Completely different from its predecessor, Dark Cloud 2 is a fine looking game that makes good use of an advanced technique of cel shading to render characters and environments. The game runs smoothly at 30-40 frames per second, with just insignificant slowdowns and minor pop-up issues in some areas. Character design is good, and the clothing style is inspired by the fashion of the late XIX century; the cel-shaded characters are built with a good number of polygons, and are very well textured. Anyhow, while animations are more refined than in other cel-shaded titles like Wild Arms 3, characters' movements look still too rough: the big hands are motionless, faces' expressiveness is very limited, and even simple movements like walking or running can look very robotic, especially during the in-game cutscenes.

The world of Dark Cloud 2 is bright, colorful, and designed with an unmistakable style that blends different influences (anime, fantasy, Art Nouveau). Buildings are amazingly detailed, both on the outside and in the interiors; even the most insignificant place, like a bakery, has been realized up to the slightest detail, and look warm, vibrant: a spectacular achievement considering the size of the game.

A good amount of work was also put into the creation of nice looking random generated dungeons; while they look inevitably repetitive, the nice colors, the good textures, and the intelligent use of lighting and particle effects make the long explorations of the floors more pleasant than in the previous Dark Cloud.

Dark Cloud 2's soundtrack is made of clean, well-orchestrated, and enjoyable music, with some memorable theme thrown into a scene when needed. Nevertheless, the sensation is that Dark Cloud 2's soundtrack is less emotional than the one of other adventure games, and seems often more aimed at describing environments than at guiding the player's feelings.

Voce acting is good, and many characters, like the evil clown Floatsam and other bad guys, are acted with great humor and style. Thankfully Max hasn't that usual cool teenage voice of your average RPG hero, and even secondary characters can be source of some surprising touch of originally from the voice talents. Definitely a good work, completed by fine sound effects.

One of the longest games available on the system. It took us 50 hours to complete the game, but it can be enjoyed for a much longer time, probably up to 100 and more hours. And we are not speaking of hours made of random battles, like in many other RPGs. Dark Cloud 2 features tons of truly amusing mini-games, sidequests, optional activities: the game is designed so that the more you play it, the more the experience becomes rich, creative, and involving. Perfect.