Exile II starts off in exciting fashion with an excellent opening cinema. Granted, it basically just shows off the four main characters, but it makes them look pretty badass, and the music accompanying it is awesome. The scene at the end of the game depicting Sadler's unexpected dilemma is also pretty damn cool.
But look between those two extreme points and you'll find a very short, very easy, very average action-RPG. It's a lot like the first one, except even more linear: the "adventure" is actually no more than a straight line from town to battle scene to town to battle scene. This is nice in that the language barrier won't become a factor if you opt for the cheap import, but it doesn't make for great questing.
The action plays out poorly, but it doesn't matter in the Japanese original because you're way too powerful for your adversaries to handle no matter how many hits they get in. If you choose to purchase the much more expensive and notoriously "difficult" US rendition, you'll find that Working Designs made the enemies hardier and capable of dealing greater damage. This isn't nearly the big deal that many make it out to be; you just have to do a little more leveling and pay a bit more attention to boss patterns in certain spots (and endure some horrible voice acting along the way--they really sissified Sadler). Wicked Phenomenon can feel more rewarding than its Japanese counterpart since it actually requires you to pay some attention to what your foes are doing; but it can also be a lot more irritating when it makes you hack away at a slow, dimwitted roadblock who poses absolutely no threat but refuses to go away until he's been hit a few million times.
Some of the bosses aren't quite as weak as the complete chumps in the first Exile, but they're still pushovers; and the stage design is worse here, as the original's levels are larger and more labyrinthine. Offering a few different characters to play as doesn't make up for these deficiencies. Plan to have this one beaten in a day (yes, even the "impossible" WP), and don't plan to make any return trips once you're done.
The opening is superb, but it's all downhill from there...
...except, of course, for subsequent solid cinemas.
The decent-looking character sprites and backgrounds are probably the best things about the in-game experience.
Town scenes are uneventful.
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