What is the best RPG for the Playstation 2? Easily, anyone can tell you that Final Fantasy 10 is the hands down winner. What is the second best RPG? Well, most people will not mention Shadow Hearts. Why is that? Shadow Hearts was released at approximately the same time as Final Fantasy 10, making what should have been a decent selling RPG disappear into obscurity.

Shadow Hearts most closely resembles Final Fantasy 8 in terms of graphics and gameplay. You have a party of 3 active characters and maybe a couple unused characters. They travel in a linear progression from location to location solving mysteries of the undead. The story is told through in game cutscenes, with only a few higher quality scenes. The game is mostly read text, with very few spoken lines. The graphics are dated compared to more recent outings on the Playstation 2, and looks like the game was a couple years old.

The story is relatively simple, but does contain a few twists and turns. Essentially, the main character possesses the ability to morph to demons. Somehow, this makes him a figure of destiny and powerful enough to fight Gods. You traverse through Asia and Europe proving how much tougher you are than the monsters you encounter.

The combat system is the highlight of the game. When you get into combat, you have a judgment ring. In order to complete actions, you must press the x button on the controller as a line moves around the ring. Depending on how well you time your presses, you can do increased damage and multiple attacks. This adds a sense of skill and timing which can drastically alter the outcome of a combat.

There are many monsters in the game, but none is overly memorable. In each area you explore, you only get to sample two or three repetitively. One monster did strike me odd. It was a male monster with a foot long male part. The monster attacked by smacking you back and forth with that part. A million nasty comments come to mind here, but knowing that there are sensitive readers out there, I will leave it for you all to make your own jokes.

With the lack of true RPGs out for the PS2, Shadow Hearts should be on everyones short list along with Final Fantasy 10 and Grandia 2. I enjoy the game in chunks, often taking week long breaks between adventure, but I keep coming back to it. I liked the game a lot more before I played Final Fantasy 10, but absent that game, it stands out pretty well on its own.

Final Grade: B