Customer Reviews

Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories - The Official Strategy Guide

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

For the last couple years, DoubleJump Books has been making increasingly better strategy guides for games (most of which seem to be from Atlus). While the guide looks more like a traditional book than the larger guides most people are used to seeing in videogame stores (those of BradyGames and Prima primarilly), they tend to contain the most in depth strategies of any of the publishers.

The guide opens up with the explanation of the game system and features, nothing really new there. Although they knew that the primary audience for this game would be people who are already familiar with the gameplay style of the original Disgaea and other Nippon Ichi(N1) games so they placed a "NEW" tag next to any section that had changed or been added to. This makes it much easier for those familiar with the series already to go straight to what has changed.

The walkthrough is very well done with pictures of the maps, enemy lists, and complete breakdowns of items available to steal and the amount of Mana and EXP you can gain from completing the map. Certainly this is expected, but then they go one step beyond and provide a breakdown for completing every level either Solo (using main characters, magic users, or monsters) as well as main character only guides. This is done on every level (even bonus and extra levels in the post game).

There is a section in the middle of secrets and unlockables. Knowing that there would be people who don't want to know the fun little secrets of the game until later, they made the wise decision of turning the pages upside down so if you are just flipping through it is difficult to catch any of the major information. As always the charts, item ranks/lists, character classes and so on are very well constructed and simple to understand. Always good, especially for a game such as Disgaea where item leveling and character classes are focal points.

The last two things I will get into are the things that have been added that I have never seen done in any other strategy guide. First is the fact that DoubleJump went through the trouble of calculating (or getting them from N1) nearly every formula used for determining damage, exp, money, mana and so on and so forth in the game and placed them all in the book. So for those of you who don't mind getting into nitty-gritty math you can project how well your characters will be in advance. The second thing is probably the most important (and should be to anyone familiar with the original game), they added a section specializing on how to power-level and maximize your items to their most powerful states in the quickest way possible. One of my personal favorite tips is on the last page or so they tell you exactly how you can do over 2 billion points of damage with one attack. May seem like overkill, but for the amount of time that can be spent on this game, these tips are well recieved.

Overall this is one of the greatest strategy guides I have ever seen. Not to mention the biggest (640 pages). For anyone who really wants to get the most out of this game (especially after the main quest) this guide will be by your side and helping you the entire way. You will always find a use for it becuase as they said on the back cover, "We went a little overboard."

At 640 pages, this is one chunky guide aimed at the hardcore Disgaea 2 player. Unfortunately, the guide is aimed solely at this theoretical hardcore gamer - the one planning to spend 200+ hours on the game, continuing to play it to death long after completion of the main storyline for the sole purpose of attaining the highest stats and inflicting the most damage. To this end, the guide is impeccable; multi-page chapters go into microscopic detail on how to exploit the game's many systems in order to create ultimate items, "powerlevel" characters so that they inflict (literally) billions of points of damage with a single attack, and so on.

Unfortunately, the actual walkthrough and guide section for the game's main storyline is skimpy, often leaving out crucial information and sticking to rudimentary, paragraph-long "first kill the zombies, then go after the slugs"-style strategies for each level. The guide often makes references to characters and classes, such as the beastmaster, without giving any explanation as to how to actually unlock that particular quasi-hidden class in the first place, leaving the gamer/reader confused and searching internet message boards for answers - a resort that feels inappropriate after having shelled out $20 for a strategy guide.

Also strangely absent are party strategies for tackling the main storyline - nowhere does the guide suggest a balanced party lineup or even explain the advantages and disadvantages of different classes and monsters within a party. At one point, I found myself stuck on a stage with the guide suggesting that I use "my mothman" to accomplish something without ever having suggested that I add a mothman in the first placel; this sort of lack of information and assumption plagues the majority of the guide.

For the gamer looking to play for hundreds of hours in search of higher statistics, this is a great guide - but woe to the more casual gamer looking for a basic strategy guide for the main game!

I read many guides before and they rarely tell me something I don't know, but this Gide for Disgaea 2 is not one of them. The guide is about as big as your average paper back, but it packs more then 600 pages, and two thirds of the book is tips, tables, facts and stats. The last third is a second walkthrough section but with spoilers and secrets, and it is also inverted (pages bound upside down) to lessen the chance of you ruining any surprises by opening up to the wrong page.

I feel this is a worthy guide for anyone needing help or and extra edge in dominating the game.

No really, they rock. Best strategy guides in the industry. Did I mention they rock?

I am blown away with every Doublejump guide I buy. The amount of detail they cram into these guides is insane. You can tell the writers at Doublejump have a passion for the games they create guides for, and a deep understanding of those games as well.

The presentation of this guide is excellent, as is every Doublejump guide. The paper feels thick, and the pages are colorful and easy to read. One thing I really appreciate is how they invert a section of the guide called "Spoilers" so you can be sure you won't flip a page and find out something you wish you hadn't!

As another reviewer has already said, I now consider buying games if they have a Doublejump guide. The extra price is well worth it, if only all guides could be this complete and well written!

Received book in advance from its time, in great condition like it says and very cheap, thanks again dear friend

Arrived quickly and in good condition. Bought this guidebook for my son. He found it very helpful and is making good use of it. Thank you.

This arrived on time since it was an international delivery and it came in perfect condition. good seller

This was a gift for my son and he says it's pretty good. He loves the Disgaea game series. He usually enjoys the strategy guides along with the games.

A very useful guide to help with the game. The book is smaller than most strategy guides, which can make it more difficult to look at but it's got pretty good stategies and a few parts that really helped me through some tough times in the game. It was easier to have everything in one guide instead of looking through several guides on Gamefaqs. I'd advise it to anyone playing through the game for the first time, though not anyone who has already beaten it once.