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If you haven't played the first two...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 9
Date: March 31, 2006
Author: Amazon User

...then you may not understand the appeal- especially if you played 3 or 4. I have only played this one for awhile and I'll say it is better than the last two. If you are a fan, you know you are going to buy it- stop reading this- I'm not going to tell you anything THAT useful!! If you aren't a fan, well, I think it is good enough to try (something I would not have said about 3 and 4, probably). Better than Star Ocean which I found to be fun but tedious with the repeating maps and absurd characters (what happens when 15 yr old characters have to save the universe!)...and frankly nothing out there is great on the RPG market (I'd guess the PS3's debut will continue this drought).
So... It looks decent- too much emphasis in my opinion, the story is interesting (this isn't a book, but the plot is decent), music doesn't grate on the nerves, and the character's customization is great (something noticeably lacking in Suikoden previously). The cons are the cutscenes really don't need to exist, the exploration needs to be more plot driven, and the load times are a bit annoying- then again this is occuring in a lot of games lately.

I was lucky to buy Suikoden 1&2 and I don't see Konami matching how fun they were... were they hip or incredibly unique? Not really, but I loved all the goofy side-stories and the stories made sense as simple (BUT SOLID) good and evil stories, but with personal conflict...like the two 'brothers' who end up on different sides of the battle. This returns to a more solid story base and the faults of the game are more easily overlookd for it.

I was disappointed in 3. The castle stank and the story made no sense- it was like playing a "Signing of NAFTA" game.... 4 was almost worse, god- that stupid boat going back and forth across that TINY but irritating map... the TRITE rich boy character!! And those STUPID sea battles...argh! (OK,OK I didn't finish it...maybe it got great). So, I'd say give it a try unless there is some game you KNOW you will enjoy more. You'll find a fun and interesting game.

Finally, a game that requires Stradegy.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 4
Date: June 07, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This RPG is one well worth buying. Here's why.
Most of the recent RPG's I have played just trot along
giving little thought to how the game progresses. I was very suprised that this game was difficult enough to keep me playing.
One of my favorite parts is the "Dual Matches". This is a one on one battle where you have to choose what you do by listening to your opponent's aggressiveness. The "War Battles" are also interesting. These battles play much like Age of Empires.
The dungons are quite complex and take some memorization. A world map is found when you find one of the 108 optonal characters in the story. Finding them is a sidequest on it's own. So all in all this game goes on my top 10 rpg list and is well worth buying.
These are my recommendations.
Chrono Cross
Chrono Trigger
Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy VIII
Suikoden V
Silent Hill 1-3
Final Fantasy Tactics
Suikoden IV

about time

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: July 26, 2006
Author: Amazon User

i must say i have been a fan of these games from the begining, i have played all of them, however 3,4 and tatics were all disappointing to me. i wanted it to get back to the second game which is my favorite, or so i thought. now i can say about time, this game is the best so far a must play for anyone who like the series

Powerful narrative and full-featured RPG

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: July 18, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Look out Square/Enix! Konami has really built this series from the ground up. The 5th installment is easily the best so far, doing everything a great RPG should.

Frustrating.....but worth the time

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 14
Date: April 29, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Alright basically this game is fun if you're an RPG player but it has a lot of flaws which I don't understand why were allowed to happen.

Good Stuff:
-battle system
-characters

Bad Stuff:
-cliche storyline
-HORRIBLE ENDING!!! RUINED EVERYTHING!!
-replay option is hardly worth it--you don't even keep your level or your equipped items!!
-no world map on a game with a world map???!!! How are you supposed to figure out where you are?
-Difficult to find the 108 stars--much more difficult that Suikoden 3
-long periods with no way to heal--just make a "tent" item like final fantasy!!
-combination of incredibly high random battle rate and long loading time make battles somewhat annoying. But really, in the Twilight Forest I couldn't move 3 steps without another battle! Combine that with the fact that the area was designed to be confusing it took me 6 hours to get out of there!

I know I listed a lot more flaws than good things but it really is worth the money it's just incredibly frustrating at times.

Only for the Old School RPG Players

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: April 10, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I have been a fan of the Suikoden series since the beginning and I have to say that five is the greatest one created. Graphics aren't ground breaking and the character/battle system isn't anything new but that is the game's greatest feature. This game brings back the game play of Suikoden 2 which is good in my book (Felt that they were slipping with 3 and 4).

Overall: If you are a fan of the older RPGs this game is a must have. If you are in real-time battle, innovative game play and/or fancy graphics you may want to look somewhere else for a RPG. If you decide to play this game I suggest you buy the guide but only after you beat it the first time.

NOW LOADING......

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 4 / 19
Date: March 31, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I've played about 4 hours of this game so far (using no walkthrough guide) and while there is plenty to be impressed at,
there are quite a few downfalls from the last installation of Suikoden,part 4.

First of all,and most notably,THE LOAD TIMES! There is a "now loading screen" with the little hero runing,after EVERY SINGLE RANDOM BATTLE!! That's nearly unforgivable.Konami should have gotten rid of all those needless voice over cutscenes to make more room for memory,thus cutting down on all the now loading times.I would be more than happy to give up some of the flashy graphics in exchange for less load times.

What's bad is that voice over cutscenes are alright,so long as they are a significant part to the story.No,not here.You get a voice over scene when you regroup with your party at town,when you need to talk to someone at the inn,meet your sister,walk the dog,scratch your arm,go to the bathroom.What's with all these friggin' voice overs!? It's almost like Konami wants to prove so badly that they can do this,which to me isn't all that impressive to begin with.Part 1 and 2 didn't have the technology of 5,yet the story,and more importantly the gameplay was excellent.More isn't always better.Please stick to making video games instead of movies.

Another bad thing is that we are seeing a return to Suikoden 3
(the very worst in the series as far as I'm concerned)as there is soooo much "go here,go there,talk to this person,talk to that person;wander around until you trigger the next scene".
With 4 as well as 1 and 2,you pretty much got to the fighting and experience gaining right off the bat.You know,the whole fun
of playing an RPG?

Also with the way that the characters are dressed,I feel like I'm playing something that is really wanting to be FFX-FFX2, Kingdom Hearts.Please,you don't need to copy;you are BETTER than those games.Be a leader not a follower.

This game is fun,WHEN YOU ACTUALLY GET TO PLAY IT!As far as the graphics and load times;if it was truely to much to cram on a PS2 disc,then Konami should have waited and released it on the PS3.For now I'll stick with playing Shadow Hearts:From The New World.

As good as Suikoden 3

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 2
Date: August 14, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I enjoyed this game. The storyline takes some suprising turns but can't say I liked the characters as much as Suikodean 3. I also liked the change of the battle system from the previous Suikodeans.

The good, the bad, and the ugly

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 8
Date: July 05, 2006
Author: Amazon User

First of all I'd like to begin by expressing my claim that I'm the master of rpg's. Someone telling me what's good and bad about an rpg is like president bush telling lincoln how to be a good president. The good in this game involves several things. My favorite is the characters. You'll instantly fall in love with them ( especially Sialeeds and jeane ). It's easy to make money if you're creative and leveling low level character's up is very easy. Also all rpg's are supposed to be long, and this one is up to par.
The bad things in this game are only minor details. Like the constant loading times. The loading times aren't very long but are very frequent which is very annoying. I'm on the same terms with what another reviewer said when he said that he hoped loading times will be fixed on the ps3 ( It better be with the huge pricetag on the system ). And being a man and all Sialeeds and Jeane definatley perked my interest, but those who are scantally clad do not belong in video games (even pervs have some morals ).There are other bad things but covering them would take forever.
Finally the ugly. I do not like having to resort to strategy guides to finish an rpg with a 90% coverage of the whole game. It is absolutly impossible to find all 108 stars of destiny without the guide. The ending SUCKS unless you have all 108 stars of destiny ( which are people in the game by the way ). The one on one duels are to easy and the battles aren't challenging enough. Perhaps the worst of all though is that there is just to much talking in the game.
This game is worth your money as long as your an rpg fan or at least a Suikoden fan. It seems good rpg's haven't had much competition in the last while seeing how most of all the rpg games that have come out in the last year have really sucked, but Suikoden 5 will relieve your withdrawals.

Awful! Stupid!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 2 / 10
Date: June 16, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Stupid story, same old characters, battles load to long, bad dubbing, I seemed to like nothing in this game.

The characters were just as in Suikoden 2, Lyon = Nanami, Hero = Hero, Georg = Flik/Viktor. Lymsleia is annyoing and a brat.
90% of the cast were complete whiners.

The story was awful!
What I hated most about was a "poor town" with it's pathetic people.
Poor town hasn't have had water for a looooooong time and they a withering away and getting sicker by the day.
But guess what?
Just a mile from the village = there's a gigantic lake!!!
Even hero just have to walk a few seconds on the map to get there.
But nooo, Poor Town is so pathetic, they can't go there to get water, so you have to fix the town for them!
Oh, and before that, they tell you how much they hate you because they are so pathetic and it's your fault! Uh!

The battle system was useless, my favorite part of RPG is training the characters to get strong.
Well in this game, aside from the battles loading so slow, the characters can only hit monsters sometimes.
That's right, they MISS like 3-5 times in a row, every single character, no matter how much you add more to their hit-rate, they still miss.
Even when you have 6 characters, like 1-2 actually HITS, and often times EVERYBODY miss.
This was my reason never to play this game ever again.

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