I have loved the Suikoden franchise since I played the original game on the PlayStation. I'm a big enough fan that I forced my way through Suikoden IV, imported Suikogaiden and even played the forgettable PSP game that was the last entry in the franchise. My favorites will always be the two original games. Suikoden I & II are some of the best RPGs out there, but frustratingly, they're also some of the rarest. They were briefly available on the PSN online store, but they've never been widely available. That's why Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune & Dunan Unification Wars is a genuine delight. It gives me the chance to replay two of my favorite games, and it's probably the best way to play them.

Suikoden I follows a young hero who's the son of the great warrior Teo McDohl. When his father goes off to war, the younger McDohl is assigned to help the Empire with some basic missions. Unfortunately, during one such mission, he runs into a dangerous situation that reveals an ancient weapon of great power: The Soul Eater, a magical rune with the power over life and death. McDohl is forced to escape with the rune to keep it away from those who wish to take it and seize ultimate power for themselves. His only hope is to raise an army to unite those who've been oppressed by the Emperor.

Suikoden I has memorable characters and some incredibly distinct scenes, and it's a fantastic introduction to the world. I like the game a lot, but it's also kind of basic. Heroes and villains alike only have a few lines of dialogue and brief flashes of personality. There are roughly five characters who get any focus, and most events are quickly glossed over. The entire game is straightforward and to the point, and the villains only get the slightest bit of detail. The settings and events are compelling enough that the game still shines, but the sequel was more fleshed out.

Suikoden is a traditional RPG in a lot of ways. You'll go through dungeons, get equipment, gather party members, and progress the plot. If you've played most RPGs, you have a good idea of what to expect. Where it stands out is in the sheer size of the conflicts. Suikoden's coolest feature is easily the Stars of Destiny. As soon as you unlock your castle in the game, you gain the ability to recruit the 108 Stars of Destiny. These are unique characters who, upon completing a task or helping them with something, will agree to go to your castle. Some of the characters are warriors, some of them are merchants, and one just wants to stand in front of your castle and scream its name. There's a good variety of characters and while not every character is distinct, you get such a diverse and memorable crew that it's easy to enjoy. It also contributes to building up your castle, which upgrades it from a dinky abandoned tower to a thriving metropolis full of every item you could possibly want — and some hot springs to boot. Recruiting all 108 stars is required to get the game's best ending.

In Suikoden's combat system, you have a six-person party that's divided into a front row and back row. You select actions for every character in the party, and actions go off all at once. Some characters are short range, some are medium range and some are long range, which roughly means they excel in the front row, either row or the back row. This is important to consider when selecting a party because if you overload your party with short-range attackers, you might not be able to progress.

Magic is also distinct. Almost every character can equip a rune, which is a magical artifact that grants them access to a special ability, such as special attacks, passive bonuses, and traditional magic. However, the traditional magic doesn't use an MP system. It's inspired by Dungeons and Dragons, so you have a certain number of spell casts for up to four different ranks. Using a spell takes one cast, and once you've run out, you can't cast any spells of that rank until you can rest. Each character has different numbers of slots, so some characters excel in magic, while others are better for non-magic special abilities, like the Double Beat Rune, which allows characters to attack twice.

Probably the most enjoyable part of the combat system is the Unite attacks. When two or more specific characters are in a party, they can combine their strengths to generate a Unite attack, which uses up the turn for all characters participating in the attack. Some Unite attacks do additional damage or hit all enemies, and most have a neat or amusing animation. They have some risks, as some can leave one or more characters unable to act in the next turn.

In addition to standard combat, Suikoden also has two different types of fights. Duels is a one-on-one fight between one of your allies and an enemy. The enemy will do one of three things: attack, defend or execute a special move. You need to counter it by reading their intent from their dialogue and choosing the proper response. Attacks do damage to a defending enemy, defend counters a special move, and special moves overwhelm attacking enemies. There are only a couple of these fights in the game, but they're memorable. (Losing can have more serious consequences than just a game over screen.)

War Battles is the other type of fight. It's built around a rock-paper-scissors mechanic but is slightly more complex. Both sides have a choice of bow, charge or magic. Bow beats magic, charge beats bow, and magic beats charge. Choose the correct option, and you deal damage without taking it. Choose the wrong one, and the opposite can occur. Choose really badly, and one of your Stars of Destiny can be injured or killed, so you won't get the game's good ending. Thankfully, the various 108 Stars can add options to make it easier, such as Ninjas who can identify the enemy's next action or Dragon Riders who can do a free attack that counters both charge and magic.

War Battles are probably my least favorite part of Suikoden, but they are relatively minor. Since the consequence of choosing wrong is so dire, there is little reason to keep going if someone gets injured or killed when you can just reload a save. Once you get past the early game, you'll also have enough Dragon Riders, Ninjas and Thieves that it isn't a gamble. You'll usually know what to do for almost every round. They don't get in the way, but they feel half-baked. (Thankfully, Suikoden II improves upon this.)

Functionally, Suikoden I is the appetizer to the main course that is Suikoden II. While it's a fully featured RPG, it's also a relatively short one that you can finish in 12-15 hours. It's a solid experience, but it adds to the unavoidable feeling that the first game was a prototype for the sequel. It's still worth playing, especially since your save data can transfer to the sequel, and I'd argue that it's ideal to play them back to back.

Suikoden II follows the events of the first game, but it's set in an entirely new land. You play as a young hero who is part of the Highland Kingdom's Unicorn Brigade, a group of military cadets. Your character and his best friend Jowy are caught in an ambush. The ambush was planned by the evil Luca Blight, the prince of the very kingdom they had sworn to protect. The friends narrowly escape with their lives and must set out to avenge their fallen comrades. Before long, they are also drawn into a conflict that spans an entire kingdom and 108 heroes.

Suikoden II is the perfected form of Suikoden I's story. It follows the same basic concept of an unlikely hero gathering a band of champions to fight evil, but it gives everything more depth, more focus, and more complexity. The morality of the situations is less black-and-white, the characters are more varied, and it's generally a big step up. The sequel really puts Suikoden on the map, and years later, it still shines.

The core gameplay is pretty much the same as Suikoden I. You have 108 recruitable heroes, six-person battle parties, Unite attacks, and more. The bulk of the changes are under the hood, such as a massively improved user interface, the ability to equip multiple runes at once, a more varied selection of potential characters, and so on. Like the story, Suikoden II takes everything that worked in Suikoden I and amplifies it.

A significant change is in War Battles, but this is almost entirely a positive. Instead of using the rock-paper-scissors mechanic from Suikoden I, your recruited characters can be placed into units together and fight enemy armies, like in a turn-based strategy game. It's not too complex, but it feels like actual gameplay instead of depending on the randomness of rock-paper-scissors. However, it takes a long time before you're allowed to fight in a real War Battle instead of winning or losing for plot reasons.

Suikoden II is a genuine delight from start to finish. It's constantly creative, clever and enjoyable, and the HD Remaster really lets it shine. The story is engaging, the characters are lovable, the sprite animations are excellent, and the core gameplay is plain fun. The only complaint I have is that it's a tad too easy at times, but it's a small price to pay for letting you use any of a massive number of different characters.

As far as changes to the games go, Suikoden I & II have received some noteworthy updates. The games have received a full re-translation. The new translation seems to be a marked improvement from the old one. It fixes some of the more egregious translation mistakes while retaining the flavor and character. There's more consistent use of terms across both games, localized terms that better match the original game or later translations, and more. Overall, it's a really nice improvement, especially since the original Suikoden II had a rough translation.

There are also a number of nice quality-of-life features. Combat can be sped up, which makes the combat go a little more quickly. The Dash button is now accessible without needing to equip a Holy Rune. There are a lot of small bug fixes and some neat optional choices, like the ability to pause the Event Timer in Suikoden II. (This should make it less painful to watch Clive's full story.) There's even a convenient auto-save that triggers before boss battles or major events, so if you forget to save, you're not out of luck. There are areas where I wish the development team had gone further. Suikoden I's user interface is cleaner, but it is still functionally the same interface as in the original game. That means annoying inventory limits, having to awkwardly juggle equipment if you want to change what someone is wearing, and more. It would've been nice for adjustments there, but even then, that's mostly a flaw with the original game, and I can't blame the development team for not making that huge change.

The biggest change is to the graphics. While the game's sprites have seen some minor touch-ups, the backgrounds and Suikoden I's character art have seen a significant reworking. For the most part, these are improvements. The new character art for Suikoden I looks much cleaner and easier to read than the original, and the new environments have some gorgeous design choices. However, there are a few areas where the dev team went overboard, and I missed some of the more subdued art in the original. For most people, I'd imagine this collection will be an improvement. The soundtrack sounds as amazing as ever, and both titles already featured some of my favorite video game music. Things are crisper and clearer but largely the same.

Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune & Dunan Unification Wars is an excellent updated port of two great games. Almost all of the changes are for the better, the translation is massively improved, and it still maintains all of the charm and flavor of the original games. Whether you're a longtime fan or a newcomer to the franchise, there's genuinely no better place to start than the Suikoden I & II HD Remaster. Even if you're just a fan of RPGs, it's well worth a try, if only to see what all the hype is about.

Score: 9.0/10