Not as great as it's predecessor... enough said.
User Rating: 7.5 | Shadow Hearts: From the New World PS2
This game gives an overall feel of attempting too hard to come up with an outstanding work of gameplay. Sadly, the game is disappointing on multiple levels. The main hero character of Johnny Garland is to put it plainly... annoyingly whiny to the nth degree. The often attempted spoof work upon various American stereotypes is a sad attempt to add flavor to a dry cut story. It just wasn't humorous enough in a natural way to really become compatible with the flow of the game. The music was ok but nothing stood out as a whole. The real draw in the game is the battle aspects. The use of the upgraded combo system and the A.I.'s slight upgrade made the game more challenging, but the drawback throughout the whole game remained the tedious snap-shooting that needed to be done. The lack of fusions in this game was a letdown and the regurgitated magic attacks that appear in the fusion skills begs to question the sanity of the creators of the game. The stupidity of the transformations of Shania for "eye-candy" is just an eye sore and comes out as just blatantly being used as a failed attempt to cash in on the success of the D.O.A. Volleyball bandwagon. Overall the game remained good but not great as it proved challenging at times, but the game could be shortened considerably while avoiding the cliche things that appear throughout the game. 
