There's way too much putzing around towns and watching cutscenes.

[Arthur Morrigan]

I like the story and characters, but my god I would like to speed these cutscenes along a bit. So much time is wasted just watching characters slowly arrive at a conclusion in 45 minutes to an hour over something that the player puts together in a couple minutes.

The entire buildup to Valmar's Eye is agonizing. The second you meet Aira you immediately know that she has a part of Valmar in her, but we're still forced to watch like an hour of dialogue and cutscenes of the characters being clueless before you're finally allowed to fight the boss. I really wish there was more dungeon crawling and battling in this game.

[Antar]

Hmmm. Well I personally really like the balance. Like Valmar's Eye as you've stated. I really liked the buildup and the creepyness of everything. But I can understand why some people wouldn't like so much cutscenes and predictability.

[Kotih]

this wouldnt frustrate me as much if the game didnt prevent you from mashing buttons to skip dialog, i am in my second playthrough and all i want these people to do is just shut up already and let me play but i mash the button to no avail

[hellaplus]

Really? I haven't found the dialogue too drawn out. There's quite a bit, but it doesn't feel excessive for a JRPG imo.

Pressing B on a controller (idk what it is on keyboard) will make all the text for a line of dialogue appear immediately, so you could mash that if you just want to skip it fast get straight to the action.

[Arthur Morrigan]

I don't want to outright skip the dialogue. I want the dialogue to get to the point faster.

[terry309]

Originally posted by $60.00 FPS:

I like the story and characters, but my god I would like to speed these cutscenes along a bit. So much time is wasted just watching characters slowly arrive at a conclusion in 45 minutes to an hour over something that the player puts together in a couple minutes.

The entire buildup to Valmar's Eye is agonizing. The second you meet Aira you immediately know that she has a part of Valmar in her, but we're still forced to watch like an hour of dialogue and cutscenes of the characters being clueless before you're finally allowed to fight the boss. I really wish there was more dungeon crawling and battling in this game.

Wait till you get to the last quarter of the game, there is a lot more dungeon crawling.

[Warrior of Right]

The only part that bothers me is the whole Aria scenerio why i always fight a bunch of battles to level up my moves, then i actually want to see more cutscenes for a change.

[terry309]

Originally posted by Bass to Mouth:

The only part that bothers me is the whole Aria scenerio why i always fight a bunch of battles to level up my moves, then i actually want to see more cutscenes for a change.

That part does drag on a bit. It's played out like a detective scenario when it's pretty obvious from the start what's going on.

[Shyao]

To be fair, consider how the story is going at this point. Valmar seeks out the corruptable to go after, like Gadan in Liligue. At this point, we know that the God of Light, Granas, has actually done things, like cleaved the land in two with the Granasaber, so divine light curing a girl's blindness is possible. It isn't until you actually follow Aria into the shed that you find out she has the Eye. And now, consider for a moment; you have to try to yank a piece of Valmar out of a child and your only option so far has been to kill the piece, and the host. Do YOU want to kill a child? Because, if so... well, something's wrong with you.

That said, the story of Grandia 2 is easily the best part.

[Arthur Morrigan]

Originally posted by Shyao:

To be fair, consider how the story is going at this point.

No. From the second Aira appears you immediately know where the story is going and what you need to do. Writing the story in such a way where this is possible and then making the player sit through an hour of dialogue leading up to the obvious is unacceptable.

[Digideath]

You my friend are playing the wrong version of grandia. You would be mutch better suited to playing the gaiden. Grandia xtreme. It's built on the same engine. It's sorta a sequal/side story and it's just a pure dungeon crawler. Very little in the way of cut scenes and story once you get past the intro back story. No field areas. Just constant dungeon grinding. Huge, massive dungeons to rip apart that reload at specific points with stronger monsters and bosses. Loads of reasons to keep going back to them. They are filled with tons of collectables and puzzles. Some of the dungeons you unlock later in the game see you going for hours between save points. It gets really hard.

I gotta admit i prefered that one myself. It's less talk, more action. Imo grandia 1 was the best of both worlds. It managed to give you both. The most infamous dungeon crawling experience in grandia 1 wasn't even part of the story. A secret hidden bonus level. A huge tower that had a save point at the bottom. It had mini bosses, bosses, the hardest monsters in the game and it took me 5 hours of game play just to get from the save point in the bottom to the top. That was me killing and collecting everything in it. I only ever bet that tower once out of 3 attempts in my life.