History VideoGame / SuikodenII

* GenkiGirl: Nanami, Nina (to the annoyance of Flik), Wakaba

** Flik, the '[[RedBaron Blue Lightning]]', returns. He has the best affinity possible with the Thunder rune, making him deals more damages with it than most characters.

To those who want to play the game but cannot afford to shell out anywhere from $100 to over $500 for a copy, ''UsefulNotes/PlaystationNetwork'' released the game as a [=PlayStation=] Classic in December 2014 in North America, and January 2015 in Europe. And should the store has issues in the future, you can get this game bundled with [[VideoGame/{{Suikoden I}} the first game]] with ''[[CompilationRerelease Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune and Dunan Unification Wars]]''.

To those who want to play the game but cannot afford to shell out anywhere from $100 to over $500 for a copy, ''UsefulNotes/PlaystationNetwork'' released the game as a [=PlayStation=] Classic in December 2014 in North America, and January 2015 in Europe.

[[TimeSkip Three years]] after the events of the [[VideoGame/SuikodenI original game]], the nation of Jowston has just signed a ceasefire with the Highland Kingdom. The protagonist, an orphan adopted by the late hero Genkaku, has just joined the army alongside his best friend Jowy. However, they fall afoul of one of the most twisted examples of a FalseFlagOperation ever attempted, courtesy of Luca Blight. Barely escaping this fate, they soon find themselves saddling with the two halves of the [[EmpathicWeapon Rune of the Beginning]], the [[CastingAShadow Black]] [[StormOfBlades Sword]] [[PowerOfTheVoid Rune]] and the [[LightTheWay Bright]] [[WhiteMagic Shield]] [[HolyHandGrenade Rune]]. From there, their paths split, as the protagonist takes the [[LaResistance traditional hero's route]] and Jowy sets out to break the system from within, setting the stage for a war where both sides fight for the exact same goal.

** Speaking of time limits... [[spoiler:Preventing Nanami's death]] requires (among quite a few other things) extremely quick selection on a particular dialogue choice. Even if you get it ''right'', the game won't tell you if you got it right until [[spoiler:the scene where doctor Huan declares her dead. If you get it right, there is a short additional dialogue in which Huan asks Shu to follow him inside the infirmary. The nature of why Huan asked Shu inside is revealed in the GoldenEnding.]]

* InformedAbility: On paper, Leon Silverberg is the greatest strategist in the series but from what we see in the actual game, he can't hold a candle to Shu, let alone [[VideoGame/SuikodenV Lucretia Merces]] or [[VideoGame/SuikodenIII Albert Silverberg]]. He does, however, acknowledge that his reputation is overblown, and that he's past his prime.

%%* PsychoForHire: Yuber.

** Seed and Culgan.
** Viktor and Flik are their similarly colour-coded Alliance counterparts.
** Miklotov and Camus as well. Interestingly, they lead the Blue and Red Knights, respectively, opposite of what their personalities dictate.
** Tengaar and Hix.

* BoisterousBruiser: Viktor once more.

* EmpathicWeapon: The Star Dragon Sword once again.

* FogOfDoom: The first boss fight in the game.

* TheGunslinger: Elza

* HeroAntagonist: Jowy
* HeroicBSOD: Poor, ''poor'' Pilika.

* LovesTheSoundOfScreaming: Luca Blight

* PreviousPlayerCharacterCameo: As an OldSaveBonus you can meet and recruit the protagonist from the first game. [[GameBreaker And he's awesome.]]

* PsychoForHire: Yuber

* {{Tomboy}}: Wakaba.
** Nanami as well.
** Tengaar, who is bossing around poor Hix.

%%* TwoGuysAndAGirl: Riou, Jowy and Nanami.

%%* VoluntaryShapeShifter: Bob.
%%* WarriorPrince: Luca Blight, yet again.

* WingedHumanoid: The Wingers.

* FailedASpotCheck: When Riou and Jowy are about to be executed, Rowd rambles and taunts them, saying they should enjoy the sunset since this will be their last one. He himself gazes upon it, mulling over having to babysit kids and that now his bad luck has finally run out, dreaming aloud about his future job. While he is doing so, we can hear that the whipping has stopped and noticably loud slashing sounds, that Rowd completely fail to notice. When he 'finally' notices, Viktor and Flik have completely routed his troops and saved Riou and Jowy. [[DirtyCoward Rowd promptly flees.]]

** Bad word choice is everywhere. The scene you get for completing [[spoiler:Clive's quest]] and its insane criteria is [[PlayerPunch nearly nonsensical.]]

* SmugSnake: Neclord.

* TheStrategist: Shu, you MagnificentBastard!

* ThoseTwoBadGuys: Seed and Culgan.

* ToWinWithoutFighting: Jowy's BatmanGambit to capture Greenhill. They released some prisoners of war from Muse into Greenhill, so Greenhill thought Highland just wanted to fight fair and square. However, [[SheatheYourSword the Highland Army laid siege to the city but did not attack at all for several days]]. This resulted in a food shortage so bad that ''[[EnemyCivilWar a civil war erupted between the citizens of Greenhill and the Muse Soldiers within the city's walls.]]''. Sounds bad? The Highland Army freed the Muse soldiers and returned their weapons specifically for that purpose. As Teresa says, Greenhill lost to an handful (roughly 5,000 men) of Highland soldiers without even having fought.

* ToWinWithoutFighting: Highland's BatmanGambit to capture Greenhill. They released some [=POWs=] from Muse into Greenhill, so Greenhill thought Highland just wanted to fight fair and square. However, [[SheatheYourSword the Highland Arny laid siege into the city btu did not attack at all for a few days]] . This resulted to a food shortage so bad that ''[[EnemyCivilWar a civil war erupted between the citizens of Greenhill and the Muse Soldiers within the walla of the city.]]''. Sounds bad? The Highland Army freed the Muse soldiers and returned their weapons ''specifically for that purpose''. As Teresa says, Greenhill lost handful (5,000 men) of Highland soldiers ''without even having fought''.

* TraumaCongaLine: A few. [[spoiler:Notably, the main character goes through one that arcs across the entire game, especially if you don't get the GoodEnding. He's betrayed by his captain, betrayed by his friend, and loses his sister in the ensuing war. Pilika is also a fair contender for this]]

* RasputinianDeath: Luca Blight. It takes tons of effort to finally do him in. First, there's an army battle where your entire army attempts to crush his unit and fails. Then, thanks to his lieutenants betraying him, Luca's small raiding party is surrounded and attacked by the entire Jowston army. Then the hero, Flik, and Victor each lead a full-sized party of what could be considered elite soldiers into a three-stage boss fight where (unless the player's done some level grinding) Luca still nearly stomps everyone flat. Luca then escapes, and is shot by an entire unit of archers. When Riou finally finds Luca, he charges Riou and forces a duel, in which the usual dialogue tells are a bit unreliable compared to before, leading the player to make guesses. While Luca is a death's door and one or two Wild attacks are way enough to beat him, there is still the very real possibility that, should you pick too many times wrong options and didn't heal Riou before starting the duel, Luca actually kills you.
-->''Luca'': [[LargeHam "It took hundreds to kill me, but I killed by the thousands! Look at me! I am sublime! I am the true face of evil!"]]

* RasputinianDeath: Luca Blight. It takes tons of effort to finally do him in.
** [[LargeHam "It took hundreds to kill me, but I killed by the thousands! Look at me! I am sublime! I am the true face of evil!"]]
** not quite, if you are good at duels it does not matter how much HP he has left. Just don't mess up...once
** Even worse, the first few times, you're likely to fail in the duel at the end. Have fun doing it over.
** To clarify: First, there's an army battle where your entire army attempts to crush his unit [[spoiler: and fails. Then, thanks to his lieutenants betraying him,]] Luca's small raiding party is surrounded and attacked by the entire Jowston army. Then the hero, Flik, and Victor each lead a full-sized party of what could be considered elite soldiers into a three-stage boss fight where (unless the player's done some level grinding) Luca still nearly stomps everyone flat. Luca then escapes, and is shot by an entire unit of archers. When Riou finally finds Luca, he charges Riou and forces a duel, which if you didn't do enough damage to him in the aforementioned three-stage boss fight, can be so difficult as to be UnWinnable. He only expires ''after'' he's been beaten to near-death with tonfa.

** It's not just the text -- entire pieces of music are missing. The [[RuleOfDrama especially dramatic ones]], like the battlefield theme and when Annalee sings. What should have been highlights in the game are rendered several minutes of unskippable, awkward silence.
*** This was fixed-ish in the PAL version.

* FiveManBand: The squirrel squad seem to be a parody of the stock ''Franchise/SuperSentai team'' composition:
** TheLeader: Mukumuku; the leader of the pack who wears red and is described as being brave with a strong sense of honor.
** TheLancer: Makumaku; the second-in-command of the pack who wears blue and is described as being cool on the outside but ferocious on the inside.
** TheBigGuy: Mokumoku; the biggest and strongest of the pack who wears yellow and is described as being a BigEater.
** TheSmartGuy: Mekumeku; the best mage of the pack who wears green and is described as being hard-working yet lighthearted.
** TheChick: Mikumiku; the only girl in the pack who wears pink and is described as being kind and curious.

* BigBookOfWar: With respect to Silverberg's strategy; lampshaded by Leon and Shu. "Never put your own life in danger, that's the first rule of the book." "I had to throw away the book, you read it too many times."

* AIRoulette: [[FinalBoss Beast Rune]].

* CanonName: Though the protagonist has no official name, the Japanese novelization and drama CD gave him the name of Riou, which has become a common FanNickname for the character. The name "Tao" has been used as well in a manga adaptation.

* CharacterDevelopment: Among others, Flik continues his evolution into a [[EnsembleDarkhorse fan favorite]].

* CombatByChampion: Surprisingly subverted, considering the number of one-on-one fights that Riou engages in with important people. Riou's duels only occur either ''after'' the "combat by army-scale slaughter" parts, or in places completely unrelated to large-scale conflict.

* DarkerAndEdgier:

* GameBreakingBug: Thanks some really bad programming, certain items will glitch and become unavailable if you trigger certain conditions (the notorious Recipe 12 and 34 glitch being the worst).

* KickTheDog: Luca Blight recklessly does this for [[IncrediblyLamePun kicks]]. Shu also engages in a fair amount of puppy-punting, especially when [[spoiler: he uses Pilika as a human shield and abandons her to the enemy so that the hero may escape from an otherwise hopeless trap. Granted, he did this knowing Jowy would never let any harm come to her, but it still came off as rather asshole-ish.]]

* {{Narcissist}}: Zamza. He keeps stating in the suggestion box that as long as he's in the party with Riou, they'll keep standing out on top. And he doesn't like it when you take him out of your party. He even tells that he's an important member of Riou's army and complains that he doesn't get his own room.

* PitifulWorms: Luca, when he's not comparing everyone else to pigs.

** The backstory, at least before Luca came into the scene, was also GreyAndGrayMorality. While Agares might be a coward that caused Luca's downward spiral into evil, he is by no means an avaricious ruler (especially when Kiba would defend his honor after Luca taunted him about it). And on his side is a honorable general like Han Cunningham. On the other hand, the City-States instead had several inept and corrupt people moreso than the current generation. Gorudo started from that generation while Teresa's father Alec Wisemail is a shrewd and ruthless manipulator that [[spoiler:poisoned the previous chieftain of Karaya tribe to lower their influence]]. But amongst the City-States stands a standout hero: Genkaku, who ended up befriending Han and paved way for peace between City-States and Highland... which is single-handedly ruined by the inept Mayor of Muse before Annabelle, her father Darrel, because of his insistence of not losing Kyaro Village. This led to the CombatByChampion where he secretly coated Genkaku's blade with poison in order to make sure City-States won and Han died as a result. Genkaku detected this and didn't raise his sword, causing his fall from grace. So yes, it's a pretty gray conflict overall.

** Speaking of time limits... [[spoiler:Preventing Nanami's death]] requires (among quite a few other things) extremely quick selection on a particular dialogue choice. Even if you get it ''right'', the game won't tell you if you got it right until [[spoiler:the scene where doctor Huan declares her dead. If you get it right, there is a short additional dialogue in which Huan asks Shu to follow him inside the infirmary. The nature of why Huan asked Shu inside is revealed in the TrueEnding.]]

* ToWinWithoutFighting: Highland's BatmanGambit to capture Greenhill. They released some [=POWs=] from Muse into Greenhill, so Greenhill thought Highland just wanted to fight fair and square. However, Highland laid a siege into the city by [[SheatheYourSword just standing over there]] ''[[IdiotBall before they could even react]]''. This resulted to a food shortage so bad that ''[[EnemyCivilWar a civil war erupted within it]]''. Sounds bad? The Highland Army freed the Muse soldiers and returned their weapons ''specifically for that purpose''. As Teresa says, Greenhill lost to a handful of Highland soldiers ''without even having fought''.