There's actually been a surge of competent old-school game players, reviewers, and discussion on TH-cam pretty recently. I have quite a couple of interesting channels I could recommend if you like. Some games too. Heck, I recently found out about a game called _Feda: The Emblem of Justice_ for SNES that had the primary Shining Force artist work on it. It's a pretty clumsy game overall, but it's still really cool.
@@chetrogers6871 Channel recommendations or game recommendations, Chet? And if game recommendations, do you have any specific platforms or genres in mind to help me narrow things down?
@@chetrogers6871 Apparently Google deleted both my original post and also the post I made asking you to clarify if you wanted game recommendations or channel recommendations. 🙃🫠
Want to know how the 90s were? As around a 10 year old boy, I was excited for when Sheela jumped out of the waterfall. I looked forward to like half a second of sprite in their birthday suit, that's the 90s for you.
Fun video! Always funny to see Bowie go from an agile swordsman to a beefy chonk who can only move his arms. One thing a lot of people tend to gloss over is that since magic does set damage in SF games, HP is essentially your magic defense stat. The more HP you have, the lower the percentage of your max HP you take from every spell making allies with low defense but tons of HP ideal for fighting mages.
When it comes to archers and flyers; remember that flyers have an evasion boost; and archers negate that evasion boost along with doing more damage to them
I always think about re-playing Shining Force 1 and 2. Those were my first true RPGs that I stuck through start to finish as a kid. I still have the music in my mind.
Same for me, I love this games, and to this day, I can't find any games that have the charisma or the same gameplay as this game. Of course, there is FE (that I like, but no as SF series), or some other tactis rpg's, on gba, or pc, but no one of them have the same vibes that this game has. I wanna explore, and then face an army in a specific spot, I don't want randoms ecounters. The only thing to improve in this game is just to have a better leveling system that not take you hours.
I do wonder if part of the reason for that line is because there’s another tier list where they call themselves experts. (They’re not- the line was made in jest)
This is the best SF2 tier list over ever seen! Thank you for this super detailed but also fun and engaging video! Also your personal tale about Screech is exactly what happened to me. Played the game many many many times as a kid thinking I knew all of the characters, used that cheat and was incredibly confused when I saw his portrait. Blew my mind.
I mostly agree with everything on this list, though there are a few factors that wpuld make me list a few units higher. 1. There's actually another good reason to like unarmed units. Not needing a weapon slot means they have more space for other items, which can make them good support units if you load them up with heal items, and Kiwi's mobility and defense actually makes him great for this purpose, since he can reach other units quicker and is less vulnerable than your other healers, allowing him to support Sarah in the early and midgame, while still finding a potential niche when he begins to fall off. 2. While Tyrin is technically the better sorcerer, there is one more thing that makes Kazin the more optimal choice: Freeze's better range over Blaze. Kazin will be stuck with range-2 spells regardless, while Tyrin loses out on a square of range as a sorceror, since Freeze 3 and 4 are both range-3 spells. 3. Don't underestimate Luke. His base attack needs some work, but that's as easy as keeping the power ring on him after the kraken fight, which puts him close to Bowie and Slade, with even better movement. This also gives you a mobile attack booster for your force without wasting one of Peter's turns doing it, which he's far better off using to annihilate everything in his path as usual. Giving Luke the dark sword is also really funny, give it a try sometime.
One of the most unsung games of the 16 bit era. If it had been released on the RPG heavy snes, it would be seen as a more of a classic. Most rpg fans were on team snes. But it was a genesis title which wasn't really known for rpg's, and didn't draw that crowd as strong. So it didn't get the exposure the major snes rpg titles had. I've recommended this game to so many rpg fans who I know didn't grow up with a genesis and were snes only so were blissfully unaware to it. Then once they played it were like "Wow yeah that was a top tier rpg".
To be fair I think it is the most memorable RPG on sega genesis, possibly the only memorable one though I know people like phantasy star (though I found it boring).
First off I love the fact that this video came out for weeks ago. Secondly, I haven’t seen all of these characters. I thought I mastered this game, but I don’t recognize some of them.
@@bsiferd You should consider replaying the game and finding those characters and other secrets! If you don't want to miss anything, I would recommend following along a playthrough made by someone called DaTruthDT. He's really funny, though he swears a LOT. Although based on your first reply, I would assume you're okay with excessive swearing.
Shining force two was literally my first video game that I wanted to play and got to complete when I was a kid, and it has a special place in my heart. Your list was actually pretty spot on, the only thing I would have done different is omit some of the brass gunner hate lol, I actually like the concept
Shining force was the first game ive ever experienced turn base gaming. I first played it on a demo and didnt have any way to save, i ended up playing it all night and beating everything.
Thoroughly enjoyed the video with your commentary and rationale behind your choices. And I agree - my love for this game can’t be put into words. A staple of my childhood
i can't believe how right this tier list is, honestly. your lore and design qualifications are absolutely essential for the true tier positions of the cast. i would like to offer, also, that because of the way the game's math works, kiwi actually becomes a really good target for stat increasing items. i think with them, he can be bumped into higher tiers even purely mechanically, since raising his defense is a proportionally higher reduction of incoming damage, and raising his attack makes him a better candidate for Attack buffs than weapon users
What a coincidence this video came up the same time I just recompleted 100% Shining Force 2 but it was done as a streaming favour for my friend who was really interested in this game because of some of the unique character designs and the animations complimenting how badass these characters are n break the generic tradition of stereotypes. (Slade is his favourite of the many fav units) I spent about 25 hours over a week streaming the game on discord for him and he loves the game however he's not a fan of rpgs n he's nervous of playing a tactical one so I did this completionist run for him. My team for this run is (Capital letters for main stays, lower case letter names for temp units) SLADE (Early game with him I treat him like im playing Farming simulator or Nasus from league of legends, Slade after I did just 2 battles of him getting last hits on all or most enemies he consistently becomes a one man wrecking crew even before promo n carries the game even doing well in elven forest secret.) GERHALT (Werewolves are cool and so are were rats, unique design on him, he hits like a truck n great defense, no issue with forest terrain.) MAY (aka my fav lady who I sometimes nickname her as Jill Valentine cus I love her to. great attack damage up until very end game she does fall off sadly n her ultimate weapon could use some bonus armour similar to Holy Lance for Paladins/P.Knights) RICK (Paladin) and JARO (P Knight) (Very good defense, I use their three ultimate weapons to buff nearby allies who're bout to go into battle "mostly slade", their holy lance is a great offensive n shield item, mist javelin for ranged.) chester (From great tank to just struggling he has to be replaced asap. I like his design personally and in alot of my runs I tend to be too stuborn to bench him but this run I did bench him before he could promo) luke and SCREECH (Yeah you're reading this right and I need slap across the face. Luke just.... exists to be the meat shield n potion hoe, for me he always always always struggles to be useful in combat besides being a meat shield. Screech however for me he's more tankier, his offense is still not too hot but serviceable for me n he's reliable for meat shielding better than luke, good potion hoe and personally I love his picture which is odd cus he's "kid" i guess but he has that adorable edgyness to him.) PETER n KARNA (I don't have to explain why lol) SARAH (Vicar) (recent months I heard of the goddess staff exploit and ngl I had a ton of fun with vicar sarah also when she gets the white ring n goddess staff she has pretty good base defense while having two massive aoe heals, the slow debuff n good high solo heal. yes her Monk from is superior but honestly having more n more aoe healing is better, especially since alot of my force are still strong front liners) KAZIN (Summoner) (Dude to me looks like anime shaggy from scooby doo (not the ultra instinct version we see all the time now), summoner damage for me is pretty good tho the aoe is poor but I just personally love this guy's design too much.) KIWI (I went overtime with grinding his levels where I had him in Nasus farming mode, also the two times I went passed elven forest I always put alot of time into grinding his levels safely with strong ally support helping him. I'm always a team KIWI fan.) I really got into Shining Force back in 2018 along with Phantasy Star and I freaking love these games also Shining Force 2 back when I first tried it out n got up to north parmecia n stopped (xbox 360 sega collection it was on) I was really enjoying the game but never got round to finishing it back then, SF2 is a perfect beginner friendly tactical rpg especially if you're bit of a furry like me. Since I completed SF2 in 2018 I've become addicted to other tactical games including more shining force games, I've dived into FF tactics, Mutant Year Zero Road to Eden, The Iconic Xcom franchise, Fire Emblem and I can't wait for the new persona 5 tactical rpg game. When I first beat the amazing SF2 back in 2018 I was so shocked at how unknown the shining force games are and that tactical rpgs just aren't a big thing. Shining Force is a series that more people around the world must play especially if those who are furries. Also the many times I've replayed this game over n over n over n over again doing so many challenge runs I've noticed that this game went through some developer hell, was rushed n didn't get the proper big funding n technical treatment for it be bigger and better. I love this game so damn much dude and I have no nostalgia for it but the amount of clearly obvious cut content just to get the game out like obvious reused sprites, most characters even main ones dont get new avatars when they promote, the very very shoddy inconsistent writing at times, n some retconning. It does make me wish this game gets a proper remake to fix so many of these issues. They don't have to go overboard with character story like final fantasy or modern persona games but I really wish more of the Granseal cast got more scenes talking about events of the adventure, their reflection of how much they've grown n matured since the start of their adventure since most of them are teens, also I like to see Slade really show in the story of his redemption and his hard commitment to righting his accidental wrong. I love to see all the force members have some humour, have some more friendly connections or rivalry or romance since at some points of the game some npcs or force members do hint at their relationships to some people or factions around parmecia. I do think the main adventure can be longer just so we can spend more time with those late game units that most of us just ignore because we're too attached to other force members. I personally do love Chaz, Zynk n Lemon but they're so late game that it doesn't make everyone want to play them also having some side content would extend the use of these late game force members to or maybe have tons of post game content similar to Dragon Quest 8 3DS n connect the characters or plots to other adventures in the shining series. Sorry for massive massive long comment here but I love shining force series so much and remmeber I don't have nostalgia childish memories, I got into this series in the middle of my 20s and fully got round to beating SF2 then fell in love with it when I was 29.
New shining force content and it's not even my birthday! Great job on the list. I just finished a replay of this about a month ago, and tried using Kiwi for the first time since my first playthrough. I now remember why he sits in the caravan lol. I'm sure I'm in the minority, but i use Luke probably 80% of the time. I use most of my stat boosting items on him, and he becomes one of the useful members i have. I love my fliers.
Aside from my first few plays, almost every run ive had i usually get sarah promoted before you leave for parmecia on the ship when everone else is still like lvl 6 bahaha. Sure, it sucks not getting her master monk, but it makes her a beast cleric.
It's a decent list, once I foubd out you can wait to promote I have always done that for better stats. After level 20 certain characters start getting stats they normally wouldn't get. Luke for instance gets high defense, Kiwi actually starts getting HP again after level 20, Chester gains ridiculous HP and Elric probably the biggest surprise gets a monstrous amount of defense if you overlevel him and promote to brass gunner, like Jaha levels of defense. Plus he gets the added bonus damage against flying like all archers, which at the end of the game feels like 50% of enemies.
I watched this vid solely to see where you ranked the bird because I remembered him being absolutely insane. Glad to see you put him in Legendary and validate my memory of this game from ~18 years ago.
Once i discover this channel I will watch every video now I love so much Shining force 2 And i love to learn more about the game, characters and more plays of gaming Love your content bro
There is no question in my mind that, in terms of his story, Lemon is the greatest thing in the game- the unsung hero par excellence. There is also the unanswered question of what happened to him (and King Galam for that matter) at the end. He can't die, so there's every reason to believe he lived on in the kingdom of devils.
I also think the story is more poignant from the point of view of Galam, rather than Granseal. The Devils possess both their king - making him lead a war on their allies based on lies - and then their national hero. But, being a patriot to the last, Lemon saves his king (even if that probably amounts to being his executioner).
It was great to hear your list and rankings. It was very nostalgic. I may need to go back and play it again when my life slows down a little bit. Great video.
Got this game as a child but, not speaking english and never played yet a RPG at this time, I didn't understood AT ALL what it was about so I never played it for years. I played it a lot later, after discovering Fire Emblem on GBA and discovering my taste for T RPG but already as retro gaming :'(. I have so much regret not playing it having the cartridge all this time...
"Words do not express how much this game means to me". Within 10 seconds of this video I already subscribed and gave a thumbs up, the feeling is mutual.
Great job! I adore you! I firstly played this game back in 1995-2000 when I was 9-14 years old and I have recenlty completed this game again with my 5 years old son! Unfortunately, we played Japanese version and there's a glitch - Lemon can't equip weapons! I think this is explained by the fact that having killed that much people as Red Baron he's now a pacifist. Thus, although he can still attack enemies with magic items, like Heat Axe, he can no longer be used as a valuable member of the force, so we had to replace him wtih Chaz for final battle (Japanese version there's only 1 Vigour Ball, so not possible to have Karna and Sarah together as MasterMonks, Cloude is too slow for us and so on - Chaz was the best option). It was a funny duel DemonMaster vs Chaz - Level 4 freeze vs Level 3 freeze but Chaz was permamently being healed by Sarah, so he won :) And Frayja killed Zeon with Shining Ball)) Now we play Shining force 1 GBA version year 2004, Mawlock and his cards is amazing)))
About PGNT Chester, I'm fine with the late Pegasus Wing, gives him additional stats before getting promoted (like 7 levels of stats). I equip a Power Spear + Power ring on him to make up for the damage and not let him fall behind for several battles. And then a Mist Javelin at the end game gives him 100+ attack. His HP pool makes up for the lower defense (takes 2-3 hits)
I can honestly say this is my best jrpg on the 16bit. Ive finished this game so many times already. I bought this when i was 16yrs old in 1993 and still have the original . ive fought and killed zeon with sarah only. Simple but time consuming. When playing a fight scene heal sarah each time when its her turn even if there are no apponents. Doing this will get you 10 exp points each time. When a fight is almost done use agress from Boweys magic and restart the fight again doing the same till you eventually get no exp points from killing a monster. Trust me you will see sarah at a completely different level. I killed zeon i think with 5 or 7 shots. I reached a stage where i couldnt level up anymore unless i promoted her and wow the amount of power i had was insane. If you have time try it.
Thanks for all the thought you put into this- I love how you brought in the backstories and aesthetics too. Frayja is definitely better than good on paper, but he just looks terrible. It had to be said...
This was my absolute favorite growing up and played through the entire game many times and got every secret available. He may start out really slow, but if you nurture is xp, Slade becomes really good. He was my favorite character. I've gotten Kiwi up there in level but he never becomes all that great and gets one shot near any caster, he's always the first to be replaced.
This video randomly got recommended to me and I have never played this game. It's on the long list of jrpgs I still want to play so I will get to it eventually. Fun video despite that though.
I never encountered the weaknesses with Sorcerers you mentioned. I used Taya as my Sorcerer and had to hold her back as to not take too many kills from the others. Also May is the most OP archer ever and had to hold her back as well.
Yeah, i have to micromanage Kazim and Peter in all my playthroughs so they don't suck all the XP, specially because kills pay very little way too soon.
@@godoftwinkies574 Kazin's Desoul is actually awesome. I discovered it had a pattern of working best when a unit is damaged OR every other time you cast it.
My last playthrough I used the Protect Ring trick to level Kiwi enough to barely survive a single cast of Freeze 4 and attack power on par or greater than Peter's. You were right about his breath doing less damage, but it DOES scale... albeit very slowly.
Great insights! I played this game through once when I didn't even know any english yet! I loveded it (the great soundtrack really helped too!) and still leveled everyone (that I happened to get, didn't know about the unit selections or different promo options or what nots back then) to 99 after promo!
I too am a sucker for the redeemed villain character archetype. Anytime a former adversary switches sides to the good guys, they get automatic points. Especially if they have a cool design and an unwinnable bossfight earlier in the game.
I watched the whole thing! While recording footage for my Final Conflict video hahaha. Pretty good list, the only thing I'd probably change would be putting Eric paladin a bit higher. I recently did a randomized playthrough where he was dropped on me in the first hour of the game and he's a beast of a unit. Ended up using him the whole game. Made Chester look like F tier. And yeah, Kiwi is Love.
Dude, I love your content, the Shining Force 3 retrospective you did was wonderful! As for Eric, both he and Randolf were probably the two hardest to talk about since I've used Eric once....many years ago, and Randolf...never.
I don't get the hate for Frayja's design. He looks like what a real medieval Catholic friar would look like. Not every character needs to be a cute anime girl.
Astral is an old man and looks cool Torasu is an old man cleric and looks fine Uryudo is a cleric and looks fine Hell Lowe looks fine too! Low brow humour incoming...Frayja's avatar makes it look like he's constipated
It's an extremely lame style. He looks lame. You can say you don't agree with that, but to say you don't understand it is absurd. Nobody is saying every character has to be a cute anime girl. In fact, I don't care for that in games I play either. But I don't complain about it, because why? The point is, this isn't Medieval Times. It's art. There is no reason for him to look so lame, when he could look cool. What, do you look just like him or something?
@@leadbones I don't mean to be rude but you are making some very disingenuous comments. If the game doesn't take place in the medieval ages, then why do we have knights and priests? Why do we have archers and castles? Having a character that looks like Friar Tuck is perfectly fitting for that type of setting. (You might need to google friar tuck since you sound like a zoomer) The reason I defend him is because Frayja has two attributes that I like in video game characters that are extremely rare in JRPG games. 1. He has a grounded design that is based on the setting. 2. He is an older character that is ugly and yet heroic. JRPGs tend to be filled with pretty, younger characters and leave the older, ugly characters as villains, which I find horribly shallow. His design isn't the best, but I prefer variety than just another pretty boy/girl character or edgelord. And I don't find it that terribly different from the design of the kings, princess or Astral (who is budget Gandalf). Just more medieval fantasy stereotypes. Me being a balding 30 something is just a coincidence. :P
@rdrouynriv Guy, I'm older than you. Medieval Times. You might need to Google it, since you obviously don't know what that is. And to claim that fantasy anime settings with hand drawn artwork should try to be more historically accurate is to claim that you have no idea what fantasy is. This game has anthropomorphic characters, giants, monsters, pegasi... is it realistic to have that shit? I don't care if you don't intend to be rude. I don't respect your opinion, so nothing you have to say to me matters at all. The art for the guy looks fucking stupid, and that's the bottom line. All the other crap you are talking about is irrelevant and misses the point of art, fantasy, and video games.
My first ever strategy RPG. I remember playing this way too late at night on school nights, pitch black room, that opening music at the title screen which I always let play out...
To me seeing Janet and Elric ranked low is inconceivable. They are both absolutely awesome to me. Then again I always grind lvl 40 promotions, which makes both snipers broken OP with that 3 tile attack range; at that point you get Elric Janed and May in your squad and enemies get obliterated before they even get a chance to do anything at all
Elric is the best Brass Gunner. You can promote Janet to be the Brass Gunner for the defense boost and Elric will still be better. That said, promoting Elric to Sniper is better since Brass Gunners have inferior attack and movement
@@ShadowMoon878 To be perfectly honest I don't know who the best brassgunner would be because I have never even tried that promotion on either Janet or Elric, I abhor the class and the movement loss is an instant deal-breaker for me, so I'll take your word for it.
good voice, good humor, making content about SF in 2023? Awesome! Also: You're right! Also: Would be fun to hear your thoughts on SF2 hacks. I've played only one and would be nice to make my backlog. Cheers!
I don't know if it was the god staff for Sarah but when I didn't promote her to monk and just focused on her for attacking as well. I was able to hit more dmg with physical attacks as a priest than I did as a monk.
I gave *Taya* the running ring, so she can always get within spell range to target her single hapless victim. *Dao* *2* is the most useful *Summons* at end game as well, because by then, most of the monsters have a high fire defense. This saddly makes the fire *summons* *Deity* the weaker choice 🔥 { Looking at you *Apollo* }
This game: a rat that turns into a ninja, and a turtle who throws his helmet and is adorable. a certain cartoon: four turtles who turn ninja, guided by a rat who's their sensei.
How could they make Skreech have a groovy pink and white colour scheme, be extremely difficult to recruit, and yet still be so bad? I share in your disappointment.
Currently playing again but not promoting until 40. I used to always do it at 20 but I think the placement of the wing is a clear indication that it’s more beneficial to wait.
Promoting at 40 is very hard to do unless you use the secret woods in the forest village and the control enemy code. However it drastically changes what units are good and what units are amazing. Kiwi starts getting HP again after level 21-22 which is great and he ends up with around 65hp at later levels, it also makes any characters you get that are prepromoted useless.
I love this game. While I first played it when very young I never got into it. Therefore I don’t think nostalgia plays a huge role. Lots of 16 bit games have aged very poorly to me after all. This game and this series is just a ton of fun still to me. A good balance of accessibility and the strategy. I didn’t even know all these characters existed so I I guess I’m still an amateur. I have tried to play 3 several times and just can’t get into it. I wish so bad they had kept it tile based and pixel graphics. 3D added nothing, especially to the battles. What a shame the series ended there.
When it comes to Sarah, one of the things I grew to appreciate was the slow, more and more after trying to level up other units. Since it's tied to how much damage you can put out or by kill in most cases, it helped me get some of my lower end units up quicker then if I didn't. I also tended to put herbs on Sarah, because for whatever reason, she still gets 10 exp for healing with an herb, so I can stretch the exp out on her to help with her exp gain issues. Still monk her up of course though.
Loved the list, agree with most. Damn that Zynk movement sucks so much and i think Chester's absurdly high HP becomes a problem for healers to cap making him a double edge sword.
I finally did the grind to get every sorc spell on my last playthrough. Let's just say that you don't need to worry about the damage split with Atlas 2. It does a LOT of damage.
I make Karna a Vicar, but this is mainly a result of playing on Super difficulty; it is really dangerous to put someone with a defense as low as Karna on the front lines and a defense boost is so impactful that she basically becomes a Boost Aura bot using magic every single turn. Sarah;s physical stats are better than Karna's on level, so she is the one that gets the Vigor Ball for me (she is fragile as well, but losing her in a fight is much less impactful than losing Karna). Also surprised that you put Eric!Pegasus Knight over Rick!Pegasus Knight when both are equally-boring, yet Rick has arguably better stats.
Might be the first list i ever watched a tier list i full agree with the rating. I’ve played this game so much and have used every character in it multiple times. I love kiwi, so many people hate on him. He’s much like slade where you have to spoon feed him multiple kills early on to get him leveled up then he does great. My last playthough i only used Bowie, jaha, Chester and Sarah. Surprisingly wasn’t that hard
I disagree with a few things. I would put Slade, Bowie and Sarah/Sheela MMNK at legendary. Slades spells are solid and he is a beast besides that. Bowie if consistently leveled is tough enough that losing the battle isn't reason enough to be too tentative in using him and the awesomeness of MMNK means you should have access to plenty of healing. The MMNK's are as good or better then most other frontline fighters and they have healing. I also think most of the fliers deserve a little boost besides Screech. Having 3 or 4 other flyers to go with Peter to act as a hit squad can help you take out troublesome or far away enemies easily. Most playthroughs I have Peter, Kiwi (who I rename as Gamora) and either Jaro and Luke, Jaro and another PGKT, or Luke, Jaro, and another PGKT to hit targets I want dead but my regular team will take longer to get to. I wish SF2 had a Domingo like character so a flying mage could be part of the group like SF1.
You are absolutely right! Also, I tend to use the core characters, because I fall in love with them and I dont want to change them... Except Karna, I would kill anyone for Karna
My only contention with the list, since this isn't an "exploit" thing, is the characters you get pre-promotion compared to the ones you get post-promotion. If you're the type that levels your pre-promotion characters past 20 (especially to 30-40) then any one of them will completely outshine any of the characters you get that are already promoted as far as all of their stats go.
@@portalguy2246for me, Karna is almost always level 35 or above by the time i get the second Vigor Ball, but she’s usually the only one i level up that high
"Kiwi is life Tier", "Karna MMNK is Borken tier",... Thanks, you made me laugh for at last a week ;). Janet and Taya are cute, so they can't be anything under good :p. Karna and Sarah as a Vicar... nop, that's trash, seriously, this class sprite is so bad, it's a crime to no promote then into master monk. Last thing, you didn't talk about them in a team. Taking the 12 that are on top will not necessarily make a good team (although Peter and & Karna are enough to solo the game :( ). It would have been interesting to talk about what makes a good team and which characters are best suited to the differents roles. Personnaly, i usually make a team such as : 1 line : Peter, Bowie, Slade, Kiwi. 2 : Sarah (MMNK), Taya, Tyrin (Wiz), Karna (MMNK). 3 : Sheela, May, Janet (SNIP), Honesty... (oups wrong game :(, seriously, i would have liked to have a knight girl like Mae (sf1) or Sylvia (FC), instead, i'm forced to used Rick (PGNT)). A team with all the girls (that's the important parts ;), where all the roles are more or less filled. Yoh, "MMNK are sexy, MMNK are Life... Use MMNK !".
Monks are over-rated if you aren't cheesing and overleveling. You have enough front-line fighter options that you don't need your support characters also fighting on the frontline taking hits. Give me the extra MP from being a vicar anytime. If the opportunity presents itself, and you don't have anyone to heal, you can use blast to pick up some kill exp with Sarah and Karna. Slow is also great with Sarah. Enemies with -40% def will even make Janet look S tier when landing hits. Also, I love the brass gunner class. My playstyle usually involves me slowly pushing the map, staying in formation for the most part, and waiting for the enemies to throw themselves at my frontline tanks. So, having less movement really doesn't matter much since I am not running full speed at every group of enemies.
Good video and list. I think I play the Shining Force games too similarly and should probably look more into the differences between them (including Shining Force CD). I've always hated the archers in any of the games and I feel like I'm often disappointed in the magic users (offensive or healing magic) and flying characters and often just lean on tanky characters. I might pull out the Genesis Mini and reconsider a different strategy.
this game was so awesome.. Story, characters, unlockable secrets, characters design, music. Although I can imagine i wouldn't like it on modern graphics... I like when the graphics have this sort of balance between realistic and cartoonish/fantasy. I don't like the current trend of making everything cartoonish with excessive difference between body ratio and lack of textures and colors too bright full with effects the hide the animations
This game deserves a remake
Shame the Shining Force Mobile game's graphics can't be used in a remake.
Only if it remains 2D.
@@magacop5180 well yeah. like the gba one
I hope :)
Try the rom hack shining force 2 requiem, it’s going to make you tear your hair out
I can't believe I'm watching content for Shining Force II made in 2023. Bless you.
2024
There's actually been a surge of competent old-school game players, reviewers, and discussion on TH-cam pretty recently.
I have quite a couple of interesting channels I could recommend if you like.
Some games too.
Heck, I recently found out about a game called _Feda: The Emblem of Justice_ for SNES that had the primary Shining Force artist work on it. It's a pretty clumsy game overall, but it's still really cool.
@@StomachPlug I'd like your recommendations.
@@chetrogers6871
Channel recommendations or game recommendations, Chet?
And if game recommendations, do you have any specific platforms or genres in mind to help me narrow things down?
@@chetrogers6871
Apparently Google deleted both my original post and also the post I made asking you to clarify if you wanted game recommendations or channel recommendations. 🙃🫠
Want to know how the 90s were? As around a 10 year old boy, I was excited for when Sheela jumped out of the waterfall. I looked forward to like half a second of sprite in their birthday suit, that's the 90s for you.
Fun video! Always funny to see Bowie go from an agile swordsman to a beefy chonk who can only move his arms. One thing a lot of people tend to gloss over is that since magic does set damage in SF games, HP is essentially your magic defense stat. The more HP you have, the lower the percentage of your max HP you take from every spell making allies with low defense but tons of HP ideal for fighting mages.
Indeed. Keep Kiwi away from those magic users, unless you want to constantly be reviving him.
"how much i like them, and that's really the only thing that matters"
i don't not care if kiwi is pretty useless he's adorable
I feel the same about Screech.
I don't care if he sucks, he's a super secret, secret character who kid me found without guides, making him awesome.
Thank you I loved kiwi so much i named my first pup kiwi.
When it comes to archers and flyers; remember that flyers have an evasion boost; and archers negate that evasion boost along with doing more damage to them
I always think about re-playing Shining Force 1 and 2. Those were my first true RPGs that I stuck through start to finish as a kid. I still have the music in my mind.
best way to play SF1 is with perma death
Same for me, I love this games, and to this day, I can't find any games that have the charisma or the same gameplay as this game.
Of course, there is FE (that I like, but no as SF series), or some other tactis rpg's, on gba, or pc, but no one of them have the same vibes that this game has.
I wanna explore, and then face an army in a specific spot, I don't want randoms ecounters.
The only thing to improve in this game is just to have a better leveling system that not take you hours.
I enjoy alot of those classic games rpg.
Same, my first 2 RPG’s and will always be my favorite as they made such an impression on me! Definitely replay them
I think you’re correct. Have played through over 50 times. And thank you for respecting my Kiwi!!
"Im just a guy that love this game not an expert" Has to be the best opening line of all times. I think Most of us will feel the same way.
I do wonder if part of the reason for that line is because there’s another tier list where they call themselves experts.
(They’re not- the line was made in jest)
Considering like 90% of his video library is Shining Force it begs the question of what exactly it takes for one to become a Shining Force expert. 😳
It called been humble and at the same time engage with the regular player. :) @@StomachPlug
@@Kakashi10ist True haha
This is the best SF2 tier list over ever seen! Thank you for this super detailed but also fun and engaging video!
Also your personal tale about Screech is exactly what happened to me. Played the game many many many times as a kid thinking I knew all of the characters, used that cheat and was incredibly confused when I saw his portrait. Blew my mind.
I mostly agree with everything on this list, though there are a few factors that wpuld make me list a few units higher.
1. There's actually another good reason to like unarmed units. Not needing a weapon slot means they have more space for other items, which can make them good support units if you load them up with heal items, and Kiwi's mobility and defense actually makes him great for this purpose, since he can reach other units quicker and is less vulnerable than your other healers, allowing him to support Sarah in the early and midgame, while still finding a potential niche when he begins to fall off.
2. While Tyrin is technically the better sorcerer, there is one more thing that makes Kazin the more optimal choice: Freeze's better range over Blaze. Kazin will be stuck with range-2 spells regardless, while Tyrin loses out on a square of range as a sorceror, since Freeze 3 and 4 are both range-3 spells.
3. Don't underestimate Luke. His base attack needs some work, but that's as easy as keeping the power ring on him after the kraken fight, which puts him close to Bowie and Slade, with even better movement. This also gives you a mobile attack booster for your force without wasting one of Peter's turns doing it, which he's far better off using to annihilate everything in his path as usual. Giving Luke the dark sword is also really funny, give it a try sometime.
I've never even heard of this game. Why did I watch this?
...excellent work sir.
One of the most unsung games of the 16 bit era. If it had been released on the RPG heavy snes, it would be seen as a more of a classic. Most rpg fans were on team snes. But it was a genesis title which wasn't really known for rpg's, and didn't draw that crowd as strong. So it didn't get the exposure the major snes rpg titles had. I've recommended this game to so many rpg fans who I know didn't grow up with a genesis and were snes only so were blissfully unaware to it. Then once they played it were like "Wow yeah that was a top tier rpg".
To be fair I think it is the most memorable RPG on sega genesis, possibly the only memorable one though I know people like phantasy star (though I found it boring).
In Sheela's defense, she IS the hot one.
Sheela is the hot one. My seventh grade self was pretty excited about her promotion.
First off I love the fact that this video came out for weeks ago. Secondly, I haven’t seen all of these characters. I thought I mastered this game, but I don’t recognize some of them.
@@bsiferd You should consider replaying the game and finding those characters and other secrets!
If you don't want to miss anything, I would recommend following along a playthrough made by someone called DaTruthDT. He's really funny, though he swears a LOT. Although based on your first reply, I would assume you're okay with excessive swearing.
@@wooper2654 yeah I should. I did miss some of these.
I absolutely adore Shining Force and this video. Thank you. I replay SF1 every year but now I need to add more SF2 into my rotation.
Shining force two was literally my first video game that I wanted to play and got to complete when I was a kid, and it has a special place in my heart. Your list was actually pretty spot on, the only thing I would have done different is omit some of the brass gunner hate lol, I actually like the concept
NOW THIS IS THE KIND OF ESOTERIC CONTENT I WANT TO SEE ON YT
Shining force was the first game ive ever experienced turn base gaming. I first played it on a demo and didnt have any way to save, i ended up playing it all night and beating everything.
I barely knew this existed. Holy crap is this game deep! Ty for putting so much heart into the review. Great commentary
Thoroughly enjoyed the video with your commentary and rationale behind your choices.
And I agree - my love for this game can’t be put into words. A staple of my childhood
Karna as Master monk is one of the best with her Aura Lv3 spell! I also like Gerhalt because of his brutal attack.
"Words do not express how much this game means to me"
Mate, same. This was my first RPG and sparked a decades-long love for the genre. Great video
i can't believe how right this tier list is, honestly. your lore and design qualifications are absolutely essential for the true tier positions of the cast. i would like to offer, also, that because of the way the game's math works, kiwi actually becomes a really good target for stat increasing items. i think with them, he can be bumped into higher tiers even purely mechanically, since raising his defense is a proportionally higher reduction of incoming damage, and raising his attack makes him a better candidate for Attack buffs than weapon users
What a coincidence this video came up the same time I just recompleted 100% Shining Force 2 but it was done as a streaming favour for my friend who was really interested in this game because of some of the unique character designs and the animations complimenting how badass these characters are n break the generic tradition of stereotypes. (Slade is his favourite of the many fav units)
I spent about 25 hours over a week streaming the game on discord for him and he loves the game however he's not a fan of rpgs n he's nervous of playing a tactical one so I did this completionist run for him.
My team for this run is (Capital letters for main stays, lower case letter names for temp units)
SLADE (Early game with him I treat him like im playing Farming simulator or Nasus from league of legends, Slade after I did just 2 battles of him getting last hits on all or most enemies he consistently becomes a one man wrecking crew even before promo n carries the game even doing well in elven forest secret.)
GERHALT (Werewolves are cool and so are were rats, unique design on him, he hits like a truck n great defense, no issue with forest terrain.)
MAY (aka my fav lady who I sometimes nickname her as Jill Valentine cus I love her to. great attack damage up until very end game she does fall off sadly n her ultimate weapon could use some bonus armour similar to Holy Lance for Paladins/P.Knights)
RICK (Paladin) and JARO (P Knight) (Very good defense, I use their three ultimate weapons to buff nearby allies who're bout to go into battle "mostly slade", their holy lance is a great offensive n shield item, mist javelin for ranged.)
chester (From great tank to just struggling he has to be replaced asap. I like his design personally and in alot of my runs I tend to be too stuborn to bench him but this run I did bench him before he could promo)
luke and SCREECH (Yeah you're reading this right and I need slap across the face. Luke just.... exists to be the meat shield n potion hoe, for me he always always always struggles to be useful in combat besides being a meat shield. Screech however for me he's more tankier, his offense is still not too hot but serviceable for me n he's reliable for meat shielding better than luke, good potion hoe and personally I love his picture which is odd cus he's "kid" i guess but he has that adorable edgyness to him.)
PETER n KARNA (I don't have to explain why lol)
SARAH (Vicar) (recent months I heard of the goddess staff exploit and ngl I had a ton of fun with vicar sarah also when she gets the white ring n goddess staff she has pretty good base defense while having two massive aoe heals, the slow debuff n good high solo heal. yes her Monk from is superior but honestly having more n more aoe healing is better, especially since alot of my force are still strong front liners)
KAZIN (Summoner) (Dude to me looks like anime shaggy from scooby doo (not the ultra instinct version we see all the time now), summoner damage for me is pretty good tho the aoe is poor but I just personally love this guy's design too much.)
KIWI (I went overtime with grinding his levels where I had him in Nasus farming mode, also the two times I went passed elven forest I always put alot of time into grinding his levels safely with strong ally support helping him. I'm always a team KIWI fan.)
I really got into Shining Force back in 2018 along with Phantasy Star and I freaking love these games also Shining Force 2 back when I first tried it out n got up to north parmecia n stopped (xbox 360 sega collection it was on) I was really enjoying the game but never got round to finishing it back then, SF2 is a perfect beginner friendly tactical rpg especially if you're bit of a furry like me. Since I completed SF2 in 2018 I've become addicted to other tactical games including more shining force games, I've dived into FF tactics, Mutant Year Zero Road to Eden, The Iconic Xcom franchise, Fire Emblem and I can't wait for the new persona 5 tactical rpg game.
When I first beat the amazing SF2 back in 2018 I was so shocked at how unknown the shining force games are and that tactical rpgs just aren't a big thing.
Shining Force is a series that more people around the world must play especially if those who are furries.
Also the many times I've replayed this game over n over n over n over again doing so many challenge runs I've noticed that this game went through some developer hell, was rushed n didn't get the proper big funding n technical treatment for it be bigger and better.
I love this game so damn much dude and I have no nostalgia for it but the amount of clearly obvious cut content just to get the game out like obvious reused sprites, most characters even main ones dont get new avatars when they promote, the very very shoddy inconsistent writing at times, n some retconning. It does make me wish this game gets a proper remake to fix so many of these issues.
They don't have to go overboard with character story like final fantasy or modern persona games but I really wish more of the Granseal cast got more scenes talking about events of the adventure, their reflection of how much they've grown n matured since the start of their adventure since most of them are teens, also I like to see Slade really show in the story of his redemption and his hard commitment to righting his accidental wrong. I love to see all the force members have some humour, have some more friendly connections or rivalry or romance since at some points of the game some npcs or force members do hint at their relationships to some people or factions around parmecia.
I do think the main adventure can be longer just so we can spend more time with those late game units that most of us just ignore because we're too attached to other force members.
I personally do love Chaz, Zynk n Lemon but they're so late game that it doesn't make everyone want to play them also having some side content would extend the use of these late game force members to or maybe have tons of post game content similar to Dragon Quest 8 3DS n connect the characters or plots to other adventures in the shining series.
Sorry for massive massive long comment here but I love shining force series so much and remmeber I don't have nostalgia childish memories, I got into this series in the middle of my 20s and fully got round to beating SF2 then fell in love with it when I was 29.
Great vid.
Thanks.
I'm currently playing This on Android, I was so excited to see it on the Play Store. I, had SF 1&2 on the mega drive as a kid
Yes i love the game like you
I liked having Chaz in my party as he has access to bolt and freeze, hence is worth your patience in leveling him up
Yep so good if you put the time in.
New shining force content and it's not even my birthday! Great job on the list. I just finished a replay of this about a month ago, and tried using Kiwi for the first time since my first playthrough. I now remember why he sits in the caravan lol.
I'm sure I'm in the minority, but i use Luke probably 80% of the time. I use most of my stat boosting items on him, and he becomes one of the useful members i have. I love my fliers.
It took me forever to realize how good Sarah could be, now every time I play, she, Bowie, Karna, and Peter are basically on par with each other.
For real, learning Sarah could become a Master Monk was a game changer.
Aside from my first few plays, almost every run ive had i usually get sarah promoted before you leave for parmecia on the ship when everone else is still like lvl 6 bahaha. Sure, it sucks not getting her master monk, but it makes her a beast cleric.
Great video. Had a good laugh a few times. It has me thinking of strategies and playing again
Man I would have loved for SFII to have gotten the same GBA treatment that SFI got.
It's a decent list, once I foubd out you can wait to promote I have always done that for better stats. After level 20 certain characters start getting stats they normally wouldn't get. Luke for instance gets high defense, Kiwi actually starts getting HP again after level 20, Chester gains ridiculous HP and Elric probably the biggest surprise gets a monstrous amount of defense if you overlevel him and promote to brass gunner, like Jaha levels of defense. Plus he gets the added bonus damage against flying like all archers, which at the end of the game feels like 50% of enemies.
I watched this vid solely to see where you ranked the bird because I remembered him being absolutely insane. Glad to see you put him in Legendary and validate my memory of this game from ~18 years ago.
You should consider replaying it! It's so good, and still worth replaying as always.
@@wooper2654 Yeah its been ages but it would be nice to replay it. Is it available on any modern platforms/systems or do I gotta dig out an emulator?
@@yoda0017yeah it’s available on modern consoles but not solely by itself
thank you!
Once i discover this channel
I will watch every video now
I love so much Shining force 2
And i love to learn more about the game, characters and more plays of gaming
Love your content bro
There is no question in my mind that, in terms of his story, Lemon is the greatest thing in the game- the unsung hero par excellence. There is also the unanswered question of what happened to him (and King Galam for that matter) at the end. He can't die, so there's every reason to believe he lived on in the kingdom of devils.
I'd forgotten just how important Lemon is to the story, and how tragic his ending truly is. Sitting alone in the darkness.
I also think the story is more poignant from the point of view of Galam, rather than Granseal. The Devils possess both their king - making him lead a war on their allies based on lies - and then their national hero. But, being a patriot to the last, Lemon saves his king (even if that probably amounts to being his executioner).
It was great to hear your list and rankings. It was very nostalgic. I may need to go back and play it again when my life slows down a little bit. Great video.
Got this game as a child but, not speaking english and never played yet a RPG at this time, I didn't understood AT ALL what it was about so I never played it for years. I played it a lot later, after discovering Fire Emblem on GBA and discovering my taste for T RPG but already as retro gaming :'(. I have so much regret not playing it having the cartridge all this time...
One of my favorite strategy RPGs. This is a very informative video.
Great video, I do love Shining Force 2
Wow, you're right! :D
Awesome list and man i love this game, been so long since I played, thanks for helping me reconnect with it!
"Words do not express how much this game means to me".
Within 10 seconds of this video I already subscribed and gave a thumbs up, the feeling is mutual.
Great job! I adore you! I firstly played this game back in 1995-2000 when I was 9-14 years old and I have recenlty completed this game again with my 5 years old son! Unfortunately, we played Japanese version and there's a glitch - Lemon can't equip weapons! I think this is explained by the fact that having killed that much people as Red Baron he's now a pacifist. Thus, although he can still attack enemies with magic items, like Heat Axe, he can no longer be used as a valuable member of the force, so we had to replace him wtih Chaz for final battle (Japanese version there's only 1 Vigour Ball, so not possible to have Karna and Sarah together as MasterMonks, Cloude is too slow for us and so on - Chaz was the best option). It was a funny duel DemonMaster vs Chaz - Level 4 freeze vs Level 3 freeze but Chaz was permamently being healed by Sarah, so he won :) And Frayja killed Zeon with Shining Ball)) Now we play Shining force 1 GBA version year 2004, Mawlock and his cards is amazing)))
Thank you.
That GBA remake is tons of fun, adds lots of flavour.
@@wallsofjerich0 Right, may be someday you'll make video about this one as well
About PGNT Chester, I'm fine with the late Pegasus Wing, gives him additional stats before getting promoted (like 7 levels of stats). I equip a Power Spear + Power ring on him to make up for the damage and not let him fall behind for several battles. And then a Mist Javelin at the end game gives him 100+ attack. His HP pool makes up for the lower defense (takes 2-3 hits)
I can honestly say this is my best jrpg on the 16bit. Ive finished this game so many times already. I bought this when i was 16yrs old in 1993 and still have the original . ive fought and killed zeon with sarah only. Simple but time consuming. When playing a fight scene heal sarah each time when its her turn even if there are no apponents. Doing this will get you 10 exp points each time. When a fight is almost done use agress from Boweys magic and restart the fight again doing the same till you eventually get no exp points from killing a monster. Trust me you will see sarah at a completely different level. I killed zeon i think with 5 or 7 shots. I reached a stage where i couldnt level up anymore unless i promoted her and wow the amount of power i had was insane. If you have time try it.
Thanks for all the thought you put into this- I love how you brought in the backstories and aesthetics too. Frayja is definitely better than good on paper, but he just looks terrible. It had to be said...
Nice video, congrats!
This was my absolute favorite growing up and played through the entire game many times and got every secret available. He may start out really slow, but if you nurture is xp, Slade becomes really good. He was my favorite character. I've gotten Kiwi up there in level but he never becomes all that great and gets one shot near any caster, he's always the first to be replaced.
This video randomly got recommended to me and I have never played this game. It's on the long list of jrpgs I still want to play so I will get to it eventually. Fun video despite that though.
I never encountered the weaknesses with Sorcerers you mentioned. I used Taya as my Sorcerer and had to hold her back as to not take too many kills from the others.
Also May is the most OP archer ever and had to hold her back as well.
Yeah, i have to micromanage Kazim and Peter in all my playthroughs so they don't suck all the XP, specially because kills pay very little way too soon.
@@godoftwinkies574 Kazin's Desoul is actually awesome. I discovered it had a pattern of working best when a unit is damaged OR every other time you cast it.
@@Sir_Adam always hated gamble moves. Only used it when i was sure that if it missed i wouldn't be in trouble.
@@godoftwinkies574 All my other units were pretty OP so I used him for fun.
@@Sir_AdamTyrin is a better mage. His lvl 4 Freeze is also OP as heck. Kazin makes a better Sorceror than Tyrin and he is better than Taya.
I love Kiwi too.
Fun video, thanks for the memories.
Welp, I'm a sick man for SF in general so subbed.
My last playthrough I used the Protect Ring trick to level Kiwi enough to barely survive a single cast of Freeze 4 and attack power on par or greater than Peter's. You were right about his breath doing less damage, but it DOES scale... albeit very slowly.
Great insights! I played this game through once when I didn't even know any english yet! I loveded it (the great soundtrack really helped too!) and still leveled everyone (that I happened to get, didn't know about the unit selections or different promo options or what nots back then) to 99 after promo!
1 min into the video and I am already sold on how you rank them. We both like to play in the same way!
Great video and excellent game. Thanks.
I too am a sucker for the redeemed villain character archetype. Anytime a former adversary switches sides to the good guys, they get automatic points.
Especially if they have a cool design and an unwinnable bossfight earlier in the game.
I watched the whole thing! While recording footage for my Final Conflict video hahaha. Pretty good list, the only thing I'd probably change would be putting Eric paladin a bit higher. I recently did a randomized playthrough where he was dropped on me in the first hour of the game and he's a beast of a unit. Ended up using him the whole game. Made Chester look like F tier. And yeah, Kiwi is Love.
Dude, I love your content, the Shining Force 3 retrospective you did was wonderful!
As for Eric, both he and Randolf were probably the two hardest to talk about since I've used Eric once....many years ago, and Randolf...never.
Great effort
I don't get the hate for Frayja's design. He looks like what a real medieval Catholic friar would look like. Not every character needs to be a cute anime girl.
Astral is an old man and looks cool
Torasu is an old man cleric and looks fine
Uryudo is a cleric and looks fine
Hell Lowe looks fine too!
Low brow humour incoming...Frayja's avatar makes it look like he's constipated
@@wallsofjerich0 that is what vows of poverty do to a man. Can't afford the Metamucil.
It's an extremely lame style. He looks lame. You can say you don't agree with that, but to say you don't understand it is absurd. Nobody is saying every character has to be a cute anime girl. In fact, I don't care for that in games I play either. But I don't complain about it, because why? The point is, this isn't Medieval Times. It's art. There is no reason for him to look so lame, when he could look cool. What, do you look just like him or something?
@@leadbones I don't mean to be rude but you are making some very disingenuous comments. If the game doesn't take place in the medieval ages, then why do we have knights and priests? Why do we have archers and castles? Having a character that looks like Friar Tuck is perfectly fitting for that type of setting. (You might need to google friar tuck since you sound like a zoomer)
The reason I defend him is because Frayja has two attributes that I like in video game characters that are extremely rare in JRPG games. 1. He has a grounded design that is based on the setting. 2. He is an older character that is ugly and yet heroic. JRPGs tend to be filled with pretty, younger characters and leave the older, ugly characters as villains, which I find horribly shallow. His design isn't the best, but I prefer variety than just another pretty boy/girl character or edgelord. And I don't find it that terribly different from the design of the kings, princess or Astral (who is budget Gandalf). Just more medieval fantasy stereotypes.
Me being a balding 30 something is just a coincidence. :P
@rdrouynriv Guy, I'm older than you. Medieval Times. You might need to Google it, since you obviously don't know what that is. And to claim that fantasy anime settings with hand drawn artwork should try to be more historically accurate is to claim that you have no idea what fantasy is. This game has anthropomorphic characters, giants, monsters, pegasi... is it realistic to have that shit? I don't care if you don't intend to be rude. I don't respect your opinion, so nothing you have to say to me matters at all. The art for the guy looks fucking stupid, and that's the bottom line. All the other crap you are talking about is irrelevant and misses the point of art, fantasy, and video games.
Great video, fellow epicurean May appreciator. 2nd worst Archer according to trogs, but these are the same cave monsters willing to babysit Sarah.
My first ever strategy RPG. I remember playing this way too late at night on school nights, pitch black room, that opening music at the title screen which I always let play out...
Taya trapped in stone now trapped in my caravan. Dark indeed 😂😂😂
To me seeing Janet and Elric ranked low is inconceivable. They are both absolutely awesome to me. Then again I always grind lvl 40 promotions, which makes both snipers broken OP with that 3 tile attack range; at that point you get Elric Janed and May in your squad and enemies get obliterated before they even get a chance to do anything at all
True but I find may works without the massive grind the other 2 need
Elric is the best Brass Gunner. You can promote Janet to be the Brass Gunner for the defense boost and Elric will still be better. That said, promoting Elric to Sniper is better since Brass Gunners have inferior attack and movement
@@ShadowMoon878 To be perfectly honest I don't know who the best brassgunner would be because I have never even tried that promotion on either Janet or Elric, I abhor the class and the movement loss is an instant deal-breaker for me, so I'll take your word for it.
I love this game. Thanks to Julien, my French pen pal for introducing me to it!
A few options to consider for my next play through. I've never given Gerhalt a proper shot.
Great Work man! I agree 100% with your list
I agree with this list.
good voice, good humor, making content about SF in 2023? Awesome!
Also: You're right!
Also: Would be fun to hear your thoughts on SF2 hacks. I've played only one and would be nice to make my backlog.
Cheers!
I don't know if it was the god staff for Sarah but when I didn't promote her to monk and just focused on her for attacking as well. I was able to hit more dmg with physical attacks as a priest than I did as a monk.
Bruh, I still have my original copy of SF2 and my Sega Genesis. It's been a minute, but I'm going to have to play it again now.
Dude im soooo here for sf2 content!!! This game defined my childhood and got me into rpgs!
I gave *Taya* the running ring, so she can always get within spell range to target her single hapless victim.
*Dao* *2* is the most useful *Summons* at end game as well, because by then, most of the monsters have a high fire defense. This saddly makes the fire *summons* *Deity* the weaker choice 🔥
{ Looking at you *Apollo* }
Best tier list yet
I can't stress enough how cool Slade is. It's impossible to ignore a rat that turns into a ninja. This is way too cool!
This game: a rat that turns into a ninja, and a turtle who throws his helmet and is adorable.
a certain cartoon: four turtles who turn ninja, guided by a rat who's their sensei.
How could they make Skreech have a groovy pink and white colour scheme, be extremely difficult to recruit, and yet still be so bad? I share in your disappointment.
Currently playing again but not promoting until 40. I used to always do it at 20 but I think the placement of the wing is a clear indication that it’s more beneficial to wait.
Promoting at 40 is very hard to do unless you use the secret woods in the forest village and the control enemy code. However it drastically changes what units are good and what units are amazing. Kiwi starts getting HP again after level 21-22 which is great and he ends up with around 65hp at later levels, it also makes any characters you get that are prepromoted useless.
I love this game. While I first played it when very young I never got into it. Therefore I don’t think nostalgia plays a huge role. Lots of 16 bit games have aged very poorly to me after all. This game and this series is just a ton of fun still to me. A good balance of accessibility and the strategy. I didn’t even know all these characters existed so I I guess I’m still an amateur.
I have tried to play 3 several times and just can’t get into it. I wish so bad they had kept it tile based and pixel graphics. 3D added nothing, especially to the battles.
What a shame the series ended there.
When it comes to Sarah, one of the things I grew to appreciate was the slow, more and more after trying to level up other units. Since it's tied to how much damage you can put out or by kill in most cases, it helped me get some of my lower end units up quicker then if I didn't. I also tended to put herbs on Sarah, because for whatever reason, she still gets 10 exp for healing with an herb, so I can stretch the exp out on her to help with her exp gain issues. Still monk her up of course though.
Awesome job!!
Loved the list, agree with most. Damn that Zynk movement sucks so much and i think Chester's absurdly high HP becomes a problem for healers to cap making him a double edge sword.
BTW Heal L4 and Aura L4 cost the exact same amount of MP.
I finally did the grind to get every sorc spell on my last playthrough. Let's just say that you don't need to worry about the damage split with Atlas 2. It does a LOT of damage.
I make Karna a Vicar, but this is mainly a result of playing on Super difficulty; it is really dangerous to put someone with a defense as low as Karna on the front lines and a defense boost is so impactful that she basically becomes a Boost Aura bot using magic every single turn. Sarah;s physical stats are better than Karna's on level, so she is the one that gets the Vigor Ball for me (she is fragile as well, but losing her in a fight is much less impactful than losing Karna).
Also surprised that you put Eric!Pegasus Knight over Rick!Pegasus Knight when both are equally-boring, yet Rick has arguably better stats.
SF2 had the best music in the series and character design. I wish they used the same artist for all the other shining games.
Might be the first list i ever watched a tier list i full agree with the rating. I’ve played this game so much and have used every character in it multiple times. I love kiwi, so many people hate on him. He’s much like slade where you have to spoon feed him multiple kills early on to get him leveled up then he does great. My last playthough i only used Bowie, jaha, Chester and Sarah. Surprisingly wasn’t that hard
I disagree with a few things. I would put Slade, Bowie and Sarah/Sheela MMNK at legendary. Slades spells are solid and he is a beast besides that. Bowie if consistently leveled is tough enough that losing the battle isn't reason enough to be too tentative in using him and the awesomeness of MMNK means you should have access to plenty of healing. The MMNK's are as good or better then most other frontline fighters and they have healing.
I also think most of the fliers deserve a little boost besides Screech. Having 3 or 4 other flyers to go with Peter to act as a hit squad can help you take out troublesome or far away enemies easily. Most playthroughs I have Peter, Kiwi (who I rename as Gamora) and either Jaro and Luke, Jaro and another PGKT, or Luke, Jaro, and another PGKT to hit targets I want dead but my regular team will take longer to get to. I wish SF2 had a Domingo like character so a flying mage could be part of the group like SF1.
You are absolutely right! Also, I tend to use the core characters, because I fall in love with them and I dont want to change them... Except Karna, I would kill anyone for Karna
My only contention with the list, since this isn't an "exploit" thing, is the characters you get pre-promotion compared to the ones you get post-promotion. If you're the type that levels your pre-promotion characters past 20 (especially to 30-40) then any one of them will completely outshine any of the characters you get that are already promoted as far as all of their stats go.
Takes a lot of effort to level them that highly though and I don’t think it’s worth it past level 30
@@portalguy2246for me, Karna is almost always level 35 or above by the time i get the second Vigor Ball, but she’s usually the only one i level up that high
@@morningcolossus yeah it’s feasible with Karna but not really anyone else
I liked Screech as a character. Too bad he was behind my party in stats.
"Kiwi is life Tier", "Karna MMNK is Borken tier",... Thanks, you made me laugh for at last a week ;).
Janet and Taya are cute, so they can't be anything under good :p.
Karna and Sarah as a Vicar... nop, that's trash, seriously, this class sprite is so bad, it's a crime to no promote then into master monk.
Last thing, you didn't talk about them in a team. Taking the 12 that are on top will not necessarily make a good team (although Peter and & Karna are enough to solo the game :( ).
It would have been interesting to talk about what makes a good team and which characters are best suited to the differents roles.
Personnaly, i usually make a team such as :
1 line : Peter, Bowie, Slade, Kiwi.
2 : Sarah (MMNK), Taya, Tyrin (Wiz), Karna (MMNK).
3 : Sheela, May, Janet (SNIP), Honesty... (oups wrong game :(, seriously, i would have liked to have a knight girl like Mae (sf1) or Sylvia (FC), instead, i'm forced to used Rick (PGNT)).
A team with all the girls (that's the important parts ;), where all the roles are more or less filled.
Yoh, "MMNK are sexy, MMNK are Life... Use MMNK !".
Monks are over-rated if you aren't cheesing and overleveling. You have enough front-line fighter options that you don't need your support characters also fighting on the frontline taking hits. Give me the extra MP from being a vicar anytime. If the opportunity presents itself, and you don't have anyone to heal, you can use blast to pick up some kill exp with Sarah and Karna. Slow is also great with Sarah. Enemies with -40% def will even make Janet look S tier when landing hits.
Also, I love the brass gunner class. My playstyle usually involves me slowly pushing the map, staying in formation for the most part, and waiting for the enemies to throw themselves at my frontline tanks. So, having less movement really doesn't matter much since I am not running full speed at every group of enemies.
I would actually like to see this done based solely off of their maximum potential.
Enjoyed watching this
Good video and list. I think I play the Shining Force games too similarly and should probably look more into the differences between them (including Shining Force CD). I've always hated the archers in any of the games and I feel like I'm often disappointed in the magic users (offensive or healing magic) and flying characters and often just lean on tanky characters. I might pull out the Genesis Mini and reconsider a different strategy.
Claude, "since he's unarmed" -- shows his dismembered arm on the ground.
I do love this game as much as you do
this game was so awesome.. Story, characters, unlockable secrets, characters design, music. Although I can imagine i wouldn't like it on modern graphics...
I like when the graphics have this sort of balance between realistic and cartoonish/fantasy. I don't like the current trend of making everything cartoonish with excessive difference between body ratio and lack of textures and colors too bright full with effects the hide the animations