sovereign Rune as the royal treasure of his family, Karnach renamed the former capital Rupanda as Gregminister and started his dynasty. Seven years prior to the game's start, a Succession crisis occurred. The previous emperor had passed over his eldest son Geil Rugner and chose his younger son Michelan to be his heir. When Michelan passed away, Geil took advantage of his nephew the crowned prince Barbarossa of being away to fight off the City-States of Jowston, to have the royal council declare him the rightful heir of the kingdom. Using his influence among the nobility and taking advantage of Barbarossa's loyal generals all being being far away from the capital, Geil set up his new government and tried to have Barbarossa killed when he returned. Barbarossa managed to escape the attempt, but his beloved wife Claudia was killed in the escape. Regrouping in Pannu Yakuta south of the capital region, Barbarossa regrouped with his famed Six Generals and with the help of the Mathiu and Leon Silverberg, started a major counter-offense to retake the throne. Gregminister was devastated in the battle to retake the capital, and the war ended when Barbarossa slayed his uncle on the steps of the royal palace.

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In the time of the countries rebuilding, the City-States of Jowston attempted another seizure of territory from the bruised empire. Barbarossa did not wish to see this happen, but found it difficult to rally the war ravaged country into another conflict. His top strategist Leon Silverberg suggested a false flag operation to rile up the people by having members of the Royal Elite Guard dress up as Jowston soldier and burn the city of Kalekka to the ground. Many members of Barbarossa's inner circle objected including Mathiu Silverberg and several of his Six Generals. Eventually Leon's plan was approved and proved to be effective in rallying the people to repel the invading forces. Unfortunately this incident caused the resignation of several people within Barbarossa's inner circle and military forces. Combined with the growing corruption within the nobility and imperial bureaucracy, dissatisfaction began to grow beneath the surface of the empire despite Barbarossa's success in defending the realm and rebuilding the empire. The capital truly started to change when the imperial court assigned a new Court Magician named Windy. A mysterious and powerful woman who bared a striking resemblance to Barbarossa's late wife Claudia.

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Our story finally begins with Tir McDohl, the son of Teo McDohl who is one of the Six Great Generals and head of the Armored Calvary. Tir has come of age and his father brings him to the palace so he can be formally introduced to Barbarossa before starting his new career within the Royal Guard. Tir starts his first day accompanied by Teo's retainers who all serve as bodyguards for Tir. Pahn is a martial artist who once served Geil Rugner and lost a duel with Teo in the Succession Wars, Teo saw his promise and spared his life earning Pahn's complete devotion. Cleo is a smart and talented mage who served as a lieutenant in Teo's Calvary unit. Gremio was a soldier who served under Teo after he took him in when his family was killed by Jowston soldiers. Gremio practically raised Tir and is almost a surrogate father to him. Finally, Ted is a boy about the same age as Tir that Teo found wandering in a battlefield. He took him in but Ted lived in a different house than the other retainers, but he became very close to Tir and serves as his best friend.

Tir is is put under the command of Captain Kraze, a self-serving bureaucrat who holds a grudge against Tir for gaining his position through nepotism, despite the fact he earned his by brown-nosing. His first mission is to go to Seer Island to receive the astrological charts from the blind Seer Leknaat. He meets the Dragon Knight apprentice Futch and his dragon Black who are used to ferry them to the island. They are accosted by Leknaat's grumpy and mischievous apprentice Luc before they finally meet the seer who tells Tir that a heavy destiny awaits him. With the first mission accomplished they are next tasked with going to the town of Rockland to collect the regions late taxes. They are accompanied on this mission by the Vice Captain Kanaan who is a cowardly glory seeker that is also brown noising his way to the top. What the group find in Rockland is a village in misery due to a choke hold by the corrupt administrator Grady. His troops regularly beat the locals for protesting his methods. Grady claims the taxes are late because they were stolen by mountain bandits from Mt. Seifu named Varkas and Sydonia. The group travel there only to encounter a powerful Ant Queen monster that nearly overwhelms the team. Ted then steps forward and reveals a mysterious rune he's in possession of that instantly obliterates the monster. Swearing to explain later, the group meet the bandits and capture them. they return to Rockland, where the bandits reveal that Grady is embezzling the taxes for himself and his troops. This falls on deaf ears as the groups argue and Grady bribes Kanaan to keep the incident quiet. When the group returns to Gregminister, Kanaan lets the group go home without reporting back to Kraze so he can get all the credit. Kanaan only asks for Ted to come with him as he knows someone who wants to meet him.

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Hours go by and a terrible storm hits the capital. The group lament how there is no glory in the Royal Guard and when Tir goes down stairs to see if Ted has returned, he finds his friend by the front door and nearly dead from a magical attack. Rushing him to bed to recoup, Ted comes to long enough to reveal that he knows the Court Magician Windy and she and the Royal Guard are after him. He reveals to the group that his rune is the Soul Eater, one of the True Runes, and that Ted has been running from Windy for over 300 years. The Royal Guard break into the house to arrest Ted having been informed by Pahn of his whereabouts since Pahn didn't want Teo for getting in trouble for protecting a fugitive. Ted gives Tir the Soul Eater in secret and gives himself up so that the group can escape. With Pahn and Ted both gone, Tir, Gremio, and Cleo find themselves made into fugitives overnight. They encounter a rough and boisterous traveler named Viktor who helps the group escape Gregminister and takes them to the city of Lenankamp where he reveals he's a member of the Toran Liberation Army led by Odessa Silverberg. Here they meet a former bureaucrat named Sanchez, the aloof former soldier of the Elite Guard named Humphrey Mintz, and Odessa's lover and second-in-command Flik. Though Gremio is against having Tir associate with the group, their situation makes it the only safe avenue for them so Tir agrees to help Odessa on a mission to deliver plans for a secret weapon called the Fire Spears to the Liberation Army's secret factory. On their journey to the rendezvous point, Tir and Odessa strike up a fast friendship as they bond over being former aristocracy who saw the corruption of the empire from the inside. When the group returns to Lenankamp, they find that their headquarters had somehow been discovered by the imperials and was in the midst of a raid. Flik, Sanchez, and Humphrey had already fled but while looking for survivors with Viktor and the others, Odessa takes an arrow for a child who stayed with the group. Dying, Odessa gives Tir her earring and tells him to seek out her brother Mathiu. She then orders them to throw her body into the underground river so that neither the imperials or liberation army will know she's actually dead.

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From here, Tir, Viktor, Cleo, and Gremio flee and head south to Seika where Tir meets the Mathiu Silverberg, the retired strategist of Kasim Hazel, Odessa's brother, and now a pacifist living his days in a small village as a school teacher. Initially against the idea of helping his dead sister keep the Liberation army alive, he is later accosted by soldier from his former command who try to force him back into service. Realizing his sister was right, Mathiu finally takes Tir's offer and helps him to establish the new Toran Liberation Army with Tir as the new leader. From here, Tir retakes the abandoned Toran Lake Castle from monsters to serve as their new base of operations. Tir and Mathiu then set off to battle each of the five remaining Six Generals who serve as magistrates in each of the Scarlet Moon Empire's regions. What unfolds after this is actually a powerful drama that touches on the realities of war such as genocide, the lost of close friends, greed, forgiveness, and questions about loyalty. While two of the generals are under the command of Windy through a special rune she uses to control them, the others have absolute loyalty to either Barbarossa or each other. Tir also begins to see the burden of being the bearer of the most cursed rune. In a brilliant move of gameplay and story integration, the Soul Eater gains a new spell with the death of a major character of which the game is marked with four of them. We also get a moment where the party travels through the memories of the past (perhaps the Soul Eater's memory?) to witness Windy destroying Ted's home village of the Hidden Rune and see how Ted came to bear the rune himself. The world itself aslo expands as we learn more about the Kelekka incident and events from the Succession War, both of which have left deep scars within the country and its people.

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Suikoden's plot is an interesting beast. On the one hand, it is a bit of an RPG/fantasy cliche storm with the usual elves/dwarves tension, rebels vs. and evil empire, one chapter is basically the RPG equivalent of Castlevania, and one death scene that is both strangely very powerful and incredibly gnarmy when you stop to think about it. On the other hand, the game deals with a lot of these cliches with a level of maturity not seen in the genre at the time. The very collapse of the empire has nothing really to do with world domination as is usual. We still have a power hungry individual pulling the strings, but the details are unique to these types of story. The game goes back and forth between being generic gnarm charm to being something incredibly compelling. Even to this day I find it hard to put into words. Because objectively, I can see how a detractor may point out how tropey and cliche the plot is, especially compared to later installments. Yet there is something about the game that has endeared itself to the fanbase and even people who play the series for the first time. It certainly has left an impression of the development team because despite the universal praise of the second installment, this is the entry that tends to get the most callbacks and reference throughout the series. In a lot of ways, it feels a bit like Final Fantasy IV to me, another game that is kind of laughable in hindsight, but somehow manages to tell a story with characters that really speak to people in a way that's easy to look past the flaws.

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On the gameplay front, Suikoden is weird beast as it continues this idea of ''generic but compelling'' aspect to the whole project. The game allows up to six characters to play in a party in a standard turn based combat system. Characters are separated by weapon range. Short range fighters (mostly swords, axes and wands) can only attack enemies in the front row when they are positioned there. If you put a short range fighter in the back row, they can't attack anything. Medium range fighters can attack the enemy front row and back row when placed in their units front row, but can only attack the front enemy row when placed in the back row. Long Range fighters can hit any enemy in any row from any place in their own formation. This does create some interesting dilemma's because short range fighters tend to be beefier and wear heavier armor, but you're only allowed to have three on your team at a time as additional units will be useless unless using rune magic or techs. Medium fighters have the best balance being decently strong but also decently armored. Sadly, medium range fighters also tend to be average at best lacking the physical power of short and long range fighters but also missing out on armor options and back row protection without nerfing their range. Long Range tend to hit hard but are frail in battle. Of course everything I just said has many exceptions. Tir for instance gets main character boosts and is actually a serious powerhouse overall despite his medium range build and lack of heavy armor use. Cleo and later Lorelai are long range fighters that can actually wear some heavier armor than is usual for the bow class users. Finally most mages use staffs which are short range weapons but they are restricted to light armor only making it a bad idea to put them on the front row.

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Another fun thing about the playable cast of characters is the development team's somewhat realistic take on a character's effectiveness in battle. Rule of thumb is this: if a character has a history as a soldier, adventurer, or mage, they are going to be pretty good in battle. If their profession is aloof scientist, little kid, senior citizen doctor, then they fight as effectively as you would think they would, which is not very well. It can be annoying when the game requires you to use said characters, but I do appreciate the idea that not all of your recruits are useful for combat even if they ask to be. Suikoden 1 has the largest playable cast in the game, technically Suikoden II beats it but not all of the cast is obtainable in a playthrough so it still stands. Of course it means not everyone would be super useful for adventuring. What does the inventor of the elevator know about slaying Siren's in the sewers of Shasazarade?

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Runes are the setting's system for magic and techniques and they come in many forms from simple elemental magic spells, to unique technique runes, and finally as support abilities like 2x XP or raising a characters critical hit %. The main issue with Runes is that you're only allowed to have one per character, and some people like Tir and Pahn have their runes permanently equipped to them, meaning less customization options. Granted, most characters with a permanent rune usually work best with said rune but I know some people get annoyed when options get stripped from them. Magic Runes get four spells per rune and are cast using a Vanacian magic point system like FFI and III. It sounds very limiting but magic is pretty potent in this game and the overall difficulty isn't so great to really require the extra fire power. What is interesting is that elemental magic runes have upgraded incarnations you can also acquire. So there is Luc's Wind Rune, but you can find and replace it with a Cyclone rune if you wish. The upgraded runes has the second spell or their weaker counterpart be their Lv. 1 spell and then gain an additional new fourth tier spell. Another interesting feature of magic is Unite Spells. This requires two characters using with similar speed ratings casting their Lv. 4 spell at the same time to create a combo spell. It is a challenging but super beneficial system as some of these Unite Magic spells are devastatingly powerful with the Water/Lightning Rune combo of Thor having the best damage potential of any spell in the game, which also revives and heals tour whole party. Technique Runes vary in quality and often exist to add flavor to a character. The main strength is that they can let a powerful character cause some major damage but often they are left unbalanced after use making the character defenseless and unusable for a round. There are exceptions to this rule and it's a large part of why characters like Valerie are well regarded in the game as her Falcon Rune let's her do 3x her normal damage with no fear of the unbalance status so she can honestly use this rune every round with no consequence. Tech runes are unfortunately rare in this entry with only six in the game. Of which only two can be farmed and they are limited to only specific characters. Though it says something about how all the characters with tech runes are often some of the more outstanding and memorable party members. Passive runes are the next most common behind magic. These do the usual things seen RPGs like status defense, and doubling the amount of XP or Potch you get in the game. Others raise percentage of a character's attribute like critical hits, dodging and countering. Unlike other RPGs, countering is something anyone can do if their stats are high enough and the Counter rune raises the likelihood of it happening. The most interesting rune, and one you have to seriously go looking for as its a rare drop, is the Phero rune. You see characters that have a strong connection to each other in battle have the ability to sometimes shield one another in combat. Gremio for instance will sometimes shield Tir from an attack and Hix will do the same for Tengar. The Phero Rune raises the chance someone will block for them, but unlike the above examples, it will be any party member of the opposite sex in the party. It's an interesting idea that sadly doesn't see a lot of use in the later entries.

Unite Attacks are the other main draw of combat. These pretty much work like Chrono Trigger's dual and triple techs except the larger party dynamic means you can get up four characters participating in a Unite attack. Like tech runes though these powerful skills can sometimes leave participants unbalanced so you have to be careful. Despite the massive cast, there are only twenty five Unite attacks in the game, which is the lowest in the whole series, but hey we're just trying to figure this stuff out. Sadly most players will only remember the Master Pupil Attack between Tir and Kai since it arrives very early in the game and is the best unite attack for random encounters bar none. It was so popular that almost every game has a variation of it with Suikoden III being the lone entry out. The fun thing about Unite attacks is that is makes it fun to experiment more with party configurations and some unites attacks are between some unconventional figures. The two most interesting of these being Humphrey (a stoic war veteran) and Krin (a simple and greedy thief) which is mainly weird because these two never actually have a story scene together. The other is the series comical staple of Flash Attack, which involves Liuken (an elderly doctor), Fukien (a humble spell casting monk), and Kai (Tir's Bo staff instructor). In this case, the obvious connection is that they are all bald and their attack involves them combining their shiny scalps to blind the enemy. It's funny as hell and again, involves a team that feels unconventional.

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There are two other battle modes in the game as well. War battles are big event battles that play like Rock Paper Scissors with Calvary beating Archers, Archers beating mages, and mages beating Calvary. You and the opposing army get to choose which to go with and see afterwards who chose wisely. Though collecting the rest of the SoD will help immensely. Between choosing rounds of choosing your offense, you can use some of your supporting units to help you. Strategist power up the attack of cavalry, Ninja's and Thieves can spy on the enemy and tell you what their next move is, and merchant's can bribe enemy soldiers to switch sides. There are also special units like the Dragon Knights that can cause untold damage to the enemy. The big danger of these battles is that a sizeable chunk of your 108 Star recruits can sometimes be killed if you make the wrong move. Maximillain is the example most people will often see since he seems to be flagged for death more than any other character. It can be pretty shocking to see them die and see how it affects some of the cast during the battle. The other game mode are duels, of which Suikoden 1 has only three, but they do sure leave a big impact. Duels work just like army battles in that it's a rock/paper/scissor type deal. Attack beats defend, defend beats critical, critical beats attack. Though it's a bit wonkier in this entry as you can technically lose even by following the rules if your character is under-leveled and poorly geared. It's a shame there isn't more of them in this entry, but later installments will fix this oversight.

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If there are two gripes I have with Suikoden's combat, one would be the game's terrible inventory system. There is no shared item bag you can use from the menu and your restricted to the ten slots each character has. 60 slots sounds like a lot until you discover that a character's equipment takes up space so that's now only 30 slots for item and even less if your character can equip a shield. There is a warehouse that can open in your castle that can hold a ridiculous amount of gear, but it can't be accessed outside of the castle and any extra loot or treasure you find in the field will have to be lost or come back to if all your inventory is full. Another annoying aspect of this is that some character's will leave your party for story reasons and they will take all their gear, runes, and items with them. My biggest PSA for this game is to make sure that Tir always has the Blinking Mirror. This the item that let's you fast travel back to your HQ and it will make traveling so much easier if you don't hand it off to Viktor or Flik who have a bad habit of wandering off from the plot. The other major issue with the game is how often the story restricts your party for you. It is surprisingly not the worst example (I'm looking at you SIV) but it is a glaring issue for sure. In a game with such a massive cast and so many party combinations, you almost never have a scenario where a story sequence let's you control who the other five members of your entourage is going to be. The most egregious example is the final dungeon where half of your final party is determined for you. Gremio is especially annoying because he'll always insist on being with Tir for half of the game. Gremio is a decent starter character but his stats are mediocre until near the end of the game so he begins to feel a bit like dead weight compared to other characters. The Kwanda Rosman chapter is another annoying example as all but one of your character slots will be filled with a story-centric character for this chapter and even worse, the last one if a short range fighter who joins you in the middle of a battle and take ups your sixth party slot and is utterly useless in the proceeding battle since he can't attack from the back row and the game won;t allow you to change your formation to correct this. The real reason this gets annoying is that some recruits in the game require specific party members and you may end up having to backtrack to them when it's possible to bring the right people along.

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Speaking of, Suikoden's most relished gameplay mechanics is the recruiting of the 108 Stars of Destiny and the advancement of your HQ. While a good half of your forces will likely join you through the plot, the other half of your army needs to be met in the various locations in the world and convinced to join your cause. The methods can vary from person to person. Some simply need to be talked to like Kai, others need to be beaten by some mini-game, others need specific recruits to be in your party. Some need you to be a certain level while others want your army to be a certain size. It's honestly the biggest challenge in the game to recruit everyone without a guide and even some can still be frustrating with a guide.

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The castle is another fun aspect of the game as your recruits start filling up the halls and fixing the place up. Not all recruits are soldiers, several actual serve various functions at the HQ such as opening up shops, a warehouse, a blacksmith and spots for the game's various mini-games. Eventually it becomes a major castle town for the player and it's satisfying seeing some of the recruits mingle with each other. My favorite being the Narcissist corner started by Milich Oppenheimer. The castle serves as hub and expanding it gives a nice sense of progress throughout the game. It feels really unique compared to other RPGs that have large casts and gives a sense of camaraderie among them for the player. It's also just so nice when you beat that game and the game starts telling you what happens to each of them after the war.

Musically, Suikoden has never been the RPG musical powerhouse that Square was pumping out at the time, but Konami is no slouch when it comes to musical muscle. Miki Higashino may not be a major name among RPG enthusiasts but her work on Konami's arcade scene speaks for itself. With that said, the music she composed along with Tappi Iwase, Taniguchi Hirofumi, Mayuko Kagetrouta and Hiroshi Tamawari for Suikoden is actually quite impressive if underrated. Tracks like Name Entry, Into a World of Illusion, and Theme of a Moonless Night are all impressive and memorable themes that get musical callbacks throughout the series even after most of the team left. What's truly impressive is how well they established the tone of the series. Choosing to pull from several genres found throughout the world, the Suikoden OSTs can often sound like a musical travel guide around the world as they pull from Moroccan, European classical, Asian period drama, and even rock and roll to create a beautiful musical tapestry that is pleasant to the ears and brings the various locations of the game to life. The biggest boon to her score is the fact that the game was able to make the most of the CD-Rom discs space to incorporate more orchestral music instead of using MIDI all the time. MIDI is till certainly here in the game but it's use is less obvious than games like Final Fantasy VII. The game was able to make use of vocal tracks that really bring out the cultural influence of the piece and leave a lasting impression as you hear the haunting ending theme, Aventunerio Antes Lance Mao. Again it's an underappreciated score, but one that doesn't really have a bad track if you ask me and it's nice to listen to some good music from outside the powerhouse of Square-Enix.

So now it's time to ask the main question here:Why should you play Suikoden? I'm going to list five reasons you should and as a contrast (because I love playing Devil's advocate) I am also going to list five reasons you might want to avoid it. Let's get the negative out of the way first:

5. The game is fairly basic - Even for its time frame, Suikoden isn't really doing anything interesting for the genre, and if you're a serious RPG vet, then this game will likely have a heavy ''been there done that'' feel to it. The plot is tropey and the gameplay is mostly basic turn based with some combo attacks and only one slot for special abilities. Unless you have a nostalgia for early to mid 90s JRPGs, this game is likely not going impress you.

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4. The meat of the game's setup is hidden behind supplement material - All of that backstory about the Succession War I posted above, that's almost all from supplement materials that were thankfully translated by some fans for the wiki and even then good luck finding the primary sources. Suikoden 1's plot feels more epic when you have the full context but outside of some snippets here and there from NPCs and characters, you're not going to get much info about the Succession War and even the Kalekka Incident has more info than what is presented in the game. I am generally not the type who promotes reading supplement material to understand a game's plot. I feel all the relevant info should be right there in the game. Suikoden gives you a glimpse of what is there but it's shame the real juicy stuff is hidden off-screen including some backstory stuff like Gremio and Pahn's backstories or fun bonding stuff between Ted and Tir while training with Kai. Hell Odessa alone gets hit hard with this because her whole backstory is in this stuff and it;s actually pretty awesome and I can see why Flik was enamored with her.

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3. The game is very tropey - I'm willing to give the devs slack here because it was a first attempt at an RPG by a company that usually doesn't make many of them. The development team was also pretty new to the genre so it;s no surprise they rely heavily on tropes to get them through the writer's block portion of the development, but it does make some parts of the game cringe worthy. The Kwanda Rosman chapter is a personal pet peeve of mine since I've never been big on the fantasy trope of fantastic racism among the Tolkien races. Even the opening portions of the game can feel more gnarm than charm as the bad guys are all hamtastically evil. I mean Barbarossa or any one of real authority just needs to walk down the hall of the throne room and eavesdrop for a few minutes to see how unqualified and evil most of the nobility and bureaucracy are in Gregminister. Speaking of...

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2. The Neclord Chapter feels really out of place in the game - I get that it was likely meant to be a palette cleanser after the one-two punch that was the Milich Oppenheimer and Teo McDohl chapters, but this particular chapter does feel a little out of place in the game. In fact Neclord in general feels out of place in the series but obviously someone on the development team loves vampires because they get story focus for three games. While some might say this is likely Castlevania's influence on the team, his chapter feels more like a stealth shout out to Vampire Hunter D with Neclord feeling more like Magnus Lee in both motive and design. I don't mind the chapter, but I know some who do hate it. Not helped that Neclord is the most challenging boss in the game.

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1. It's too easy to get screwed out of the Golden Ending - I'm not generally opposed to making the best ending easy to acquire, nor do I feel its cheating to make it almost require a guide to do so, but I know a lot of people who would see this as a major flaw of the game's design. I know I screwed myself out of the Golden Ending in my first playthrough and only was able to do so because of reading a guide. Still, I feel the first game is a little more malicious in tripping the player up in this regard. It;s easy to not get all the Stars in the first playthrough. Hell there are four other Stars I didn't mention above the designers lay sinister traps that will lock you out of the best ending if you make the wrong choices or do the wrong thing. I feel it gives the game fun replay value but some gamers will call it a guide book trap. Course guides for a 26 year old RPG are easy to come by these days.

So with that said, let's look at the best reasons to play this game:

5. The foreshadowing is superb - Something that may not be noticed on a first playthrough, but certainly noticeable on second playthroughs of the series is a lot of the foreshadowing of the grander world inhabiting the series. Suikoden name drops places and people that feel inconsequential when you play the first game by itself, but coming back to this entry with some of the other games under your belt, you don't realize how early the series was really laying down the roots of the greater world Murayama and Kawano had envisioned. The fact the game is short makes a second playthrough a breeze too.

4. It is incredibly user-friendly and noob friendly - If you're only here to play games for character and plot then Suikoden is definitely the series for you. the game was designed to be pretty streamlined and noob friendly, which is likely why it helped a generation be prepared to get their minds blown by Final Fantasy VII two years later. Two of the best features the game has is that XP is handed out based on the level difference of the enemy and the character, so low level characters will have their levels skyrocket if brought to harder areas and leveling up the game's 78 characters becomes a breeze. the fact the best characters are introduced at the end isn't an issue with this system in place. The other great feature is that walking in a straight line will reduce the encounter rate. This way it makes exploring easier and less frustrating for players.

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3. Recruiting the 108 Stars is fun - Forget what I said about the top five annoying people, the rest of the cast is fun to recruit and see what is up with them. Honestly the recruiting aspect of the game is one of the major draws of the series and gives it a bit of a Pokemon style ''Gotta Catch em' all'' factor that makes the games pretty fun to play.

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2. The characters are pretty awesome - I'm not going to lie, of the 108 Stars, maybe a fifth of them stay relevant throughout the whole game, but the ones that stick around are generally superb and fun. They help make the drama of the plot work despite the tropes and while Viktor and Flik are stuck in your final party, I bet most players would have taken them anyway since they are both great characters on and off the battlefield. Even the less plot relevant characters are surprisingly affable and memorable most of the time.

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1. Golden Emperor Barbarossa - It's going to be hard to talk about this without spoiling stuff but here we go. Suikoden is a series that goes back and forth with its villains. Most of them are either well-intention extremist or figurative(sometimes literal) monsters, or they fall somewhere in between like Windy. Windy is certainly the game's main villain but Barbarossa is the figurative main antagonist over her and yet he manages to be unique above all the villains in the series. The man only appears in three scenes in the entire game, and yet manages to leave such a lasting impression on the player in all of his scenes. What helps is hearing the way people talk about him. The man is spoken of as the greatest friend you can ever have and even when his own allies defect to the Liberation Army, it's always with a sense of regret on their part. This is a man who deserves to be admired because he really was once a great and just ruler. Things just changed for him and at the end of the day he's more tragic figure than some typical big bad. The fact his story manages to change Windy's more generic evil story into something greater is also a testament to his character. Suikoden is a series that often strives to keep their villains more on the morally grey side and I don't think they ever hit such a success as they did with Barbarossa. Course you'll have to play the game to see what I mean.

In conclusion, Suikoden was a game that has stayed with me for a long time, even today I have the blasphemous opinion that I like it more than it's better recieved sequel. It's why I combo the two together in my Top 100 List because the idea of this game being lower on the list didn't sit well for me. My nostalgia for this entry is very strong, which is surprising because I didn't play the game until either 98 or 99. Deep into the RPG renaissance of the era, and yet it has stayed with me so strongly. I think part of it is because I didn't think I was going to lik this game at all and for a while in my first playthrough I was not impressed, but somewhere, somehow, it won me over before I got to the end, and considering my judgmental ass, that's impressive. Hell I'm replaying it right now and having a blast. I'm hoping some of you will now also play it, whether for the first time or doing a replay. Its a pretty fun opening to a great series.

Next time: "My friend and I seal our thoughts here. We deeply regret that we could not make them one."

[Del Murder]

I played Suikoden 1 and 2. Both were pretty fun and it was fun to collect the 108 stars. I liked that they all weren't fighting party members.

[Wolf Kanno]

Tips and Tricks for Suikoden 1

Since I'm replaying the first game, I figured I would offer a bit of a mini-guide about some stuff players may miss in this game. I sort of did something like this in the main post, but I think it would be better to discuss it in it's own post.

Recruitment
Here's the top five most annoying characters to recruit and the method to do so:

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5. Jabba the appraiser, he starts a long trend of the appraiser character being a bit of a pain to recruit. He won't join your team unless you bring him an item he can't appraise. You need to speak to him first so the item in question will finally start dropping and even then you'll still have to deal with Suikoden's funky drop system to get it. So expect to grind a bit. I will also mention that this usually the course of action for any character whose recruitment is based on acquiring an item from a monster. You need to speak with them first at a point where you can actually ask them to join your army before they'll mention the item in question and the item will finally start dropping for you. Thankfully, both the Nameless Vase and the Opal (another item needed for a recruit) are from monsters you encounter close by. The later games are not as nice...

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4. Pesmerga - This guy always appears late in the game and is a real powerhouse having the best raw stats in the game at the cost of most of his equipment being permanently fixed to him. He will usually pop up after your party has a Lv. 4 HQ and have encountered his arch nemesis Yuber during the main plot. The reason he's a pain is because he's usually taking it easy at the end of a former dungeon. Adding to this is that the game often never hints to this very well, so you'll likely never encounter him if you don't backtrack a bit. In the first game, he's found at the end of Neclord's castle but you'll likely won't be able to recruit him until you have at least a 100 of the 108 stars.

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3. Clive - Another character who is incredibly easy to miss. He's hanging out in an inn in some backwoods town you go to half way through the game. He won't start appearing there until you have the Lv. 4 HQ (see Pesmerga above) and even more annoying is that he appears in the inn randomly so even if you have the first requirement, he may still not appear. Even more annoying is that the RNG won;t reset unless you leave the town entirely, so expect some annoying back and forth here if you're unlucky. Clive is another great late addition to the game being one of the fastest and most powerful Long range fighters and the only gun user in the game. Give him a spark rune and you'll likely never have to heal your party after a random encounter again. Hell even some boss battles if you're lucky.

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2. Mace - The final blacksmith is someone you're going to run into before you can actually recruit him. Mace is one of the hardest characters to recruit because you really only have two shot at getting him. And that's not counting the fact he has other requirements as well. There are four other blacksmiths in the game who are all apprentices to this guy. You need to have recruited all four of them and get a Lv. 4 HQ. Then make a party with all four of them in it and go speak with him. There are only two free periods in the game where this is possible after you unlock the area he's chilling at since the plot will often keep your team too filled to use all the blacksmiths. One is the night before the mission in Moravia Castle, and the other is the night before the raid on the naval fortress of Shasarazade. If you miss either chance then kiss the Golden ending and Lv. 16 weapons goodbye.

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1. Leon Silverberg - It seems almost fitting that a character who plays a huge part in the game's backstory would be the biggest pain in the ass in the game to recruit. Like Mace, Leon has only two chances at being recruited. You'll encounter him way earlier in the game but he will be the second to last Star of Destiny you'll recruit due to all the conditions for his recruitment. After you get your HQ to Lv. 4, you need to speak to Leon in the ruins of Kalekka where he'll mention how impressed he is with the Liberation Army. After this you need to speak with Mathiu about this, which Mathiu will then write a letter asking for his assistance which you need to deliver back to Leon. The main reason this is so difficult is because Mathiu is often the character you need to speak to in order to advance the plot. There are very few times in the game where he's not he event flag for moving the plot along. The only two instances are, you guessed it, the night before Moravia Castle mission, or before the major battle with Sonya Shulen's forces at Shasarazade. If you do the latter, you have to immediately leave after the war battle with Sonya (don't enter the dungeon) and return to Kalekka to drop off the letter. It is easier to screw this up since you don't even realize you can leave. What's even more annoying is that outside of story charm for anyone who read my description above or kept up with the supplement material, Leon is mostly useless as a character as he only gives you one more use of the Strategist ability in a War Battle and there is only one or two battles left like that depending on when you recruit him.

Runes
There are 32 runes in the game that can be equipped on party members and used in battle. Of those runes, only 7 of them are one of a kind.

Runes are broken up into three categories: Magic, Technique, and Support.

Magic Runes
Magic runes come in seven elemental flavors: Lightning, Wind, Earth, Fire, Water, Light, and Darkness. All the elemental runes have a higher tier version of themselves you can also find except for Light and Dark. So Lightning becomes Thunder, Wind becomes Cyclone, Earth becomes Mother Earth, Fire, becomes Rage, and Water becomes Flowing. Light is represented by the rare Resurrection Rune, and Darkness only appears as the one of a kind True Rune Soul Eater. The stronger tier rune drops the first spell from the lower version and replaces it with a new fourth tier spell.

The magic runes are:

Wind/Cyclone - These runes give a well rounded selection of healing, damage, and status magic making them incredibly versatile. the Unite magic it has access to is also one of the best spells in the game. Both of the game's best mages, Luc and Crowley use this class of runes.

Fire/Rage - Great for handling mobs of enemies, fire magic specializes in AoE magic, though it does have a few powerful single target spells as well. It will be the first magic rune you acquire in the game. It's only weakness is that most bosses have a strong defense against it.

Lightning/Thunder - The opposite of the Fire/Rage Class, it focuses on lots of single target spells with a few unique group hitting spells for versatility. Very powerful rune and great for boss battles. It's biggest drawback is that the spell that do target groups tend to do so by attacking in a straight line. So it's way less effective for dealing with groups.

Earth/Mother Earth - Easily the worst magic rune in the game, the earth rune deals mainly with support/defensive magic though this version does have two offensive spells unlike later entries. The main problem is that the two defense raising skills (Lv. 1 Earth Rune/Lv. 4 Mother Earth Rune) are bugged and don't work. Likewise, the two offensive spells will not work on enemies that are flying, of which a surprising number of annoying enemies fall into. The best spell is Copper Flesh that protects a character from all damage for a round, but it's single target. The runes only real use is accessing the Unite Magic it has with Fire magic.

Water/Flowing - Not as good as later incarnations, the rune is the only not to have an offensive spell, opting for a buff spell that raises evasion instead. Thankfully all of the healing magic also restores status. The biggest issue with the rune is the redundancy of its spells election. The third and fourth tier spells for the Water rune (second and third for Flowing) pretty much do the same thing which is heal the whole party. The difference being one does it for 300hp and the other heals all HP, but on a strong enough mage, the 300hp group heal will likely restore way more than that. Likewise, Mother Ocean has the benefit of being able to revive a party member who is dead, but it's a fourth tier spell despite being a group resurrection/heal spell, it's fairly impractical.

Resurrection - A very rare rune, most players will only see it when they recruit Fuiken since he has one permanently attached, but you can gain more as a rare drop from an enemy later in the game. This rune is the only Light elemental magic in the game. There is nothing in the game immune to light magic, but a lot of enemy types that are weak too it, including Neclord, the game's token That One Boss. So it's a great offensive run despite one of it's spells being somewhat weak, and the other being the high cost fourth tier spell. Resurrection also comes with a great group healing spell, and a low cost revival spell of which there are only two of them in the game.

Soul Eater - It goes without saying that True Runes live up to their status as the top tier powers of the game. Soul Eater has two different instant death spells which work on every non-boss enemy in the game, which is great for random encounter and grinding. It's two offensive spells are also great since no enemy has a defense against it and Judgment is the most powerful spell in the game even outclassing Unite Magic spells. It's main drawback is that the powers are locked behind the plot so you won't have access to these higher spells until you reach certain milestones in the game. Course that doesn't apply to the entries it also makes an appearance in...

Technique Runes

These do what they say on the tin, they let the user perform a special technique. They are the smallest category of runes with only six types in the game. I'm not going to really list them because they all do variations of the same thing which is to deal anywhere from 1.5 to 3x damage and possibly cause the user to be unbalanced after use. Also most of these runes are unique to a specific character and are usually fixed to them.

The Falcon and Hate runes are the only ones I will point out because while both are fixed to their respective users, these runes both do 3x damage and do not cause unbalance status meaning that these characters can use these rune with impunity. The worst one of these runes is the Trick Rune which looks like a unique one of kind rune, but it can actually be farmed from a specific enemy in the Dwarves Vault. The problem is that while the rune doesn't have the unbalanced issue, it does really low damage and can only be used by Juppo (who comes with one anyway that's fixed) and his niece Meg. The rune only does 1.5x damage and neither character are powerhouses so the damage is negligible.

Support Runes

What it says on the tin, these runes cause passive effects for a user. I will state a few that are worth using and some to avoid. The main issue with a lot of these runes is that their effectiveness in Suikoden 1 is negated by the one rune limit to your characters. A lot of these runes get way more use in the sequels where you can equip multiple runes.

Best:

Killer Rune - Boring but incredibly practical, the Killer Rune simply raises the chances of dealing critical hits. Granted the effectiveness of this rune comes down to a character's Skill/Technique stats, but even those who don't have high stats in those area can benefit from it. Suikoden has a lot of characters who are poor at using magic, and specialize in hitting things hard, so this rune easily sees a lot of action.

Counter Rune - Dodge an enemy physical attack and counter with an attack equal to the user's normal attack. Like the killer rune, this one works best when the character has the stats to make it activate more often, but it's a pretty useful rune for people who want variety in their builds.

Double Beat Rune - One of three unique support runes, of which there is only one of in the game. The Double Beat Rune lets the user attack twice in a row. It comes equipped on Eikei but unlike most unique runes found only on characters, this one isn't fixed, so you can actually remove it and give it to someone else like Viktor or Pesmerge...

Spark Rune - This is a weird rune that I probably only like so much because of it works really well with my play-style. The rune makes the whole party have the same speed stat as the bearer when using normal attacks. Great for parties where you have some slow but heavy hitters in the team and you don't want to be healing up after every few battles. This is another support rune, of which there is only one in the game.

Worst Runes:

Hazy Rune - This rune raises a character's evasion rate to physical attacks by 1.3 which frankly isn't enough to help the characters who would need it (mages and tanky characters) while also using up their one rune slot that can be used for better things. It's annoying that Kai is stuck with this rune. The Counter Rune is a much better rune since counters in this game also negates the attack, meaning it does the same thing as the Hazy Rune but also allows the character to perform another attack.

Gale Rune - Doubles the speed of a character. Like the Hazy Rune, it's not that great since it deprives a character who would need it from using a more effective rune like Killer or Counter. This is why I also prefer the Spark Rune since it can effectively do the same thing except party wide.

Phero Rune - This rune is pretty interesting on paper but impractical in use. It basically makes characters of the opposite gender of the user take hits for the user. It doesn't work all of the time either but it will raise the likelihood you will see it. The issue is that very few characters really benefit from it except maybe vendor trash party members like Lieuken or Sergei who are awful characters all around and can't benefit much from using a magic or killer rune. The other issue with this rune is that it's only available as a rare drop from one enemy, meaning you may got through the whole game without ever seeing it.

WK's Character recommendations:

With almost 80 playable characters, it can be tough figuring out who to throw into your team. So I'm going to give you my own recommendations. I will leave out three characters though: McDohl (the MC), Viktor and Flik. You will almost always have two of these characters in your active party throughout the game and spoilers, all three are going to be used in your final team as well regardless of how you feel about them. So instead I'm going to talk about characters who may only be required to be used for certain parts of the game or are completely optional. Also, for those who care, Suikoden 1 uses an algorithm for stats that has several variables (think FFIV after you reach Lv. 70) so even though some characters have the potential to be absolute juggernauts they can sometimes be a bit weaker if RNG hates you enough. Likewise, some characters that may be mediocre can potentially be the best party member if fortune smiles on them enough in level ups.

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Pahn - An interesting trend here is that McDohl honestly starts with a killer team in the game. Pahn might seem to be dumb muscle but he's got the best stats of the three martial arts characters, the Boar Rune is a pretty damn good tech rune even with the unbalanced handicap, and he has incredible synergy with a lot of characters giving him three separate Unite Attacks that are all fairly good. The real trick with Pahn avoiding a potential story line death if you don't prepare so you can avoid it.

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Cleo - Adding to the fact McDohl starts with one of the best teams. Cleo is debatably the best Long range fighter in the game. Cleo is fairly unique for she's one of only four female characters who can equip the heavy helmet class of armor that significantly raises her defense for the usually squishy L fighters. Likewise as a female, she gets access to some of their better defensive items that keep her fairly tanky in the early to midgame as well as the Wing Boots that give an insane +10 to speed on top of her high speed stat. Her weapon is also much more powerful than usual L fighters opting to use Lances that she throws over the typical bow and arrows of this class. Rounding all of this out is her strong affinity towards magic of which she'll likely be your main mage in the early game. Cleo is a fairly well rounded character that can carry you the whole game.

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Gremio - This might throw a people off a bit. Gremio is Suikoden 1's lethal joke character. He's required to be in your team for half the game but he starts to quickly fall behind the rest of his team due to his low weapon power and mediocre stats. This changes if you can get him to endgame. After Lv. 50, Gremio's stat pool switches from his normal one, to a much better one that will skyrocket his stats and round him out into something much better giving him significant boost in his defense and strength. Likewise, he has a killer Unite attack with Pahn and will innately protect McDohl from physical attacks when low on health. Likewise his Axe class of weapons get huge attack boosts during their final three levels.

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Luc - Luc is an odd one in this game. He has a Guard Robe and Speed Ring permanently fixed to him, meaning he loses out on the more useful Emblem accessories to boost his magic and he's forever stuck as a glass cannon due to having the second lowest tier of robes stuck on him. On the flip side, Luc is one of the fastest mages in the game and his magic and speed are on the same growth path as Crowley, the game's debatably better mage. Likewise, despite Luc's obsession with the Wind Rune, it can be replaced with something better like a Cyclone Rune. So despite some of his drawbacks, the game actually hands you one of the best mages off the bat.

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Valeria - Valeria is a beast of a character. She has the same equipment pool as Cleo but even better stats to offset the light armor restriction and she can use shields to better increase her defense. She's a fairly powerful fighter on her own compared to most Short range single sword fighters but Valeria chumps them all by having the Falcon Rune which gives her ridiculous damage potential. She also is a story recruit that arrives relatively early in the game, so she can stay a powerhouse on your team for most of the game.

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Humphrey - I don't normally like tanky slow characters but Humphrey has enough customization options to offset this like being able to equip the Windspun armor that boasts the best defense in the game and adds +20 to the characters speed. He hits really hard and is also available fairly early in the game. He sucks at magic but a Killer Rune does wonders for him.

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Milich Oppenheimer - Despite his foppish demeanor, Milich isn't lying when tells the team he could probably whoop their ass without his death spores. He's a red mage style character with more emphasis on the mage part, but he's a decent frontline fighter with good overall stats to keep him alive while he rains death down his enemies with his ridiculously high magic. Just don't let your emotions get the best of you when it's time to recruit him.

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Ronnie Bell - I can't believe I forgot her. She's an amzonian-esque martial artist who serves as a bodyguard for Maas at the Liberation Army's Secret Factory. in story, she's very insecure about how tall and muscular she is, but in game these traits serve her well. She has a unique rune called the Hate Rune that basically looks like a hadoken from Street Fighter and does 3x damage with no consequence outside of the fact it does factor any elemental runes you embed into her weapon. Beyond that, she's a pretty strong fighter who even gets a good Unite attack with Pahn.

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Kasim Hazil - Doesn't look much on paper but he honestly has the best offensive stat spread of the Six Generals with the exception of Sonya. Kasim just pours all his stats into attack power, defense and HP. He's one of a handful of characters that actually get over a 1000hp if you're lucky. His only drawback is the limited nature of Short range fighters meaning he's always fighting for a spot in the party. He also arrives late in the game but he's a story recruit so you're guaranteed to have him at endgame if you're not using a guide.

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Sonya Shulen - Sonya is probably the best of the Six Generals. She's the inverse of Milich in that she's more fighter than mage. Being a Medium Range fighter gives her more flexibility in team builds. Her only failing as a character is that she will likely be the last person you recruit in the game so she's really only available for the final dungeon and screwing around.

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Crowley - The ''best'' mage in the game. Crowley appears late in the game but starts with some hefty stats and a Cyclone Rune making him instantly viable from the get go. Being able to equip the useful Master's Robe with it's auto-Regen properties also gives him way more survivability than Luc. Crowley's only real drawback is that he's a late comer to be recruited due to all the conditions that need to be met, in addition to the fact he's easily miss-able due to hiding out in a secret room in the dungeon he's occupying.

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Clive - Is debatably the best Long Range fighter in the game next to Cleo. He can't use magic as effectively as she can, but in an unusual inversion of RPG logic, Clive can easily out-damage her with his normal attack because he uses an honest to goodness rifle instead of some bow or throwing weapon. The man can do as much damage as some of the strongest front-line fighters from the safety of the back-row. and he's one of the game's fastest characters only beaten out by some of the elves. His weaknesses are simply how obtuse recruiting him is in addition to arriving late in the game.

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Pesmerga - Another character that divides the fanbase up on how good he is. Pesmerga is a mix of characters like Viktor and Kwanda being a powerful front-line fighter with great damage potential combined with heavy armor makes him a powerhouse. Like Crowley, Pemerga has a tendency of being recruited with fairly high stats compared to your other recruits. His most annoying attribute besides the usual problems of arriving late in the game and being tricky to recruit is the fact he's stuck using Dragon Armor that's fixed on him. Made more annoying when players hacked the game and discovered he can equip the Windspun armor to boost his abysmal speed. stat. Still, this is actually his best incarnation due to being more flexible than in Suikoden II.

Misc.
Easy Prosperity or Fortune Rune

You can leave Gregminister early in the game after talking with the Emperor. You can do so faster coming home or after Ted joins your team. While grossly under-leveled. If you fight a team of three Bon Bons (they look like Trebbles from Star Trek) these can easily be beaten by a lone McDohl or a team with Ted in it. This will skyrocket your level enough to get you to the mountain town of Sarady to the west of the capital past the Tigerwulf Mountains. In this town,. you can speak to a man who will reward you with either a Fortune Rune if you come alone, or a Prosperity Rune if you come with Ted. The Fortune Rune doubles XP, the Prosperity Rune doubles money.

Before you officially get the Soul Eater, be sure to unequipped any Runes you may have given to McDohl. The Soul Eater will overwrite the rune instead of removing it, making it lost forever.

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The easiest way to get money in this game is to play the betting mini-game with Gaspar once he's recruited. The game is bugged and there is actually a sweet spot that will let you win like 90% of the time. With the high betting cap, it's easy to max out all your money in a few rounds of the game. Even better, his mini-game is located very close to the Castle Inn (save point) so it's easy to save scum yourself to victory.

If you're going for the Golden Ending that requires all 108 Stars of Destiny, you will need to make sure you use Pahn a bit in the early game and keep him both well-equipped and weapon maxed out. There is a story point in the game where Pahn has to do something reckless and you'll need to keep him up because even though it's not a traditional battle, his gear and stats still factor in.

[Wolf Kanno]

It is with heavy heart, that I learned that Yoshitaka Murayama, the creator of Gensou Suikoden and Eiyuden Chronicles: One Hundred Heroes has passed away February 6th 2024 from complications of an ongoing illness he had.

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[Wolf Kanno]

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Suikoden II is one of the most praised flops in RPG history. Despite all the fanfare it gets from journalists and the fanbase these days, Suikoden II actually did poorly when it initially released back in 1999 in North America. It did fairly well in Japan, but was likely overshadowed in PAL regions by Diablo 2. North America got it the worst, because while the original Suikoden was a modest success, it had no real competition at the time. I mean Beyond the Beyond and Revelations: Persona are not exactly games that get name dropped as excellent Pre-FFVII JRPGs for the PlayStation. In NA, Suikoden II released the same month as Final Fantasy VIII, one of the most anticipated games of the year. Regardless of ones feelings about the game, being released a mere 20 days after the follow up to one of the biggest games of the decade was not a good idea, and I don't know what Konami's U.S. division was thinking. Even worse, it wasn't like Square hadn't just released another major hit with Chrono Cross the month before in August and FF Anthology was being released in October as well. 1999 was just a bad year to release a game without being overshadowed by Square.

Adding to all this was just how much FFVII's influence had on the genre in terms of foreign markets. If you weren't 3D, no one took you seriously at the time. Konami releasing a 2D JRPG that was more reminiscent of the 16-bit era than the fancy visual feast that Square had been releasing one after the other wasn’t really going to fly. So it was fairly easy for the foreign market to pass this game by. I had played Suikoden 1 by this time, but I didn't even know Suikoden II had been released until maybe a year later, simply because FFVIII and Square in general dominated the market at that time. So yes, despite all the praise the game gets these days, it wasn't uncommon to see reviews for Suikoden II at the time being a bit more mean spirited because it wasn't following the leader, so to speak. Ironic, in a way, since these days Suikoden II is remembered far more fondly than FFVIII, and has graphically aged far better (Remaster withstanding) than Squall's pixelated face.

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Sadly, there isn't much to go on for Suikoden II's development. Konami was pretty bad about promoting the title and even the few Japanese interviews I can find don't share any interesting highlights. I guess Konami was still beside themselves with their smash hits, Metal Gear Solid and Silent Hill that they sort of forgot about the games between their releases of new DDR arcade machines. What we do know is that the sprites were a conscious choice by the team. The main feedback the game got from fans about the first entry was that they loved the world and characters the most, so the team placed all their focus on that. Much like the first game, I felt this choice was a good one in the long run, though obviously a bad one from a short term perspective. There is a persistent rumor, one I myself unfortunately helped propagate over the years, that Suikoden II was the original idea that Murayama and Kawano tried to make, but chose to shelve the project until they were more experienced to do it justice. This ended up being cleared up in recent years as just an apocryphal story, and the games were written in order.

The Story

Set a few years after the end of the first game, Suikoden II moves us to the Highland Kingdom, a former territory of Harmonia. It was gifted to the Blight family after their ancestor helped bring the Harmonian Civil War to a close. Shortly after, the Beast Rune of the 27 True Runes, left its place of safe keeping within Harmonia and came to Highland where it chose to stay with the founder of the Blight dynasty. Officially, Bishop Sasarai of Harmonia gifted it to the Blight Family, but this was a cover up so Harmonia wouldn't lose face. Located north of the City States of Jowston, the confederacy that had been born from the collapse of the Dunan Kingdom and the encroachment of Highland into their territories, the two nations have a long history of conflict with each other with the Blight family wanting to expand southward, while the City States, led by Muse and South Window, tried to expand northward. These constant wars were interspersed with small short lived truces which often ended when both groups started doing underhanded tactics to get an upper hand when they started the next inevitable war.

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When Agares Blight became King of Highland, the City States and Highland had been engaged in a six year conflict that saw Highland conquer Muse, Greenhill, and even the Matilda Kingdom. The rest of the City-States managed to muster their forces and push Highland back, but the town of Kyaro became a major stumbling block in peace negotiations between the two countries. Muse claimed the territory, but Highland still had control over it. The conflict was decided by a duel between the two nation’s greatest generals, Genkaku of Muse and Han Cunningham of Highland. Genkaku forfeited the duel, giving Kyaro to Highland and leaving Genkaku hated by the City-States, who chose to exile him to Highland. The peace lasted for nine years until Muse, led by Mayor Darel, hired bandits to try and assassinate the Blight family while they were traveling the countryside. Agares managed to escape, but his wife Sara and son Luca were captured. Sara was raped while Luca watched, and it was several days before Agares came back with his soldiers to save them. Queen Sara was then later found to be with child from the incident, and Jilla Blight was born, though Sara died from complications. This fueled Luca Blight's hatred for both his father and the City-States of Jowston. Conflicts continued between the two for several more decades with both sides posturing and trying to get a reaction from the other. Highland created the Unicorn Youth Brigade for propaganda purposes. A unit made up almost entirely of Highland teens that were deeply passionate about Highland. They mainly stayed behind safely in Highland during the small war. A peace treaty was to be signed between the two and the Unicorn Youth Brigade was to be disbanded shortly after.

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It is here that out story finally begins. Jowy Atreides and his friend Riou are childhood friends who joined the Unicorn Youth Brigade to show their love for their country. Jowy was from a middle class family that married into the Highland aristocracy. Due to his commoner's blood, he is ostracized by his new family, and took refuge at the local dojo where Genkaku had set up as his home. Genkaku had adopted and raised two war orphans named Riou and Nanami as his own, though Genkaku himself would eventually pass before he saw either reach adulthood. With the peace treaty signed, the two boys are ready to return home to Kyaro, but their plans are ruined when the City-States break the treaty and sneak attack their unit. Riou and Jowy are told to flee down the mountain path by their commanding officer Rowd. The two do so, but Jowy realizes that the mountain path is the only road off the mountain and would likely be the best place for the City-States to ambush them. They return to camp to warn their commander, only to find Prince Luca Blight and Rowd discussing the success of their false flag operation. Luca has his own men dress as City-State soldiers, to murder the Unicorn Youth Brigade, so he can blame the City-States and get overwhelming support for a major war to break into their territory. The boys are discovered and flee to the cliffs of the mountains where they are forced to jump into the river below. Before they do, Jowy realizes they'll likely get separated and marks a stone so they'll known to meet back there. Riou marks it as well and the two make the jump.

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They become separated, and our main hero Riou finds himself found, and made captive, by a mercenary unit working for Muse that is being run by none other than Viktor and Flik from Suikoden 1. Jowy eventually finds Riou and tries to rescue him, but gets caught in the process as well. The two eventually manage to escape and make their way back to their hometown of Kyaro, where they reunite with Riou's adopted sister Nanami. Unfortunately, their reunion is cut short when the boys are arrested by their former commander Rowd, who tells the general public that the two of them had secretly been spies for Muse and had helped coordinate the massacre. The two are captured, beaten, and nearly executed until they are rescued by Viktor and Flik. Along with Nanami, the five of them flee Highland and return to the mercenary fortress where they help Viktor recruit more mercenaries for the war. Riou meets Pilkia, the young girl who saved Jowy after the cliff dive and the two spend time in the Muse countryside helping the war effort. That is until Luca Blight makes a serious push into the region, and the boys see first-hand the madness that has taken the Highland Prince. Luca doesn't wish to conquer the City-States like his father and grandfather, his goal is revenge against them, and he plans on committing genocide on the entire populous, especially Muse. Seeing his atrocities firsthand, losing the mercenary fortress, and barely saving Pilkia, the three childhood friends make their way to Muse. Along the way, they uncover a hidden temple in Pilkia's hometown that houses the Rune of Beginnings. Jowy and Riou are chosen by the True Rune which splits its power into Riou's Bright Shield Rune and Jowy's Black Sword Rune.

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The group eventually makes it to Muse, where the two boys witness firsthand the total dysfunction of the City-State Alliance. Many of them feel the war is simply another squabble between Highland and Muse, so none of the other members of the Jowston Alliance wish to get involved. Muse's current leader, Annabelle, asks the two boys to do some reconnaissance for Muse. Here they meet Jillia Blight and encounter both Rowd and Luca Blight once again. The boys are found out by their former commander, forcing them to flee. Jowy stays behind to be a distraction, but eventually reunites with his friends in Muse after giving Riou, Pilkia, and Nanami a scare. That night, Jowy meets with Annabelle and assassinates her, he proclaims he is now working for Highland and wishes to change them from within. Riou and Nanami are devastated and forced to flee to the former region of North Window. Viktor learns of the rune Riou has, and tells him how his adopted grandfather Genkaku, once had the same rune. Riou is then prompted by the Muse survivors as the second coming of Genkaku, and he is made leader of the new Dunan Army, after Riou and Apple manage to convince Shu, a former student and strategist prodigy of Mathiu Silverburg, to join their cause and help them fight back against the Highland Kingdom.. From here the plot expands as Luca Blight and Highland at large make short work of the bickering City-States and the two childhood friends find themselves on opposing sides of the great conflict, with Riou trying desperately to pick up the pieces of the fallen City-States, while Jowy deals with the maniacal Luca Blight and the nervous aristocracy that serves him. Both boys trying to find peace between two groups that have decades of bad blood be5tween them.

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As can be gathered by this very abridged, yet incredibly dense discussion of the game's opening, Suikoden II has a lot going on for it. As Murayama said, the focus for the sequel was the world and characters and already in the opening hours we find the City-State/Highland conflict to be quite a doozy of a political quagmire while also making the relationship of Riou and Jowy fleshed out and central part of the story's conflict. It's a bit interesting how Suikoden II seems to take some inspiration from FFTactics with similar themes of two warring and dysfunctional factions whose ambitions causes the most pain for the common people caught in the middle of their schemes, as well as a friendship being tested by said conflict. I will say that Suikoden II manages to strike a more hopeful presentation of the concepts. The game has a very rich setting and cast with almost thirty returning characters from the first entry. Suikoden II does a better job of fleshing out most of the cast, whether it's making more of them prominent in the plot, as well as the introduction of a detective character that can investigate said characters and expand on the backstory of them. Many of the returning characters have their own returning subplots. like Flik still trying to mourn Odessa, Futch's journey to find a dragon so he can rejoin the Dragon Knights, Apple growing into her own as a strategist, Sheena is still womanizing, and Tengaar is still trying to make a true warrior out of Hix. While Suikoden II is mostly its own plot, there are enough returning elements and plot threads from the first game to make it sometimes feel like a continuation of the first game as they they were written to be one large epic novel. I know some Suikoden II fans get defensive when I talk about this because they feel SII stands on its own, and I agree, but I feel what elevates it to something greater is the fact it feels like a continuation from the first entry. It's a shame the series never manages to repeat this, though it comes closest with Suikoden IV/Tactics, but that's a whole different mess we'll eventually get to.

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Still I appreciate the fact Suikoden II is also its own thing. The new characters are a real treat, and I'm glad they get more screen time to really be fleshed out, like the traveling Grasslanders trio and their gypsy performances. The detective Richmond is not only super fun, but a great asset to the castle and lore of the series since he can fill you in on all of the background info about the characters. While I wasn't a huge fan of the Kobold characters from S1, S2's Gengen is adorable, and Ridley Wizen showed the race is way more versatile as characters. Nina is a fun, if creepy, foil for Flik, and Camus and Miklotov are basically what I was wishing Alen and Grenseal were. Course one of the best and divisive characters from Suikoden II is easily Shu, the game’s token strategist. Mathiu Silverburg from the first entry was largely a paragon of virtue, who could still throw a curve ball or two when he had to, such as sacrificing territory to the City-States to defeat Kasim Hazel of the Six Great Generals, but overall, Mathiu was sort of the moral conscious of McDohl’s forces. Shu is not that.

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Shu is a lot of things: a prodigy, a businessman, an exiled pupil, and self-serving. But if I had to summarize his character into one word, it would be a pragmatist. Mathiu was all about building alliances with honesty and integrity, but Shu doesn’t care if he’s liked and is willing to play the bad guy from time to time if means he can step one closer to winning. This trait is largely why Mathiu banished him as his student. Shu keeps his own allies guessing and he is not above using children as hostages to get results. But even Shu will be the first to admit he’s a bit of a bastard, but considering what the Dunan Army is facing, they need someone just as intellectually ruthless as Luca Blight and his strategist Leon Silverburg (yes, the same one from the first game) if they want to stand a chance of winning.

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Suikoden II helped move the series into a bit more mature territory with its story. Not that the first game was lacking in mature themes, but the first game could sometimes be a bit goofy. The first game has a faux gay Frenchman caricature who uses poisonous plants to protect his castle and is mostly hated by the locals because he changed all the town names into French sounding ones. SII in contrast has a South Window try to negotiate peace with Highland, and they summarily execute their leader and take over the whole territory. Both games tackle themes of racism, genocide, and political corruption, but Suikoden II always manages to do it with a better sense of realism and grittiness that S1 was just not willing to go to. I mean General Kwanda Rosman wipes out the entire elven village in the first game using a giant magical magnifying glass, meanwhile, Suikoden II, we watch Luca Blight raze and murder an entire village, including a famous scene where he forces a female villager to dehumanize herself in front of him and his soldiers by pretending to be a pig in the pretense of saving her life, only for Luca Blight to murder her anyway after he gets his laugh in. Suikoden II doesn’t hide its darker themes behind more cartoonish fantasy tropes and instead prevents a grittier narrative that was good enough to sit next to other big name Konami projects like Metal Gear Solid and Silent Hill. This isn’t to say Suikoden II is all grim dark real politick. The game can still be goofy and throw the characters into wacky anime shenanigans like Greenhill, where the party has to go undercover as students and we get a short lived slice of life mystery going on, including a schoolgirl stalker character. The Unicorn quest used in the Hix and Tengaar recruitment questline is also just pure wacky comedy gold. Likewise, not all mature themes hit right either with Two Rivers racial tensions feeling a bit like it was resolved a bit too easily considering the initial animosity. Suikoden is not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. Even the conflict between Jowy and Riou can feel a bit contrived at times and needs some of the supplemental materials from the Suikodgaiden titles to help it land on its feet better. But the game is a narrative leap compared to what came before it, but it also did so by building off of what really worked well in the first game as well, which is what a sequel should do.

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Probably the biggest thing Suikoden II does is really expand the world building for the series. The Holy Kingdom of Harmonia is just a name given in the manual; here we get to see what the big deal they really are. The Grasslands are introduced, the Island Nations and the Queendom of Falena are both named drop. We get our first taste of the Sindar civilization and suddenly the world feels so much larger than it was before. Hell, we even get to take a very brief trip back to the Toran Republic. The scale of the setting feels so much bigger than it did in the first game and the fact the setting is the same area that was always named dropped in the first game as this outside invader is also intriguing, because S1 does not paint a pretty picture of the Jowstown Alliance, and while Suikoden II doesn’t really either, it at least gives us an idea of who they are and gives a face to them that comes with a more humanization of their group. We get a similar treat in the next game when we go to the Grasslands and meet the Karayan Tribe proper. If you do the Clive quest, we’re also introduced to the Howling Voice Guild from Harmonia. Suikoden II broadens are understanding of the setting far more properly than the first game was capable of doing.

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The gameplay has also seen lots of improvements, but ones that come with their own issues as well. The battle system gains some small, but incredibly powerful improvements that add a lot of depth to its mechanics. The most obvious change is the introduction of characters now being able to equip multiple runes at once (One in the forehead, one in the right hand, and one in the left hand) instead of being relegated to just one. If you read my previous S1 Tips post, then you’ll notice I lambast a few runes due to their effectiveness not being as good as I would like because of the one rune limit. A Hazy rune that lets a character dodge more incoming attacks would be great for a mage character, but is utterly useless if it also means they can’t use magic either. Now that mages can equip multiple runes at once, they can have the benefits of both and several “useless” runes from the first game now have more leg room to be effective tools. Though this all comes with a catch. Not every character can get three rune slots. Not only are rune slots acquired by leveling up, but only a handful of the 108 Stars can actually get the full three slots. Likewise, a new addition with this new mechanic is that some runes can only be equipped in certain rune slots. The new Pale Gate Rune for instance, which deals with summoning magic can only be used by people with a forehead rune slot available. The new class of weapon runes must also be used on one of the hand slots, and so on. This has an interesting effect of adding a bit nuance to the characters you can play as that was lacking in the first game. Some characters whom at first seem lackluster can combine support runes to make them widely more effective while characters with unique runes can now be more versatile beyond their one gimmick rune. This adds more depth to the cast as a whole and helps to make them feel more memorable mechanically, especially since this game is filled with more unique skill runes than the first. The first game had 33 equippable runes including the Soul Eater. Suikoden II expands this to 87 runes, of which 21 are unique to different characters. There are now weapon runes that can only be used by characters using specific weapons like the Viper Rune that does damage and may inflict poison on enemies or the Unicorn Rune for spear users that let them strike a row of opponents instead of a single one. The massive expansion of runes and rune slots make way for a healthy amount of customization that felt pretty limited in the first game.

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For magic users, they also get an interesting new mechanic. The game adds an elemental affinity system to the game that every character is beholden to. The affinity system basically dictates which elemental runes a character can use and how effective they are with said rune. In the first game, a character’s effectiveness with a magical rune really just came down to their magic stat. Flik started with a Lightning Rune, but you could switch him with an Fire or Wind Rune and he would be just as proficient. In Suikoden II on the other hand, Flik has a B rating with Lightning Rune, allowing him to do 20% more damage when using the rune, whereas he has a C rating with a Fire rune, meaning he doesn’t do any more damage with its spells than most characters and he has a D rating in Wind, meaning he does lower damage with the rune. Funny enough, the E rating does allow a character to do 20% more effectiveness with a rune as well, but comes with the caveat that they may cast the spell incorrectly and either heal the enemy if using a healing rune or attack the party if they’re using an offensive rune. This again adds more lairs to customization, though sadly, this mechanic is not telegraphed to the player as effectively as the other mechanics. For those worried about the E rating though, it’s very uncommon and usually more prone towards more comic relief characters like the flying squirrels or the most obvious one being Viki, who has an E rating in every element.

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There are other tweaks like special runes you can equip on weapons that replace the system from the first game which was poorly thought out and of course the Unite attacks are back and there are far more in this entry than the first. Duels are also still here and there are a few more than the first game thankfully, but they are still uncommon occurrences and largely work the same as they did in the first game. The castle mechanic returns as well with more minigames and events with the highlight being the Iron Chef style cooking battles held by the Chef Tai Ho.

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The real big change is how Army battles play out. In the first game it was a menu based rock/paper/scissors type ordeal where you can use extra recruit to do special things between the big army choices. In Suikoden II, the Army battles are now a turn based system played over a grid map with party members divided into units which dictate what kind of unit they are along with the unit’s stats and skills. This gives more weight to collecting heroes and really playing around with party combinations. It is also nice to have the system present itself in a more strategic way than the simpler Suikoden I.

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Finally the game has a second challenge quest for players who want a bit more challenge. Returning marksman Clive returns and this time we have a questline that is unique to him. But the quest is timed and requires the player to rush their way through the game and beat it under twenty hours, similar to FFIX’s Excalibur 2 quest, except instead of a shiny new item, you’re rewarded with a unique story that finally sheds some light on the mysterious figure and the organization he works for.

Musically, Miki Higashino returns from the first game to spearhead the music along with a few collaborations from other Konami sound designers, but it seems that Higashino is the one who largely scored the entire soundtrack this time, and she frankly goes all out. While the game still is mostly using MIDI like everyone else, she manages top sneak in some impressive orchestral pieces with great choral pieces, most notably the game’s opening theme and the Reminiscence theme played towards the game’s beginning. Like the first game, Higashino and her team focus on giving the game a feeling of traveling the world, but unlike the first game, I do feel this one has a bit more noticeable Asian motif to go along with the game’s more Asian style setting. There are some unique instrumentation used that is noticeable despite the MIDI quality kind of muffling it up sometimes.

The soundtrack is massive as well, having twice as many tracks as the first game ultimately ranging up to a hundred and five tracks in total. The larger score allows Higashino and her team to express a larger range of emotions and sample even more styles of world music to give the game a very unique score from its contemporaries. We also see a few themes from the first game return with standard classics like the series main theme mixed into the game’s stellar opening track, the ever amusing Theme of a Narcissist, and the ever lovely Theme of a Moonlight Night. Hell, even Neclord’s theme Passacaglia returns now sporting an awesome backup choir to make it feel even more Castlevania-esque. You can tell Higashino really had fun composing this soundtrack.

So now we’re at my not-so-controversial moment where I give you five reasons not play Suikoden II followed by five reasons why you should, starting with…

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5. The game is too easy. While I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s the easiest installment in the series, the expanded customization system and wealth of new runes does leave it rife with balancing issues. Don’t get me wrong, I mentioned the first entry was also pretty easy, but it’s a bit more ridiculous in this installment. You can setup characters to solo the game, that’s how ridiculous the game is. I’ve beaten the final boss with a party of two characters before. Even the token “final boss” Luca Blight can be trivialized with the right set-up. In fact, you may never see a game over if it wasn’t for…

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4. The War Battles are awful. For tactical RPG fans, this might seem like a dream come true, and lord knows I’ve met some deniers online who love this system, but Army battles are kind of the least fun part of the game if you ask me. The tactical RPG mechanics make them slow as hell and frankly, this segment of the game tends to get the most questionable RNG moments where you can watch a low ranking unit score a critical against your better units and watch as they are completely decimated; likewise, some of your more powerful units can sometime struggle to take out weaker units due to the RNG just not being in your favor. Not helping any of this is that the game still makes use of these war battles as story-telling moments, sometimes to a detrimental amount as it often feels like most army battles are just scripted events. The most obnoxious being the battle where the Matilda Knights let the Highland Army wipe out refugees trying to reach their border. It is supposed to be a dramatic moment, but it’s really just five minutes of you watching this low level unit slowly move up the map while being hounded by the Highland units. You have to watch every unit move individually at a slow pace, and you will pray the first Highland unit manages to wipe them all out so you can get on with the game. As you can tell, I am not a fan of this system.

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3. You can easily soft lock yourself out of the Golden Ending. This is less of an issue if you’re using a guide, but it’s kind of surprising how easy it is to screw yourself out of the true ending. Part of the issue is that it’s possible to recruit characters who are not part of the 108 Stars of Destiny but require a key item that is limited. Veterans will know I’m talking about the Hearing Crystals, and I’ll mention that in the next post when I talk about difficult recruits, but the even easier way to screw yourself is not knowing you should leave the castle without checking in with Shu during the game’s ending. If you meet up with Shu as you normally would if since it goes with the game flow, then you’ll get the boring Good Ending, but to reach the game’s final “boss” you actually have to leave the castle and return to the start of the game, and there is no real hint on doing this. Sort of reminds me of the trick at the end of Lunar SSS.

2. The Bugs. Suikoden II, especially the NA version, is a buggy game and if you’re a completionist like me, this game is a nightmare for it. Music won’t play in certain spots, certain runes do crazy things like maxing out stats, and the drop system is a nightmare due to an oversight that makes several items take up the same slot, meaning you may never see certain items drop because they’ve already been “obtained”. Hell, I think the bugs are a lot of the reason the RNG in army battles fluctuate so much.

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1. The game is overrated. Yes, I am going there, but let’s be honest here, cult classics that get praise to high heaven for decades will often find themselves feeling underwhelming to newer audiences. Let’s be clear, Suikoden II was pretty snazzy for its time and huge improvement over the original in a lot of ways, but it can also be just as goofy, unintuitive, and basic as the first game. I’ve seen people compare Jowy and Riou’s relationship to Ramza and Delita in FFTactics, but the quality is not the same. FFTactics story is a Shakesperean Tragedy in the truest sense, while Riou and Jowy’s conflict is very much contrived. Part of this is due to Jowy’s choices within the second act not really getting the development needed to work. The logic makes sense, but his choices don’t in light of everything we’ve seen. Likewise, even Riou’s role as leader of the New Dunan Army also reeks a bit too much of “because Destiny says so” so it’s not like the game doesn’t have its narrative faults. Hell, half of the game’s bosses have no narrative importance whatsoever and even the final boss feels less like a proper buildup compared to the first game, and more like tying up loose ends. It’s not the worst offender in this regard, but it’s kind of annoying how often the fans look past some of these blatant narrative issues. The game is solid, but far from perfect.

Okay, so that was five against, let’s do five for

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5. The gameplay is just more fun. I know I just complained that it was too easy, but no one would know half of that if the gameplay didn’t have enough room to experiment have fun. The expansions to rune slots and rune options make it really fun to experiment and actually try out new characters and party configurations. I wouldn’t realistically use half of Suikoden 1’s cast, but I’ve definitely played around with most of Suikoden IIs. And playing around with more characters means it’s easier for them to endear themselves to the player. Adding to that, the game has a far better selection of minigames to play compared to the first with a rebalanced Chinchiroronin, fishing, rope climbing and most famous of all, the cooking mini-game.

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4. Continuing Narratives. Being a direct sequel to the first game with over twenty returning characters, it’s nice to see more progress has happened for a lot of these characters with Flik overcoming his grief for Odessa, Viktor getting his revenge, Hix and Tengaar on their journey to make Hix a real warrior, Humphrey and Futch trying to find a dragon, and we even get to jump back into the Toran Republic and say hi to a few familiar faces. Suikoden in general is at its best when we get to see these small story threads stretch across several games. Which leads me to…

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3. The Best Old Save File Bonuses. Konami really loved to throw in bonuses for players who played a lot of their games with the most famous being Psycho Mantis naming off Konami games off your memory card, including Suikoden 1. But Suikoden II introduced us to a neat mechanic in which your old save file from the previous game would give you some worthwhile bonuses including returning characters starting with more levels and better equipment, but the best was getting a chance to recruit the main hero from Suikoden 1, McDohl, as a temporary character which even comes with an optional quest. It’s a shame Konami never did more with this mechanic in future installments.

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2. The darker narrative. The first Suikoden had glimpses of this here and there in the plot and saved a lot of it for supplement materials, but SII is a bit more forthcoming on this story being about the ugly side of war. Dehumanization, apathy, self-interest, betrayal, genocide, dysfunctional politics, and generational trauma; Suikoden II is not afraid to wade a bit more into the wider suffering that war causes. I also appreciate that Suikoden II does a better job than most in these type of stories as to not white wash events no5r completely devolve the conflict into a simple good vs. evil type of ordeal. The Highland Kingdom is monstrous in its actions against the City-States, but it’s not like the City-States weren’t asking for it and don’t have equally terrible deeds and innocent blood on their hands. Likewise, Highland has enough good souls working for it that you can’t completely hate them, just as the City-States have some awful people who make up their alliance as well that you have to work with. I’m calling you out Tinto. A large part of Suikoden II’s narrative is uncovering and working past all these darker elements and I am here for it.

1. The Characters. I feel I’ve been building up to this for a bit with these, but Suikoden II really has a pretty well defined cast of characters, from Nanami being the heart of the trio, Jowy being the wayward friend, the hamtastically evil Luca Blight, the deliciously arrogant Shu, the colorful circus trio, Pohl, and so many more. The game does a great job of giving the characters more time to breathe and express themselves, which in turn makes it easier to get invested in the story and really feel those emotional highs and lows with them. The game even started to take more liberties with some of the more one-off characters with Tai Ho having a fun story with his cooking mini-game or Clive finally getting some development, or creating a hard boiled American gumshoe in the form of Richmond, or even collecting a family of Flying Squirrels. Suikoden II does a lot more to really make everyone stand out a bit more from its predecessor and I appreciate the game giving us more side adventures and Richmond’s detective skills, to help develop the characters more for us the player.


In conclusion, Suikoden II was a huge leap for the series that instantly became a cult classic due to poor marketing on Konami’s side, and an industry that was too focused on the new hot thing to appreciate the classic style gems still being made around them. I am very happy Konami is finally getting a second chance to wow a whole new generation of players. Now is a great time to be a Suikoden fan once again.

This post is dedicated to the memory of the forum member Jowy. I am sorry I didn’t get this entry finished in time for you to enjoy it. May you rest in peace.

[Wolf Kanno]

Tips and tricks for Suikoden II



I'm probably not going to go into as much in some parts as I did in S1 due to there either being too much information like Runes or in the case of recruitment issues, the game is mostly a bit nicer to the player. Mostly.


The most difficult characters to recruit In Suikoden II.

I know I said this game made them less obtuse, but... I lied. The game introduces multiple ways to recruit characters with some moving around after story events so you can get another shot to recruit them, which is nice, but the game still sometimes fails to explain exactly what you need to do.

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Anita - Anita can first be found at Muse City, she will be drinking and asks you to run some errands for her. By some, I mean a lot. The issue is that for story reasons, Muse won’t be accessible for very long. So then you'll have to wait until later to meet her in Banner Village instead. It is possible to recruit her while she's in Muse, but she'll be pretty low level if she does. Ironically, there is a much easier way to recruit her, and that's to recruit her rival Valeria and bring her to talk to her at Banner Village. There are pros and cons to doing either recruitment. If you snag her early, she's a pretty strong fighter with the awesome Falcon Rune. The second method involves recruiting Valeria, which has its own dilemma, but if you're playing the original PS1 version, there is a common glitch that has Anita start at lv. 99 if you recruit her this way.

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Gilbert - This dude is technically not difficult to recruit, but potentially you can run into some issues. During the Army Battle he appears in, you simply have to wound his unit by attacking it. The issues stem twofold, 1) this battle is the only attempt you have to run into him, so you'll have to beeline it to him and 2) he can potentially get killed in this very same battle if you're unlucky. Hope you saved beforehand.

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Oulan - This amazon of a woman can be tricky to recruit unless you're a type of player like our members Pumpkin and WarZidane and have a tendency to run all female parties. Basically you have to go to Kuskus with a party consisting of only female party members. If you have any male characters that are not the MC, the event won't transpire. Cross a bridge where you'll get attacked by bandits and this kind soul will appear to save you and your party.

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Tetsu - This guy is the one I personally hate trying to recruit. In order to recruit him, you'll need to speak with him with one party member that has the Toasty status effect. He's not exactly clear about this and the easiest way to get the status normally would be to take a bath, but since this is the bath guy you'll have to resort to finding a food item and using them until you get the status. The other issue is that the menu won’t tell you if you have the status, but you'll know when you're in battle because your character's skin will be reddish and they'll have a bit of steam coming off their head.

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Georg Prime/Pesmerga/Mazus - I'm lumping all three of these characters together because all three of them have the same gimmick, which is simply that they are all late game characters hanging around minor dungeons you'll have to revisit to find them after the team beats Neclord and have a Lv. 4 castle (basically 100+ recruits). Georg Prime is in the mountain pass towards Tinto. Mazus is in the Tinto Mines in a hidden corridor, and Pesmerga is in the mother smurfing Cave of the Winds where you fought the Zodiac/Star Dragon Sword at the beginning for the game.

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Genshu - Likely the last recruit you'll get in the game if you acquire everyone the earliest that you can. He really likes swords, and wants to see one that is above Lv. 14. So to begin with, players will need to have found the Silver or Golden Hammer so your blacksmith can upgrade your weapons. The other requirement is you also have to reach him. The issue is he's in a town that spends most of the game under Highland occupation. You'll need to take a boat ride from Kuskus, which will drop you off right by him. If you didn’t find the hammers, you can also just bring Pesmerga as his weapon starts at Lv. 14.

Runes!!!

This game introduces a lot of new runes, so I'm not really going to go over too much here as that would be exhaustive and there are plenty of guides out there that can do a better job than I could.

Weapon Runes –
These are runes for specific weapons like the Viper Rune for 1H swords or the Lion Rune for Fist fighters. These runes give a bit more punch to characters, especially ones that are bad at using magic. A lot of these runes also have some weird drawback though so be careful.

Weapon Enhancing Runes –
The Rune Piece mechanic from the first game that allowed the player to add elemental/stat boosting properties to their weapons through the blacksmith was dropped due to how unfinished and poorly balanced it was in the game. S2 tries to do more, but ultimately manages to break the system even further. You can once again add elemental properties to a weapon that also give certain stat boosts by embedding the weapon with an elemental rune. But in addition to using the day to day elemental runes, the game also added a slew of runes that are only for this process. Most are self-explanatory such as Sleep or Poison Runes that give your weapon the ability to inflict the statuses on enemies. But there are two you should definitely look out for as their properties are actually pretty overpowered if you know what you're doing and there are only two of each in the game and technically the second one are mutually exclusive. These runes are:

Exertion Rune - This Weapon rune makes the users base attack power rise every round of battle for about six rounds until they'll be doing double damage. There are technically three in the game, but one is permanently attached to one characters weapon. One can be found in a vase in the Kobold Village and the last requires the castle statue to have a specific monstrous design.

Friendship Rune - This weapon Rune raises your attack power based on how many recruits you have acquired. This even includes non-numbered recruits. This rune was also bugged in the PS1 version and would sometimes raise a characters attack to the maximum level. One is found South Window while the other requires the castle statue you make to have a specific monstrous design.

Magic Runes
Magic runes didn't change much in this version though the Water Rune gains an offensive spell and the Earth rune finally works, but we do get to see three new ones that sort of become mainstays for the rest of the series.

Blinking Rune- This is a joke type rune used exclusively by Viki that lets her insta-kill enemies by teleporting them away or teleporting random objects to hurt the enemies. Course she sometimes does it to your party...

Pale Gate Rune – This rune is a derivative of Windy and Leknaat's Gate Runes from the first game which allows them to summon monsters. This rune largely works like a powerful "summon" rune a la classic FF, but it is quite powerful. Sadly, it's restricted to the head, so only a handful of characters can actually use this rune. Likewise, each spell does different elemental damage, so to get the most use, you need a caster who has high affinity with multiple elements.

Darkness Rune – This rune technically debuted in the Saturn version of Suikoden 1, but most westerners will know this as Sierra's rune. It is a derivative of the Soul Eater Rune and like it uses a few of that runes signature moves Finger of Death and Black Shadow. It also has two original moves with some quirky effects as well. Oddly enough, this is the last time the Rune ever appears again in the series.

Support Runes –

These are the runes that will make or break the game for you. Support runes ended up being a big deal in the first entry due to the lack of strong skill runes and the fact some characters were just not geared for magic. But some of those runes were not as useful as they could be due to the one rune slot per character rule. Now that the game gives your characters multiple slots, the player can mix and match effects to create some truly powerful combinations. The game even adds some new ones that go off to become mainstays within the series. In fact the best melee build in the game requires the first three runes I’m going to list.

Fury Rune – Berserk is one of many new status effects added to Suikoden in this installment. It is similar to the status from FF in that it raises a character’s attack power,, but unlike FF, it does not leave them uncontrollable. In fact some runes get added effects when the character is under the status as well. This rune basically just keeps a character under the status permanently.

Double-Beat Rune – This bad boy returns from the first game for what will end up being its last appearance in the series. This rune lets a character attack twice but doubles damage they take if they are countered. In the first game, only one exists in the game. In this one, you can actually farm it off enemies so it’s possible to outfit most of your army with it. Enemies rarely counter, so the drawback is hardly noticeable.

Double-Strike Rune – Making its debut in this entry. This rune becomes a mainstay for the rest of the series. This rune doubles the damage the user does in exchange for doubling the damage they take from enemies. This sounds very risky, but Suikoden isn’t terribly hard, so outside of bosses and a few enemies, you’ll probably never notice the damage being significant if put on a heavy hitter like Viktor who has defense and HP to spare.

Fire Sealing Rune – This rune is a bit weird in that it’s the only one that protects against a specific element. It reduces fire elemental damage to 0 but doubles damage to water elements, which coincides with the fact the Water Rune gained an offensive spell in this entry. But surprisingly, this rune actually is super useful in the series in general. Characters like Zamza have a rune that does fire damage to himself when used, and this rune protects him from accidentally killing himself. There is a weapon enhancing rune that raises attack power at the cost of taking 25% damage from your attack as fire damage, and again, this rune negates that negative property. But the bigger thing here is that a lot of enemies (including the game’s token “That One Boss”) use fire elemental attacks and rune in this game, and this rune no sells all of them.


WK's Character Recommendations

With over 80 playable characters, it can be tough figuring out who to put in your party. But I'm here to offer some of my own recommendations once again. Like before, I'm not going to count certain characters, namely Nanami and Jowy. Like Gremio, Nanami is in your party for the majority of the game, unlike Gremio, she's actually a fairly solid fighter for all of it. Jowy is essentially a more magic orientated version of Riou and a temporary character as well, so he doesn't really count despite being in your party for like a fifth of the game.

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Zamza - This smug pain in the ass is a bit deceptive at first use, but he's not all talk. He comes equipped with a unique rune called the Fire Dragon Rune, which is sort of a shout out to Capcom's Fire Shoryuken move by its animation. It does 2x Fire damage to the enemy but does half of that damage to Zamza as well, which sounds like a deal breaker if the Fire Sealing Rune wasn't a thing. This rune allows the user to take no damage to fire elements in exchange for receiving double damage from water element instead. Thankfully, water is much rarer to see than fire damage so this rune makes Zamza even better. Throw in the fact there is a Fire Lizard Weapon rune that works the same as his signature rune that you can attach to his fist weapons to further boost his damage, he's honestly not a bad character for someone recruited so early in the game. He's a decent mage as well for the early game as well and as one might guess, his best elemental affinity is fire.

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Anita - If you get her early enough, Anita can be a very powerful ally. She is essentially Valeria from the first game, equipped with the same Falcon Rune. Sadly, the rune got nerfed a bit in this entry as it now only does 2x damage instead of 3x and it lowers her accuracy after use, but the rune now has a special “critical” that activates in the lower accuracy phase that allows her to do 5x more damage. Regardless, she's a pretty strong front line fighter with good armor options, a killer rune and secondary slot for customization options later down the road. I'd say the biggest drawback for her is recruiting can be a pain and her rune isn't as abusive as it was in the first entry, but she's still very solid, especially for someone you can be using for 80% of the game.

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Rina - Of the Circus Trio, Rina is easily the one with the most longevity. She's a bit like Cleo in the first game in that she's a strong L range fighter with good magic. She doesn't have Cleo's good equipment options but she makes up for it with high M.def and being the first character you'll recruit with three open rune slots, this leads her to having lots of options, but unlike some other 3-rune characters I can think of, she's more of a magic based one. She is one of only twenty characters that can use the powerful Pale Gate Runes. Her good synergy with her sister Ellie and Bolgan is also great for the early game when you have limited options. If I have one gripe, it's that she's mainly average as a spell caster.

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Flik - I didn't really get a chance to chat about Flik in the last one of these due to the fact the game just always forces him o9nto your party, so of course he was above average. S2 doesn't change this much, but it's not quite as extreme as the first game. Flik is basically a Red Mage being both a strong frontline fighter with good survivability with his equipment options as well as being a pretty strong mage for a melee focused build with a high affinity with Lightning Runes which are great for dealing with bosses and powerful enemies. You can also scrap his magic and double up his melee options once he gains his second rune slot or you can keep him focused with a good support rune for offense like a Double Beat Rune and upgrade his Lightning rune to a Thunder Rune for his magic. Flik remains a powerful ally for most of the game and the game just hands him to you as part of the plot.

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Viktor - Again, I didn't really say anything about him because he was required for half of the Suikoden 1 and not much has changed in S2, though not to the same extreme. Viktor is a beast of a man with high melee focused stats. Unlike Flik, you shouldn’t bother giving him a magic rune; instead use his two rune slots to plays with some of the game's powerful melee support runes like a Double Beat and Double Strike Rune. This plays into the fact Viktor's Star Dragon Sword is the strongest weapon in the game in terms of pure stats and combined with Viktor's high strength, allows him to play in the big leagues of Suikoden Heavy hitters like Pesmerga. Flik might have versatility, but Viktor is really good at hitting things really hard.

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Luc - The pain in the ass Wind Mage is back, except even better. He still has that permanent Speed Ring attached, but now he can equip real armor to augment his magic stats. He also has three rune slots, and unlike Rina, he's built to be a top tier mage and is debatably the best mage in the game. He has either an A or B affinity with every magic type, and in addition to being able to use the Pale Gate Rune, he can use Unite Magic by himself if you equip the right runes on him. The Wind/Cyclone rune is still overpowered in this game as well. If you want a magic focused team, then Luc should be there.

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Oulan - This guardian of women everywhere is a powerhouse with another unique rune in the form of the powerful Angry Dragon Rune which does 2x damage once per round to one enemy... that is unless you berserk her by giving her a Fury Rune that boosts her attack by a noticeable percentage. While she is restricted to light armor and is a short range fighter, she makes up for it by having strong stats to compensate, sporting the highest natural defense of all female characters. She’s pretty powerful in the early game, and if taken care of, she can last you the whole game if you want.

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Richmond – Okay, Richmond is a bit unique here for my recommendations as he’s not a fighter or playable character. Instead he’s a support character that works a sa detective. His whole function is to not only identify and give clues on where to find the 108 Stars you can recruit, but you can also pay him to find information about your party and help give more details about the whole cast. He also gets his own snazzy theme song.

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Wakaba and L.C.Chan - A Master- Student pair that both use the powerful White Tiger Runes. These two are good frontline fighters with great speed, attack power, and high HP to offset their poor defense and equipment options. Seeing how their speed will help you murder everything quickly, you don't have to worry about these weaknesses very much. Wakaba can be recruited early in the game, and in the PS1 versions of the game, so can her master if you use the Matilda Glitch to reach him in Rockaxe early. They both also get an extra rune slot for some additional support rune action.

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Valeria - She back from the first game and still sporting the powerful Falcon Rune. What makes her interesting is that she's one of the few characters that can break the damage limit as her Falcon Rune has the potential to do 5x damage while afflicted with the -10% hit status after using it once already. This is of course if you have her properly equipped as well. She's otherwise the same as Anita, the only issue is that she shares her Star with Kasumi in this game, so depending on which you choose you might miss out on some content or easy recruitments.

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Sheena and Killey - These two are part of a short list of characters in the game with three open rune slots and a melee focus which makes them perfect candidates for the Fury/Double-Beat/Double-Strike combo that essentially allows these characters to solo everything. The devs must have known this because neither is available for one of the game's actually challenging boss battles. Now there are at least four other characters that fall into this category, and all four are available before either of these two are recruited, but these two often get special mention due to having no glaring weaknesses. Both characters have good stats, good equipment options, and strong weapons. Unlike the other four who often have subpar stats or equipment options that make them a bit more fickle to use.

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Kahn Marley - You meet this Belmont inspired hero early in the plot, but he won't join until much later, but Kahn is another good mage that can actually fight in melee if needed be and even has a unique critical hit animation where he changes his sword for a spear. While he's average with most magic, he does get an A with Resurrection Runes which he starts with and again, he also has all three rune slots available to him, which means he can use the Pale Gate Rune and some magic focused support runes to help him with his average affinity.

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Bob - Bob is a bit of an hidden gem if you ask me. He's an average fighter associated with a strange village and he has one of the coolest unique runes in the game. His Rabid Fang Rune lets him transform into a werewolf who double his stats and he can tear apart the battle field afterwards. Despite having to wait one round for awesomeness, he's a fun fighter to bring to the battle.

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Georg Prime - The legend himself in his series debut. Georg is a bit of an oddity on this list due to his lack of rune options. He only has one rune slot and it’s already filled with a Killer Rune. But Deathblow George is on this list due to his high melee stats and great stat growth. Even without the better customization options of say Killey or a cool unique rune like Valeria, George Prime will still be one of your top damage dealers and he’s also one of the faster characters with great survivability in the frontline due to his good HP and defense gear options. While he isn't quite to his meme status from a later game, Georg Prime is another hidden gem among the roster and personally I feel he fills the role left open by Pesmerga in the first game.

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Pesmerga - Like Georg Prime, Pesmerga makes up for his lack of options with the highest physical stats in the game. With that said, I feel Pesmerga is a bit less awesome in this entry due to the fact all of his equipment being permanently equipped makes it harder to customize him since he only gets one equipment slot and one rune slot to work with. On the bright side, he starts with a Rage Rune already equipped to his sword, so that's a bonus. I prefer Georg, but I still like we get more of the Pesmerga/Yuber conflict in this game.

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Mazus - The "ultimate mage" in this game. He also has high magic stats and not only starts with three rune slots; he already comes with a Pale Gate rune. Interesting note, his affinity is the inverse of Luc's with his B rank affinity magic being Luc's As and vice versa, meaning he specializes in Fire, Earth, and Resurrection magic. He does have a Robe of Mist permanently attached which limits some of his equipment options, but this is not a big deal as much as his late arrival is probably the bigger issue with him.

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McDohl - Yes, he can be recruited if you have a save file from the first game. He's not a traditional character though as he's not a Star of Destiny and he won’t stay in your castle, so you have to wander all the way back to the Toran Republic to recruit him after every story event. He still has the Soul Eater, it is still overpowered as hell and its final spell is still the strongest spell in the game. He also gets his broken Master/Pupil Unite Attack except this time he does it with the MC Riou, and seeing him do it with someone with better stats shows how powerful this Unite can really be. He also gets two open slots in addition to his true rune so he has a lot of customization options and he can even carry over his endgame gear from the first game if you spent the time to outfit him with all of it. The quest you do to make him available for recruiting is also really fun. I actually beat the final boss with a party consisting only of McDohl and Riou before, that's how overpowered these two are together.

Misc.

The Matilda Glitch – If you’re playing the original PS1 version and not the PSP or Remaster, you’ll have access to this glitch. For some reason, the gate at the Matilda-Muse border is not fixed in its spot and thus it’s possible to push it away with your character and gain access to an area much later in the game. You’ll have to run to the nearest town and hope you don’t get ambushed though. Once there, you can recruit L.C.Chan if you bring Wakaba, but more importantly, you can recruit Humphrey and Futch from Suikoden 1 who will both be scaled for the area. Now you can power level your whole army and make the early game even more of a breeze.

Suikoden 1 Save Data – The game gives you a lot of bonuses if you have save data from the first game on the same memory card. The base line thing that unlocks is McDohl. As long as you have an S1 save, you can unlock the quest to recruit him. If the S1 save file has all 108 stars recruited and the Golden Ending unlocked, Gremio will also be present in the McDohl quest and you can later obtain Gremio’s Famous Stew recipe to use in the cooking mini-game.

The other bonuses allows all returning characters from the first game to start with higher levels and weapon upgrades than they normally would which is based on how high they were in the S1 file. The best bonuses involve the characters having Lv. 16 weapons and being Lv. 99, but you’ll get a level bonus as long as the character was above level 60 in the base game.

McDohl and Humphrey also have some equipment carried over. In Humphrey’s case, his armor is locked and he normally starts with Knight Armor that has pretty high defense. But if you equip him with the Windspun Armor (highest defense in both games +15 speed and Wind resistance) he will actually come equipped with that instead. McDohl’s is a bit more complicated and he will start with an equivalent piece of armor depending on what his final armor is. For best results, make sure McDohl ends the first game with a Silver Hat and Master’s Garb equipped as he will start with both. Interesting side note, Pesmerga can also transfer the Windspun Armor, but this is not possible without hacking the game as he has Dragon Armor permanently equipped to him in Suikoden 1. Save data also suggests runes were supposed to be transferrable as well but this was removed. Though this has not stopped fans spreading rumors that the Clone Rune can be transferred, despite the fact it was one of the many runes that can’t be transferred according to the formula.

The Flying Squirrels – While Mukumku is a required recruit as one of the 108, the critter has four other siblings you can recruit with different color capes. This starts a trend in the series where every game afterwards has a weird animal group you may recruit that don’t count towards your Stars but often affect abilities that are based on how many people you have recruited. You basically recruit these characters by getting into random encounters in certain places while having a party slot open. They still require you to be at certain points in the game though.

Makumaku – Lv. 4 Castle, path between Two-River and Greenhill
Mikumiku – Lv. 2 Castle, path between Greenhill and Forest Village
Mekumeku – Lv. 2 Castle, Greenhill and forest path to Matilda
Mokumoku – Lv. 2 Castle, clearing south of Forest Village

Rulodia and Chuchara – One of the monsters you can recruit with the Listening Crystal is a giant octopus named Abizboah. If you recruit him with one of the Listening crystals and return to the spot you found him, you may recruit his wife Rulodia. Afterwards, you will eventually see their kids Chuchara, which is a neat little element the game added. It is also a trap. Rulodia is not one of the 108 stars, so using the second listening crystal to recruit her will lock you out of the Golden ending.

Kasumi and Valeria – One of the biggest choices in Suikoden II happens when you reach the Toran Republic. President Lepant gives your party a choice between Valeria and Kasumi as serving as representatives of the Republics alliance with the New Dunan Army. There are pros and cons to either choice.

Kasumi is a strong but fragile short range fighter and is still using her cool suplex rune. Recruiting her allows you early access to the hidden Ninja Village and access to a few recruits you normally won’t acquire until later. She also has a cool scene with McDohl if you bring both of them back to the Republic.

Valeria is a stronger short range fighter with her powerful Falcon Rune. She can give you easy access to Anita if you waited to recruit her, but Anita can be recruited much earlier. Valeria’s main advantage is that she’s a much stronger fighter than Kasumi and is more useful for endgame party builds.

[Wolf Kanno]

I forgot to post this, but Konami has recently been investing hared into Suikoden. Likely for a lot of reasons, but I'm thinking the Eiyuden Chronicles kickstarter helped them realize the franchise still has a strong following.

For one, we have the remasters of Suikoden I and II that recently came out. It's based off the PSP engine so expect a few of the bug fixes and the game also sports a new translation and Kawano even helped out and redrew new face portraits for Suikoden I. Sadly, it doesn't have the extras from the Sega Saturn version of Suikoden I, but it's not like they are as extensive as say the additions from Symphony of the Night.


They also announced a Suikoden II anime, which will be really neat. It looks pretty good so far from teaser art. It's apparently being worked on by an in-house studio that belongs to Konami.


Finally, they announced a new entry to the series called Star Leap. It might be a mobile entry, which will likely turn off some players, but the trailer for it looks really good and the background info for it is really intriguing. The game takes place sometime between the ten year gap of Suikoden V and Suikoden I, and will focus on the Rune of Change, which if you've been reading this thread, is associated with the mythical Sindar civilization.

The trailer already shows a lot of familiar faces including Odessa Silverburg, Humphrey, Flik, and Viktor from Suikoden I, as well as Genoh from Suikoden V and of course Viki makes an appearance and possibly Jeane. The game looks like a nice throwback to the PS1 era of the series. While it doesn't have a release date, or even a non-Japanese trailer, it does look like it has a chance to come out West since the website has an English option. I'm excited to get a new entry to the series story, and while Murayama has sadly passed away and had nothing to do with this game, Takahiro Sakiyama, the director of Suikoden V has largely taken over as the IP director of the series for Konami and worked on the remaster. I imagine he is also working on this entry as well in some capacity most likely as producer. That puts me a little more at ease.



So yeah, it's pretty exciting to be a Suikoden fan again.