Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals
Encyclopedia
Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals, known as in Japan, and as simply Lufia in Europe and Australia, is an RPG game with puzzle
elements developed by Neverland and published in Japan
in 1995
by Taito
, and in North America
and Europe
in 1996
by Natsume and Nintendo
respectively, for the Super Nintendo
video game console
.
The game is a prequel to Lufia & the Fortress of Doom
. It follows the story of the first main character's ancestor, Maxim, and explains the origins of the war between mankind and a group of superhumans called the Sinistrals. Lufia II made a number of changes from the first game. Dungeons no longer have random encounters and there are hundreds of puzzles throughout the game, ranging from simple to extremely challenging. It also introduced new skills, such as a variety of weapons that could be used to stun monsters or solve puzzles, and IP attacks. In 2009, Square Enix announced a re-imagining of the original game titled Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals
.
, set ninety-nine years before it, telling the story of how the Sinistrals first appeared in the world and the battles fought against them.
Throughout the game, Maxim is joined by other talented warriors or 'Heroes of Legend' such as Tia, his childhood friend, who has a romantic interest in Maxim; Guy, a wandering warrior who joins Maxim after he rescued his sister; Dekar, the powerful bodyguard of Prince Alex of Bound Kingdom; Lexis, a brilliant inventor; Artea, an elven bowman; and Selan, commander of the Parcelyte army who becomes Maxim’s wife in mid-story.
The game’s antagonists are the Sinistrals, a group of four godlike beings bent on world domination. They are led by Daos, the Sinistral of Terror, who seeks an ultimate weapon to use against the people of the world. His three subordinates are Gades, the Sinistral of Destruction, who is credited with the destruction of two entire cities; Amon, the Sinistral of Chaos, who is known to be a brilliant tactician; and Erim, the Sinistral of Death, who is revealed later in the game to be Iris, the mysterious woman who sent Maxim on his quest.
The game features a number of new gameplay features, explained below:
titles), such as a bow and arrow, bombs and a hookshot; these, along with his sword (swung using a face button), will stun monsters temporarily and interact with obstacles. Finally, dungeons place great emphasis on challenging puzzles.
member. These monsters can be fed items and equipment, and once they are satiated they evolve to a different form, up to a fifth and definitive form, labeled M. Seven of them exist, and each Capsule monster belongs to a different element (Neutral, Light
, Wind
, Water
, Dark
, Fire
and Soil
), and has a different set of skills.
genre.
Within the cave, the characters are downgraded to zero experience point
s and are stripped of nearly all equipment and items. The player must then proceed through the cave's floors, collecting equipment, finding magic spells and increasing levels, with the objective of reaching the Ancient Cave's final floor. There are three ways of exiting the cave: by dying, by reaching its bottom or by finding and using an item exclusive to the cave, named "providence".
Within the cave lie two kinds of chests — blue and red. A red chest contains items which can only be used inside the cave for the duration of the playing session. As soon as the player leaves the cave, all items from red chests disappear. On the other hand, the rare blue chests contains items that are for the most part unique to the Ancient Cave (though not completely — the Catfish Jewel, for instance, can also be won in the battle against the giant Catfish), which can be used outside the cave and can be brought back to the cave on subsequent journeys. The equipment found in the blue chests is often far superior than those found outside of it. Some items that can be found in blue chests can also be found by other means, such as monster drops. These can also be taken in and out of the Ancient Cave just as if you had found them in blue chests. Also found in the Ancient Cave are the "Iris Treasures," which are found in red chests. Unlike normal red chest items, the player is allowed to take them out of the cave. They are not equippable and serve only as collectibles. The bottom floor of the inn and Gruberik serves as a storage for these items.
Several very powerful monsters exist only in the Ancient Cave, most notably the Bronze, Silver, and Gold Dragons.
On the 99th floor, the player must fight the "Master" (a huge red jelly). It must be defeated in four turns (actually three, since it goes before the characters - unless you repeatedly use some speed lowering IP moves like Spiderweb), or else it will commit suicide and give no reward. Upon defeat, however, it gives the player the Ancient Key, unlocking the room in the lobby, as well as one of the Iris Treasures. It is very difficult to actually defeat the Master due to the time limit and its high HP value (which is always 9980 and not based on the party levels as some rumors say). Thus, a much easier and somewhat cheap way has been devised to kill it. It was found that it was not necessary to kill it-the battle only needed to end. So if the characters killed each other in the allotted time limit, the game would still consider it to be a victory. Equipping and using items which removed set fractions of enemy health (from 1/8 to 1/2 of all enemy health) was also very helpful in defeating the monster.
, which includes a 8.5 out of ten from AllRPG, and 85/100 from RPGFan.
s. The Australian version was released in 1997, one year after the North American version.
Starring Maxim, a young monster hunter blessed with impressive and mysterious powers, the game features him and his friends on a quest to uncover the mystery of the Sinistrals, godlike beings with extraordinary powers. As in Lufia II, the game features dungeons that focus heavily on puzzle-solving; unlike Lufia II, the gameplay is now action RPG in style, with the player controlling Maxim directly in battle and switching between characters by tapping his or her portrait on the bottom screen.
Puzzle
A puzzle is a problem or enigma that tests the ingenuity of the solver. In a basic puzzle, one is intended to put together pieces in a logical way in order to come up with the desired solution...
elements developed by Neverland and published in Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
in 1995
1995 in video gaming
-Events:*May 11 – Introduction of trade magazine GameWeek *May 11-16 — The 1st annual Electronic Entertainment Expo is held in Los Angeles, California...
by Taito
Taito Corporation
The is a Japanese publisher of video game software and arcade hardware wholly owned by publisher Square Enix. Taito has their headquarters in the Shinjuku Bunka Quint Building in Yoyogi, Shibuya, Tokyo, sharing the facility with its parent company....
, and in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
in 1996
1996 in video gaming
-Notable releases:*January 29 — Duke Nukem 3D, successor to the simple side-scrolling originals, and a genre-redefining title for first person shooters....
by Natsume and Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
respectively, for the Super Nintendo
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System is a 16-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America, Europe, Australasia , and South America between 1990 and 1993. In Japan and Southeast Asia, the system is called the , or SFC for short...
video game console
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
.
The game is a prequel to Lufia & the Fortress of Doom
Lufia & the Fortress of Doom
Lufia & the Fortress of Doom, known as in Japan, is an RPG developed by Neverland and published by Taito in 1993, for the Super Nintendo. It is the first title in the Lufia series of video games and the only game from the series released under the Taito label in North America.- Story :The story...
. It follows the story of the first main character's ancestor, Maxim, and explains the origins of the war between mankind and a group of superhumans called the Sinistrals. Lufia II made a number of changes from the first game. Dungeons no longer have random encounters and there are hundreds of puzzles throughout the game, ranging from simple to extremely challenging. It also introduced new skills, such as a variety of weapons that could be used to stun monsters or solve puzzles, and IP attacks. In 2009, Square Enix announced a re-imagining of the original game titled Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals
Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals
Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals, released as in Japan, is an action role-playing game video game co-developed by Neverland and Square Enix for the Nintendo DS...
.
Setting
The story is centered around the hero Maxim, a swordsman from the town of Elcid who is born with a natural ability to fight and is destined to destroy the Sinistrals. Throughout his journey, he meets other warriors who are able to confront the Sinistrals as well. The game is a prequel to Lufia & the Fortress of DoomLufia & the Fortress of Doom
Lufia & the Fortress of Doom, known as in Japan, is an RPG developed by Neverland and published by Taito in 1993, for the Super Nintendo. It is the first title in the Lufia series of video games and the only game from the series released under the Taito label in North America.- Story :The story...
, set ninety-nine years before it, telling the story of how the Sinistrals first appeared in the world and the battles fought against them.
Characters
The game’s protagonist is Maxim, a talented swordsman from the town of Elcid. Little about his past is mentioned in the game, but the game begins to follow him when a mysterious woman named Iris tells him that he is to go on a journey.Throughout the game, Maxim is joined by other talented warriors or 'Heroes of Legend' such as Tia, his childhood friend, who has a romantic interest in Maxim; Guy, a wandering warrior who joins Maxim after he rescued his sister; Dekar, the powerful bodyguard of Prince Alex of Bound Kingdom; Lexis, a brilliant inventor; Artea, an elven bowman; and Selan, commander of the Parcelyte army who becomes Maxim’s wife in mid-story.
The game’s antagonists are the Sinistrals, a group of four godlike beings bent on world domination. They are led by Daos, the Sinistral of Terror, who seeks an ultimate weapon to use against the people of the world. His three subordinates are Gades, the Sinistral of Destruction, who is credited with the destruction of two entire cities; Amon, the Sinistral of Chaos, who is known to be a brilliant tactician; and Erim, the Sinistral of Death, who is revealed later in the game to be Iris, the mysterious woman who sent Maxim on his quest.
Gameplay
In Lufia II, characters walk around an overworld map, enter dungeons, fight monsters, buy or find new equipment and spells, and set out on a quest to save the world. The player's party will support up to four characters at once, along with a Capsule Monster. There are various forms of transportation which the player may utilize in order to travel faster than walking, these include; warping, a spell learnt early in the game; a boat, modified by Lexis into a submarine and later a blimp. Various casino games are accessible later in the game; these include Pachinco Slot, Black Jack, Slot Machine, Stud Poker, and Action Bingo.The game features a number of new gameplay features, explained below:
Dungeons
All monsters appear on the dungeon map as well, and can be avoided if the player wishes. Motion in dungeons is also "turn-based," in that monsters do not move unless the player does. Maxim gains a number of tools and weapons for use in dungeons (similar to the The Legend of ZeldaThe Legend of Zelda
The Legend of Zelda, originally released as in Japan, is a video game developed and published by Nintendo, and designed by Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. Set in the fantasy land of Hyrule, the plot centers on a boy named Link, the playable protagonist, who aims to collect the eight fragments...
titles), such as a bow and arrow, bombs and a hookshot; these, along with his sword (swung using a face button), will stun monsters temporarily and interact with obstacles. Finally, dungeons place great emphasis on challenging puzzles.
Skill Ring
During the course of the game, utilization of acquired "skills" are key to progressing in dungeons and towers. The player starts out with 'Reset', which when activated either by pressing Select or using it as a spell, resets the whole area to its previous state, if by accident something was placed that couldn't be fixed. Other skills are acquired later in the game, such as Hammer, Hook, and Arrow, all of which are added to the 'Skill Ring'.IP Skills
Aside from the RPG standards of "Fight," "Use Item" and "Use Magic," characters also have access to IP Skills, which are attached to weapons, armor and accessories. Each character's IP bar fills when he or she takes damage, and can deplete it to invoke available IP skills at any time, assuming they have enough charge in the bar. IP Skills take varying amounts of charge to activate. Players can purposely wear weaker equipment and/or fight higher-level monsters to fill the gauge faster, but run the risk of having characters killed in battle. Also, IP Skills cannot be customized, sometimes forcing the player to choose between a newer and stronger piece of gear, or an older, weaker one that has a useful IP Skill.Capsule Monsters
Capsule monsters are special creatures which the player may only find on specific locations of the world. Once a Capsule monster is found, the party acquires a fifth, computer controlledArtificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...
member. These monsters can be fed items and equipment, and once they are satiated they evolve to a different form, up to a fifth and definitive form, labeled M. Seven of them exist, and each Capsule monster belongs to a different element (Neutral, Light
Light
Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that is visible to the human eye, and is responsible for the sense of sight. Visible light has wavelength in a range from about 380 nanometres to about 740 nm, with a frequency range of about 405 THz to 790 THz...
, Wind
Wind
Wind is the flow of gases on a large scale. On Earth, wind consists of the bulk movement of air. In outer space, solar wind is the movement of gases or charged particles from the sun through space, while planetary wind is the outgassing of light chemical elements from a planet's atmosphere into space...
, Water
Water
Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...
, Dark
Shadow
A shadow is an area where direct light from a light source cannot reach due to obstruction by an object. It occupies all of the space behind an opaque object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two-dimensional silhouette, or reverse projection of the object blocking the...
, Fire
Fire
Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material in the chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. Slower oxidative processes like rusting or digestion are not included by this definition....
and Soil
Soil
Soil is a natural body consisting of layers of mineral constituents of variable thicknesses, which differ from the parent materials in their morphological, physical, chemical, and mineralogical characteristics...
), and has a different set of skills.
The Ancient Cave
One of the most notable features of Lufia II is the Ancient Cave, a randomly generated dungeon composed of 99 floors which is presented to the player as a side-quest in the town of Gruberik. Every time the player enters the cave, a new layout is generated. The Ancient Cave has a very similar execution to the roguelikeRoguelike
The roguelike is a sub-genre of role-playing video games, characterized by randomization for replayability, permanent death, and turn-based movement. Most roguelikes feature ASCII graphics, with newer ones increasingly offering tile-based graphics. Games are typically dungeon crawls, with many...
genre.
Within the cave, the characters are downgraded to zero experience point
Experience point
An experience point is a unit of measurement used in many role-playing games and role-playing video games to quantify a player character's progression through the game...
s and are stripped of nearly all equipment and items. The player must then proceed through the cave's floors, collecting equipment, finding magic spells and increasing levels, with the objective of reaching the Ancient Cave's final floor. There are three ways of exiting the cave: by dying, by reaching its bottom or by finding and using an item exclusive to the cave, named "providence".
Within the cave lie two kinds of chests — blue and red. A red chest contains items which can only be used inside the cave for the duration of the playing session. As soon as the player leaves the cave, all items from red chests disappear. On the other hand, the rare blue chests contains items that are for the most part unique to the Ancient Cave (though not completely — the Catfish Jewel, for instance, can also be won in the battle against the giant Catfish), which can be used outside the cave and can be brought back to the cave on subsequent journeys. The equipment found in the blue chests is often far superior than those found outside of it. Some items that can be found in blue chests can also be found by other means, such as monster drops. These can also be taken in and out of the Ancient Cave just as if you had found them in blue chests. Also found in the Ancient Cave are the "Iris Treasures," which are found in red chests. Unlike normal red chest items, the player is allowed to take them out of the cave. They are not equippable and serve only as collectibles. The bottom floor of the inn and Gruberik serves as a storage for these items.
Several very powerful monsters exist only in the Ancient Cave, most notably the Bronze, Silver, and Gold Dragons.
On the 99th floor, the player must fight the "Master" (a huge red jelly). It must be defeated in four turns (actually three, since it goes before the characters - unless you repeatedly use some speed lowering IP moves like Spiderweb), or else it will commit suicide and give no reward. Upon defeat, however, it gives the player the Ancient Key, unlocking the room in the lobby, as well as one of the Iris Treasures. It is very difficult to actually defeat the Master due to the time limit and its high HP value (which is always 9980 and not based on the party levels as some rumors say). Thus, a much easier and somewhat cheap way has been devised to kill it. It was found that it was not necessary to kill it-the battle only needed to end. So if the characters killed each other in the allotted time limit, the game would still consider it to be a victory. Equipping and using items which removed set fractions of enemy health (from 1/8 to 1/2 of all enemy health) was also very helpful in defeating the monster.
Reception
The game has an aggregate review score of 86.67% on Game RankingsGame Rankings
GameRankings is a website that collects review scores from both offline and online sources to give an average rating. It indexes over 315,000 articles relating to more than 14,500 games.GameRankings is owned by CBS Interactive...
, which includes a 8.5 out of ten from AllRPG, and 85/100 from RPGFan.
Versions and rereleases
The North American release of the game has a few graphical and textual glitches which were corrected in the European version. The Australian release of the game was titled "Lufia", not "Lufia 2", and included no subtitleSubtitle
A subtitle can refer to:* Subtitle , an explanatory or alternate title of a book, play, film, musical work, etc., in addition to its main title...
s. The Australian version was released in 1997, one year after the North American version.
Nintendo DS remake
The new Lufia, an action RPG "reboot" of Lufia II for the Super NES, was developed by Lufia creator Neverland Company, with much of the staff of Lufia II closely involved with the project.Starring Maxim, a young monster hunter blessed with impressive and mysterious powers, the game features him and his friends on a quest to uncover the mystery of the Sinistrals, godlike beings with extraordinary powers. As in Lufia II, the game features dungeons that focus heavily on puzzle-solving; unlike Lufia II, the gameplay is now action RPG in style, with the player controlling Maxim directly in battle and switching between characters by tapping his or her portrait on the bottom screen.