Part 24: Two Rivers, Three Races

One of the things that makes II's headquarters worse than I's is that there's a billion more hallways with little to nothing in them and many places are hidden away. It's not hard to find your port, but it can be annoying to find places such as where the restaurant is later on.



Suikoden 2 Tunes – The Sea is Vast, Isn't It?

Oh and yeah, Yam Koo supplies a fishing minigame now. Basically it's 100 potch per play, and you can either keep the fish you catch to cook them, or sell them to Yam Koo.



If you get tired, you can reel the line in with Triangle.



You have to keep the fish's Pulling Power in sync with how much you're reeling in. If you go above the box, you'll pull too hard and the hook will come out of the fish. It's a really easy game to get the hang of.







Got a whitefish, which isn't close to the best catch you can make here. Anyway, there's a variety of fish to catch and it's just a fun little thing to do on the side.



Some of these are used for recipes, some of these are used for selling. The boots are junk items.



Richmond offers two services: One, you can pay him to stalk one of your characters to learn little things about them. I generally cover all of these in my bios.



He also reveals characters you might be able to acquire at this point in time, and how to get them. You can pay him to tell you how to do it. Because I'm silly, I sent him to find out more about Mukumuku. It takes him a little time to figure this stuff out, so go do other things in the meantime.



Viktor really needs to stop treating guests so rudely.



Unfortunately, piloting the boat places Amada in the convoy and you can't move him out of it, so we need to go put in another party member. Fitcher also joins the convoy.



Now we have a boat! Whoopee.



First thing we're going to do is dock in Kuskus and go back to South Window.



Clive will now join us since we've used our boat (note that you have to actually go out on the world map with it to trigger his recruitment). This is also the next step to continue his story, as he needs to be recruited and taken to Lakewest to track Elza. He also forces himself into our party.



Clive is much better in this game thanks to his insane Technique growth. Slap a Double-Beat Rune on him and he'll hit pretty much every enemy on the field in his turn. He's also an example of strong offensive long-range characters. Also your boat automatically returns to the HQ when you dock it in another city, which is a bit annoying.



In the second floor of South Window's Inn, Alex, Hilda, and Pete are just standing around.



They have some sort of bet going...





I know, it's shockin' everybody



Alex has given up treasure hunting, but Hilda wants to help out. Since she won the bet about our new Lordship, they both join us regardless of Alex's misgivings. Alex opens up an Item shop in our HQ, which works the same way as the first game in that it scales with item shops you've visited. It does not, however, compile Rare Finds from those places. You must find those on your own in their respective shops. Hilda, of course, opens up the Inn. Both of these are located upstairs from the Tavern.



The next recruit requires that we buy a Sacrificial Jizo (or strip it off Bolgan/Clive), a Wooden Shield, and a Wind Rune.



Meet Adlai, an inventor.



He doesn't care about our army, but he sure does want things.



He's also pretty senile, or at least can fake it well.





Choose option 2 here or you'll have to do this all over again.



He enjoys our rebellious nature, and we automatically head back to the HQ.



Sergei beat you to the punch five years ago, man.

Suikoden 2 Tunes – Carried On Rippling Waves ~ Lakewest Theme

Lakewest is a small town of 2,000 people that is known for producing seaweed and dried fish for export.





Fitcher also writes us a letter to get in to see Makai when we reach Two River. Amada will kick back and wait by the boat, so we are free to do whatever.



The basket of vegetables to our right contains the Kindness Rune, an interesting Rune. This Rune adds attack power over time. Normally, it gives the character +1 ATK for every hour they are in the active party (NOT convoy). It also gives +1 ATK power when you give that character a stat-boosting stone. Since you can farm unlimited stones in this game, you can use the Kindness Rune to break the game even harder. The maximum Kindness value that can be added to your attack is 255.

HOWEVER, you can get negative Kindness. To do so, you have to repeatedly have that character be knocked unconscious, since it subtracts ATK power and Kindness level. A negative Kindness value causes a glitch and loops back around to give you 999 ATK. This Rune only exists in 2, and for good reason.



If you're continuing Clive's quest, you'll talk to this guy beside the counter in the Inn. He'll tell you Elza went to Forest Village, which is west of Greenhill. You'll need to reach there by 13 hours, 1 minute.



As you can expect, we get a farmer later on. He'll grow produce, which we need the seeds for.



There's another missable recipe here, Recipe #16. You can only get this before talking to Taki and convincing her to join the army, because once she leaves her house you can't go back in.



We have to talk to her multiple times.



If you were wondering, Taki is the Onil of this game, she loves to gossip. She will also give you hints on how to acquire party members outside of Richmond.



Well, we already foiled that.



She joins us because she figures we're on hard times and she can help us out. What a kind old lady.



There are some interesting, if not annoying, enemies in the Lakewest region. But they're not that tough. These Spikebeaks can drop Balance Runes, which as you know keep a character from becoming Unbalanced. If you want to use the Family Attack Unite infinitely, farm one and put it on Nanami ASAP. The Rockadillos (armadillo enemies) drop Turtle Plans #1, but we won't know what that's for until much later.



Suikoden 2 Tunes – Every Day is a Carnival ~ Two River Theme

As soon as we enter Two River, our money is stolen. Fuck.



Oh and here's a shot of the region, because I forgot to show where we are. Lakewest is to the east, Kobold Village to the south, and Greenhill to the north.



Two River is separated into three districts. We're currently in the Human district. The Two River Principality is one of the oldest members of the Jowston Alliance, and thus is a very old city. It was originally inhabited by humans and kobolds, but wingers settled down in the strip between the two branches of the Lana River. Genkaku had invited them there after Tinto's strip mining had destroyed their habitat. They were then discriminated against and belittled by the natives.

The city itself has 9,000 residents split into three districts. Each district has a different standard of living with the wingers being stratified and discriminated against, the kobolds operating as a military force primarily, and the humans enjoying a vast amount of wealth.



Yeah, so that winged kid stole our reference letter.



Racism is thick in this town, and we have to deal with it like any jRPG.



Those damn minorities, doing things we don't do!



Guess he's heading to the second district. Let's follow him.



On the second floor of the inn is Hans, an armorer.





Now you can choose these options, but it actually makes it much harder to recruit Hans. You see, he WILL spend in-game time gathering the potch needed to pay you these amounts, and considering there's a potch glitch we can exploit over and over again later in the game, this isn't worth your time. The first option makes him join automatically.

Plus I'd rather make people happy sometimes.



Goddamn winged kids.

Artwork:



Clive – Tensyo Star

Despite his cloak looking less trash-baggy, the need to age him down was a weird choice on the artist's end, especially when Viktor, Flik, and Luc look older than their S1 counterparts. Going into his backstory would spoil the Elza plotline, so I won't say anything at the moment.



Alex – Chisu Star

The game's item shopkeeper. Learned that the secret of the Sindar is family values.



Hilda – Chiin Star

The game's innkeeper.



Adlai – Chisou Star

His elevator is apparently powered by four “Elevator Barbarians” who lift it with their strength. They train in a forest near Greenhill.



Taki – Chizen Star

She spends time being a rumormonger/gossiper inside the castle. She grew up in Lakewest and lived there all her life, although she has children that have all moved to Two River. She visits them from time to time.



Hans – Chiyu Star

The game's armorer. If you ask him to pay you to join, he'll take his time to acquire the money before actually joining you.