The main problem ni no kuni 2 has is that it plays too safe, way, way too safe.

The story lacks any type of engagement or epicity, you have to build a kingdom, go to every main city, solve the problem they have, proceed to the next one and do the same, this is the whole plot no kidding. The characters are all uninteresting and way too "good", everybody seems to come out of a book for 6 years old children, they are all nice and perfect.

The combat system is fluid and has an overall nice feeling but it lacks depth and balance, there are some characters way more powerful than others and the action oriented gameplay is all centered around smashing the attack button until you can release a more powerful attack and repeat, it's also evident that it wasn't designed for higher difficulties added later with patches: you can only control one character at the time with others controlled by ai, and unless you manually swap control when bosses realease powerfull attack they will not move away and die everytime.

There is a managing side game centered around building your kingdom but the only control you have is the order of your upgrades, the building locations will always be the same and in the end it's just a more engaging way of upgrading your stats. I am kind of biased because I don't usually like these type of managing systems but I found it lacking under many departments, expecially customization which is the main reason you wanna manage something.

The aestetics is the only redeeming factor in this game. It has the classic gibli style and it's really pleasing.

The main problem ni no kuni 2 has is that it plays too safe, way, way too safe. The story lacks any type of engagement or epicity, you have to build a kingdom, go to every main city, solve the problem they have, proceed to the next one and do the same, this is the whole plot no kidding. The characters are all uninteresting and way too "good", everybody seems to come out of a book for 6 years old children, they are all nice and perfect. The combat system is fluid and has an overall nice feeling but it lacks depth and balance, there are some characters way more powerful than others and the action oriented gameplay is all centered around smashing the attack button until you can release a more powerful attack and repeat, it's also evident that it wasn't designed for higher difficulties added later with patches: you can only control one character at the time with others controlled by ai, and unless you manually swap control when bosses realease powerfull attack they will not move away and die everytime. There is a managing side game centered around building your kingdom but the only control you have is the order of your upgrades, the building locations will always be the same and in the end it's just a more engaging way of upgrading your stats. I am kind of biased because I don't usually like these type of managing systems but I found it lacking under many departments, expecially customization which is the main reason you wanna manage something. The aestetics is the only redeeming factor in this game. It has the classic gibli style and it's really pleasing.