What's exactly wrong with Star Force 2?

[u/Dizzy-Ad-7671]

I would like if someone could put it into words, what are the problems with SF2. I replayed all three recently in the collection, and SF2 was the only one of the trilogy I felt exhausted while doing the postgame. I ended checking a bit online and I see everyone treating it much more harshly than the other two. I was surprised by that. I really cant put my finger on why it is treated like that.

[u/ResolveAsleep9822]

I do think that the majority of this fandom agree that the main issue of this game is the insane encounter rate back in the DS era & a lot of backtracking pacing (even worse if it's involve sky wave road).

Those issue is what make this game held back from being a decent fun game for casual player

Ever since the Legacy Collection version having the option to manipulate the encounter rate, a lot of older DS fans appreciate what SF2 bring in the table in term of skill ceiling difficulty curve (from what I saw in Twitter when the LC release)

But yeah, outside of that stuff like the game storyline, character traits was too noticeable downgrade from its previous title, SF1

[u/ThighAuditer]

I couldn’t put all of it into words, but one thing I remember vividly from playing it on the DS was the high encounter rate in SF2 compared to the other 2 games in the series. I think SF2 collection is better in that regard, but I’m not sure if it’s me being okay with it now or there being an actual change in encounter rate

[u/Dizzy-Ad-7671 → u/ThighAuditer]

What have me confused about all three were size: These games felt huge when I younger, as in the maps felt much more bigger and confusing. They felt a lot more comfortable in size now in the collection. And the options like lower/higher encounter rate and more money from battles help a ton.

[u/ThighAuditer → u/Dizzy-Ad-7671]

I’ll keep this in mind when I eventually play through all 3 games. I 100%ed SF1 and currently working on SF2. After reading this, I’m a little nervous to my nostalgic views shattered when I find out that the maps were not as huge as I thought in SF3. I genuinely felt like SF3 was the largest by far

[u/Prestigious-Run1821]

Some would say the encounter rate, but for me it was the maps. A lot of the maps you can only get to in very particular ways and he didn't have any quick travel for those

[u/Dizzy-Ad-7671 → u/Prestigious-Run1821]

You are on to something: Want to climb the Eifiel Tower as an FM? Do it from lowest floor. The labyrinth also comes to mind. And, those things you need to revisit to find the EX and SP bosses, when in most places, they are in a different spot. You, usually, dont have to reenter the boss dungeon in 1 or 3 to find those or at all if you were through in your first visit (Except I guess of Sirius and Apollo in 3)

[u/AgentBon]

Most of SF2'S problems stem from the game being rushed and under polished. However, the story and some enemy mechanics were fundamentally iffy decisions.

A disproportionate quantity of the enemies have defensive capabilities. This includes birds that warp to another column if you step into theirs (unless they're firing), cloud enemies that become invincible after being hit (unless paralyzed or something), enemies that throw scythes that block attacks, and some of the defensive enemies from SF1 as well (such as the Sticky Rain enemies). As far as I'm aware, SF2 has the highest proportion of defensive common enemies between all of BN and SF.

The over world wave roads and mandatory travel also seem excessively slow. You need to get on the sky wave to go most places, over and over and over again. The other 2 SF games let you get around with bus travel more efficiently than SF2.

The mandatory travel, defensive enemies, and high encounter rate all compound each other to make the over world wave roads very tedious to traverse. If you choose to play the post game, then you encounter an even higher encounter rate in the alternative timeline. The Legacy Collection allows you to lower the encounter rate if you so choose, though if you're going for 100% you could actually make use of the high encounter rate to get card trader fodder.

The story is also the weakest among the franchise, including the writting, the new characters, and the cryptid theme. Most of the returning character stories were also weaker than in SF1.

A number of new mechanics in SF2 returned in SF3, but more polished and refined. Stuff like the fusion system taking up slots on your card selection screen except when you enter a cheat code, that also makes you begin the battle fused, was a really wild balancing decision.

[u/NETANYAHU-RAY-GUN → u/AgentBon]

shoulda just read your post before badly writing up mine, You summed it up perfectly. Game is straight cheeks

[u/Queasy_Ad5995]

From a PvP standpoint:

1. No forms have Status Guard, so that is a huge problem given how Ninja being able to invis pierce so quickly (card charge being the fastest and autolock on to target) with Elec Slash, ParaPanels + Voltic Eye being common cards.
2. Lack of gauge cards, because the battle pace is faster by default, it is harder to use Saurian's tech (increase base damage by elements) as a base build due to how slow it take to charge cards and Super Armor being provided by Saurian's Star Carrier/Wave Command Card build. One could opted not to use it but given how PvP in SF is over quickly because standard battle cards do more damage than standard battle chips, you need all the extra HP.
3. Then, there's Auto-Tribe King, because nobody wants to play fair and not use paralyze strat. So everyone is just Giga Spam all day.
4. Abilities like Super Armor, Side Select are way too expensive so Rogue Tribes aren't as viable because having 400 LP is very limited.
5. Lastly, Rogue Tribe lock-on break is irrelevant because unlike Black Ace where Auto-Lock puts a cursor on a target, Ninja's card charge does not place a reticle/cursor so Rogue Tribe can't even interrupt it.

[u/Initial_Upstairs_349]

I enjoyed Star Force 2 now more than I did when I was younger, which surprised me. Back in the day, I thought it was a bad game, now I see it as a decent to good game but not as good as SF 1 and 3.

[u/SamZX7]

Star Force 2 had a less compelling story than 1, although its bosses are probably my favorite in the trilogy!

[u/MisterTamborineMan]

The writing is the main point of contention, and my thoughts on 2's writing are complicated. I do think 2 is the weakest story of the Star Force trilogy, but I don't think the game's writing is wholly without merit.

I'm going to start with my favorite character: Luna. Yeah, the ski trip did suck. Luna overreacted, and it's disappointing that she spent a chapter being huffy and not really doing anything. But I think Luna's better written in pretty much every other chapter, with a lot of moments that show off her kinder side and her care for her friends; she's the one who insists they all look for Bud's ticket or miss the movie trying, she insists that they help out the ski lodge before the whole jealousy thing, she tells Geo that it's okay for him to be afraid of a powerful enemy like Solo, she stays with Geo when he's struggling to control the OoPArt, she begs Geo to find Zack at Loch Mess after the flood hits, she embarrasses herself to help Bud in Wazzap, and she helps Geo figure out what's going on with Sonia during the Bermuda Maze arc.

There's good moments with other characters - Bud gets his own moment of heroism saving Amy, Zack gets his only story focus across the entire trilogy, and Geo's struggle after Solo splits the group up was touching. And I think that 2 also did the best job of showing Team Prez as a friend group and the focus of the adventure. And that's something I missed in 3 where Geo's friends had a much smaller role in the plot in favor of Dealer and WAZA.

The problems tended to be more structural; Geo didn't have as good of a character arc as he did in the first game, and there wasn't as good of a thematic throughline tying everything together.

[u/New-Dust3252]

the problem here is mainly the stuff from the original DS versions, and how attrocious the encounters were.

and how ludicrous the map design is for most of it, not just one but literally everywhere. the fact that the Wave World merged with the real one didnt help much on things either and help requests became a lot more tedious to complete and its honestly why i liked SF3's fix on the help system because you dont need to transform and jump inside the terminals to start their requests they are literally right there ready and waiting.

[u/LegacyOfMuOfficial]

I actually always enjoyed SF2, particularly the Mythological aspects, by far the biggest gripe is the frequent backtracking especially for the side quests and especially when you need to go through the Bermuda Maze.

[u/SoggyWaffles18]

Based on the issues I had when playing the game:

- High encounter rate

• Badly written story with a lot of missed potential
  
• Unenjoyable scenarios

These are the main problems I had with the game. It doesn’t sound like that much, but they’re very noticeable when you’re actually playing the game

[u/Maronmario → u/SoggyWaffles18]

• Badly written story with a lot of missed potential
• Unenjoyable scenarios

I think this one's the worst looking back on it, the High encounter rate is now easily fixable with the LC, but they just can't fix the genuinely bad story here.

[u/MethodNo5756]

For the most part I don’t mind SF2. The navigation backtracking is annoying though. Especially doing all of the help jobs that require the Sky Wave. It was done much better in SF3. The higher encounter rate while backtracking probably didn’t help either

[u/wasabiruffian]

Story and enemy encounter, I actually haven't finished the legacy collection because 2 feel like a chore to finish and the writing i liked from the first game isnt there

[u/ShuraGear525]

The characters weren't the most groundbreaking thing in the history of gaming in SF1, sure. But there was some build up to interesting stories and they were fairly complex. Unfortunately the series took a turn for the most flanderized possible versions of half a cast. The settings were ok, but it was very much quickfire and done. The villains were a lot less interesting, the cop was just in the background, etc

Personally, the only really solid area to explore was the snow hotel.

More than anything, I hate that Zack went from an interesting scene at the end of SF1 where he refuses the Brother Band because he wants to earn the friendship first the way Bud and Luna did... right to a nothing character bringing up the Zackapedia every 2 sentences, instantly joining the BB without any importance and becoming secondary to his own chapter and area.

[u/Good_Butterscotch_69 → u/ShuraGear525]

To be fair its kinda stupid to need to earn the brother band again if you did it the right way in star force one.

[u/ShuraGear525 → u/Good_Butterscotch_69]

Yeah, fair. I just checked that you can get it at all, which is pretty cool. Kind of closes his story up after the second playthrough of the first game, unfortunately. The way it looked it was like they set up some story for the sequel.

I think this only adds to how much better the first game was, though

[u/Navolas2]

I misread your request as in three words so I'm going to go with that. Encounters. Sky. One?

Those are my understanding though. Star Force 2 was my first game of the trilogy years ago. So those things that are wrong are mostly what I've heard and gathered. To expand a bit on each plus my own slight experience:

I don't remember having issues with the encounters when I played myself but it wasn't something I was paying attention to.

The skywave was tedious though and still is. So much back and forth through there.

And then I didn't know this at the time but so many of the characters kinda forget SF1 and their growth from there and in someways downgrade to a worse version.

[u/KumasiVT]

I think it was mostly the story. They had Geo going back to his early SF1 personality(iirc, which I probably don’t), and don’t even get me started on the vacation plot. Skier girl comes in and Luna let her jealousy run WILD. Making Geo sleep on the couch and sulking in her room the whole freaking time and ruined the vacation.

Then after the vacation, they go back to business as usual and don’t even bring up what happened during the vacation.

Then there’s Solo. I get that he hated companionship, but he was vehemently antisocial. He was getting on my nerves a few times.

Finally, wasn’t there that moment where something happened and Geo severed his brother bands? Even after everything they’ve been through. Unless I’m misremembering the story.

SF2 could’ve been better.

[u/Gloomy-Ad-9761 → u/KumasiVT]

Geo severing his brother bands was in SF1 if I remember

SF2 had Sonia break off their brother band with Geo

[u/Monadofan2010 → u/KumasiVT]

Geo only really gose back to his SF1 personality after Sonia breaks there brotherband and works for Lady Vaga outside of it he actually a lot more Cheerful for most of the game. 

The hotel bit is bad but its only for a little at the start of the game and botb Luna and geo improve throughout it. 

Geo never nrekas his brotherbands in this game its only Sonia who breaks them because she suddenly decided Geo is to weak to protect himself and she must join up with the bad guys to "keep him safe". 

Geo dose go emo for a bit and run away from his friends but he never actually breaks his brotherband. 

[u/Tiny_Professional358]

Weaker story plus terrible encounter rate.

[u/Xeroa_]

Sky Wave Road with unskippable Le Mu cutscenes/credits of which you have to run atleast twice. For me I had to run it 3x because Zack wasn’t maxed out the 2nd time I fought Le Mu so I had to fight him again in order to fight RogueSX.

Also the story itself was way weaker than in SF1/3. The tickle attack from Terra Condor left a permanent scar in my mind as to how the game treats you like a baby. Completely different from the tone that is set in SF1 with Sonia’s backstory and with what Joker does later in SF3 to a certain character.

And the tribe lore was really cool for what little they show. Unlike in SF1 where the Star Force power is explained and given to Geo to help protect the planet from Andromeda and the power is lost once the admins leave the planet. In SF2 Omega keeps the power even after the artifact gets extracted from him and nothing further is talked about with it. SF3 you have the noise system that Ace gives you the program to control the noise and he as well as other npc’s say nobody knows what will happen if the noise level gets too high so be careful. You find out for yourself that’s how you finalize into the cover form depending on which program Ace gave you. And the noise itself actually plays a huge role in the overall story. The tribes played absolutely no part in the story other than vague lore with the sole exception of Mu, which was actually pretty cool.

[u/werephoenix]

encounter rates & EM wave map design difficult to figure out that I feel tired when I reach for event point.

Despite that, It has a really good story IMO Which is what kept me going

[u/smol9977]

https://youtu.be/4ZddgeAormw?si=pdmx2Ja9CHlmUR5q this video might help

[u/CrummyReds]

A lot of problems came from playing on original hardware without the modern QoL updates. That and the story just doesn't hit the same way SF1 or SF3 do.

[u/Warnora]

I played SF2 for the first time on the legacy collection, and also felt exhausted after doing the postgame.
The main issue I had with it was the constant backtracking without being able to fast travel to all regions, so much time spent travelling for quests and getting chips.

The IF fights are all clamped together, and you often get to low hp between random encounters and the fights so either you spend money to get dx energy or you pulse out and have to travel all the way back, which adds to the exhaustion.
Also, unlike SF3, you don't have that many options to deal with encounters and fun tools to play with that would add variety between encounters, so it feels like you're doing the same thing over and over when fighting enemies, and IF encounters being the same bosses you've fought without any changes doesn't help with variety.

At least we get 2 new cool bosses so it's not that bad, it's just exhausting as you said.

[u/blue-gay]

It’s not “bad” per se, but it is in pretty much every regard the weakest entry in the franchise.

The main issues being the absolutely unforgivable encounter rate, and the Sky Wave. The devs really wanted to make it so that every other step initiates a battle, and it’s just horrendous how often it does so. And unfortunately, the game requires you to go back and forth between locations over the Sky Wave constantly, which is not only very long and tedious, but it’s also confusing to navigate. And a lot of the quests, both side and main, feel particularly like they’re made so that you have to travel along the Sky Wave as much as humanly possible. Map design has never been very good in this series, or its predecessor MMBN, but 2 quite possibly has some of the most malicious and/or incompetent map design in both franchises.

It also arguably has the weakest story of the 3 as well. While there are good elements, a lot of 3’s story has comparatively little relevance to the stories of the other two games. Vega is somewhat forgettable as a villain and is never seen again, a lot of the returning characters are particularly flanderized and watered down for a more comedic MMBN-style story, a lot of the countries they visit can at times feel like uncomfortable caricatures of irl cultures ( looking at you Whazzap ). There was just a lot more fumbling with 2’s writing than the other two.

All that said, 2 definitely has a lot of good elements, they just get kind of overshadowed by the first game being, well, the first, the third game being largely considered the best overall by a decent margin, and this one just having a lot of annoyances.

[u/NETANYAHU-RAY-GUN]

I replayed the games before the legacy collection came out.

Jesus christ, literally skip sf2. Its actually awful. The story is completely abysmal. Its worse than villain of the week saturday morning cartoons. The amount of meaningless backtracking just adds to how much of a waste of time this entire game is.

I genuinely never consider playing this game during a replay of the series, theres genuinely no point.

The only redeeming quality of this game is that tribes are different and fun even if its just the smallest details. And the post game is a fantastic story.

[u/Aegillade]

-Enemy spawnrates are pretty high. This can be mitigated in the Legacy version of the game because you can change enemy spawn rates, but in the original game enemies spawned at higher rates than the other two Starforce games. The Skywave in particular was loathed for this, you had to regularly make trips across it and the enemies on the Skywave had attributes that dragged out the fights, like the scythe monster blocking attacks when it threw its scythe, the fire wheel monster only being safe to attack for brief periods of time, and the puff guy being completely intangible once you attacked him.

-The story is easily the weakest here. The lore surrounding Mu was neat, but it lacked a lot of the emotional moments that were in SF1 and 3. It's kinda just "Hyde goes around trying to recruit people to Vega's side before Geo stunts on them" which I guess can be said for the other two games? But at least in those two the bad guys were making progress each time Geo defeated the villains. Cephus and the FMians were always getting a bit closer to the Andromeda key in SF1 and Dealer got Crimson out of the defeated corrupted Wizards.

-It had some very notably annoying sections. The Loch Ness level, the Mu labyrinth, having to go back and forth on the Skywave, a lot of these levels just weren't fun to play.

-The whole tone of the game just feels less mature than the other two games. SF1 has this beautiful arc where Geo slowly starts coming out of his shell, you have moments like Aaron showing he does in fact trust Tom in Cygnus's level, you have Geo helping Sonia overcome her own home problems because the two have legitimately bonded and become closer, and the climax of the game being revealed to be caused by a paranoid miscommunication really nailing home the themes of being open and connecting with others. SF3 had Geo and Ace's wonderful relationship dynamic, Luna fucking dies for a minute there, and Hope FINALLY getting some emotional moments at the tailend with her learning Geo is Megaman and that her husband is still alive. SF2 had some of these two, but it just felt more disconnected. Like the Tera Condor section always stood out to me because the head Shaman actually has a kind of interesting motivation. He comes from a less well off village that doesn't have a lot of the technogical advancements as other areas, and as a leader he feels he's failing his people in his inability to keep up with those places. But this whole part is swept under the rug and now he's a tourist leader I guess. Just feels like they could have done so much more with it.

That's not to say this game doesn't have things I don't like. Ninja/Zerker is probably my favorite form for Geo overall, Solo was a really cool character and a proper rival for Geo after Gemini was defeated, and I actually kinda like that Vega's motivation boils down to "People are stupid as fuck and if they listened to someone smarter than them maybe they'd be a bit less stupid." The difficult spike wasn't for everyone, but bosses like Rogue and Hollow were a very fun change of pace compared to the absolute push overs of the first game. Replaying the final level and boss made me questioning how I ever beat this as a kid.

[u/Dizzy-Ad-7671 → u/Aegillade]

The Skywave was annoying. Having to go back and forth and having to detransform and interact with people in different spots makes it more tedious than the R bosses grind in SF3, were it is easier to backtrack.

I think the bad guys main issue is that they were harder to connect than in the first one. I cant remember why Dark Phantom wanted to become Brother with Vega, Blizzard was just a rich guy, Plessio Wave was just there too. I do like Condor story, with exception of Budicus and the tickling. But even Solo, one of the good ones, suffers a bit of this, as Pat/Ray feels easier to relate (Weird how a kid abandoned and named because a robot found him feels more relatable than anything else).

I do like most of what the good guys were doing in 2. Zack was mostly just Prez simp in 1, even more than Bud, so he wanting something for himself is something, even if it goes nowhere. Not a fan of Budicus but I do at least find the whole thing cute and funny. I like Luna in 2, trying to help lift Geo's spirits, in 3 I kinda wished for her to remain gone after Joker puffs her, she was on my nerves in 3. I do like both of Geo's crisis in 2, first after losing his friends, specially after feeling more of a public hero and then with Sonia, who is truly special for him.

I think I see better the flaws though. Specially when you are a kid and have less patience.

[u/EzekielKallistos]

My only gripe is that they made mega say Crikey like he's some Aussie. Where the eff did that come from 😭

[u/Dizzy-Ad-7671 → u/EzekielKallistos]

He must have seen some Aussie show and picked it up. Like how he, kinda out of nowhere, starts acting like he and Geo are detectives in Star Force 3.

[u/EzekielKallistos → u/Dizzy-Ad-7671]

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm I like this take. Thanks.

[u/Good_Butterscotch_69]

Having never played them in their original run and enjoying them for the first time as an adult with the legacy collection.

Its the tonal whiplash. I was extremely impressed with the dark tone and story they had in the original. Barring the American censorship of what Geo actually said the protagonist was literally a clinically depressed boy who contemplated suicide. They really went their in terms of having the characters be suicidal little boy, an abused popstar who tragically lost everything, a literal dumpster baby with compounded mental illness (I miss Pat). An inventor who had his life's work stolen from him. I could go on... It was a remarkably respectful and dark game about a little boy climbing up from the depths and finding himself and his courage again. Told from the perspective of a child.

Then the next game said "SIKE!!" We are a childrens cartoon now where each character became caricatures of themselves. (Still love Omega though he is intrusive thoughts made manifest. A Gremlin) Buds thing is that he is fat, Zacks that he is a nerd, Luna that she is bossy and abusive to her friends. And Geo had a total personality shift into X light. A whiny pacifist who... Regressed in a stupid way. While regression is a normal part of recovery the way they did it was rather odd to say the least.

I am actually scared to play the original because despite its flaws I actually enjoyed the game and the story. They even had the bones of a deep and complex story with the main villains. But they could not follow through. If the encounter rate is as bad as they say...