Bandai Namco and Level-5 have announced that last year’s Ni no Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom will be receiving its second major expansion pack in March- on March 19, to be exact. Called The Book of Wizards, it’s going to be one that fans of the first game in the series will surely appreciate, as it sees the return of The Conductor in a separate story.

The DLC will be available to all players as soon as you hit Chapter 5. The expansion will also go into deeper character-specific stories, while two new styles will also be added to the Martial Method combat mechanics. Finally, a new battle arena, called Pandora Night, is also part of the DLC, and will be presenting players with tougher combat challenges in time attack form.

Back in December, we saw the launch the first major paid expansion for the game, called The Lair of the Lost Lord, which added new story content and areas, while a few months before that, a free update to the game new challenges and content as well.

Ni no Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom is currently available on PS4 and PC.

ASSASSIN’S CREED ODYSSEY

Ubisoft went the full RPG route with Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, and in doing so, made sure that the Origins formula, that was already brimming with content, would become even more packed. Ancient Greece is an astoundingly large setting, full of beautiful locations to discover and sights to see, with a plethora of quests and side quests waiting for you around every corner. The Aegean Sea is a vast and open environment for you to sail about in, engage in naval battles, and dive underwater to discover hidden secrets. The Cultists system is intricate and expansive, and it’s very easy to get lost in the loop of identifying targets and tracking them down before moving on to the next one. On top of that, there’s tons of smaller activities to indulge in, such as killing mercenaries, gathering loot, upgrading your ship, clearing out forts and fortresses, and so, so much more.

Monster Hunter: World – Tempered Deviljho

While the Deviljho seen much earlier in the game can be prepared for and taken down with relative ease, the Tempered version added to the late game as an event is a different story all together. The huge beasty is incredibly well armoured and aggressive, meaning players are going to constantly want to be on the move, only moving in to punish when completely safe to do so. A mobile weapon that allows such quick strikes is advised, bonus points for dragon element.

Another week of Japanese sales charts, and in spite of a number of new releases, it was a mostly quite one, with not much upended. The Nintendo Switch topped the hardware charts, with 50,000 units sold; the PS4 came in second, with 23,000, while the 3DS rounded out the top three with 11,000 units sold.

On the software front, Kirby: Star Allies held on to its first place, in spite of newcomers Valkyria Chronicles 4, Ni no Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom, and Detective Pikachu, which debuted at second, third, and fourth places respectively. The Switch version of Hyrule Warriors came in at sixth place.

Meanwhile, Monster Hunter World, Splatoon 2, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and Super Mario Odyssey continued to exhibit absurd legs as well. It will be interesting to see whether Kirby, or any of the newcomers this week, will be joining them as mainstays on the charts in the coming weeks.

[via ResetEra]

The world of Ni No Kuni is alive once again in Revenant Kingdom, and the story is off to an interesting start. You play as Evan Pettiwhisker; he’s a young king who gets his castle swept out from under his feet, and he sets out on an adventure to get his castle back. There will be several other characters that be controlled as well, and Evan will find them during his adventure. For the preview version our team was made up of Evan, Rolland and Tani. Evan seems like like a lovable character much like Oliver, his predecessor from the original game.

"Flying through the skies and past the barren mountain cliffs is a vast ocean; and once they pass the ocean its a river world of waterfalls, and sprawling trees where beautiful white birds fly over watching Evan and his crew riding along in their airplanes."

There were a total of two preview trials total, and both were boss fights. I’ll focus on King’s Cradle — Challenge of Courage, as both boss fights were similar enough. A small introduction of the synopsis pops up between loading screens; and we learn that Evan needs to form a bond with a kingmaker if he ever wants to become a king. So he and his friends fly off to a remote sanctuary where one of the kingmakers awaits in a sky pirate base.

As Evan arrives, he meets Tani, a local who decides to help the boy out on his adventure to see if he is worthy to become king. For a short moment, we get to see a small glimpse of one of the many worlds in the game. In King’s Cradle opening, Evan is in a small mountainous-cliff region. Hues of dusty browns and dirt reds line the backdrop of crumbled cliffs and dangerous ledges. Upon one of the many cliff’s is Tani’s small community where she decided to help Evan get to King’s Cradle via her airplanes.

Flying through the skies and past the barren mountain cliffs is a vast ocean; and once they pass the ocean its a river world of waterfalls, and sprawling trees where beautiful white birds fly over watching Evan and his crew riding along in their airplanes. Its majestic moments like these that really sets the Ni No Kuni franchise apart from other JRPGs of similar style. With inspiration from Studio Ghibli (no longer associated with the sequel) taking to the set of Ni No Kuni 2, there’s a lot to appreciate within each scene.

"Evan’s melee fighting style is similar to Oliver’s from the original game. You push the action buttons and Evan will perform light or heavy melee attacks that cause small bits of damage overall."

Oddly enough, when it’s at last time to battle we’ve flown to another barren set of mountains of bleak browns. Here, I had to climb the mountain to get to the cradle at the top. Sadly, there was no exploration in the preview version of the game. There was one path that went up the mountain and that was all. Reaching the top and entering a structure, Evan and company teleport to a half-circle brick dome floating in the sky.

Ni No Kuni 2‘s magnificence and grandeur are truly put to work upon entering the Cradle. The set of eyes painted on the sides of the upside down dome are eerily creepy but cool. Once Evan and his friends run the path, we find out that the Cradle is a massive stadium that looks fit for gladiators. Gold railing lines the stadium’s seating with flames of gold decorate the entrance to the battlefield. Lined with luminescent glows and covered in vibrant colors, the Cradle is a wondrous and majestic location within the game.

At last we meet our challenge: Thogg: Monstrously Muscled Mettle- Tester, as he’s referred to. This towering ape-like creature is huge and fits well into the mythology of the game based on his design. Thogg appears similarly shaped to that of a giant ape, with the face of lion, and horns of a bull. After his introduction the battle begins.

"Overall, Ni No Kuni 2 shows promise for a game that’s still mostly under deep in development. "

The first thing I noticed with Ni No Kuni 2’s gameplay was that my two teammates, Tani and Rolland, really seemed to know what was going on. One of the issues with the original Ni No Kuni was the familiars system. Familiars were little beasts that battled for you (think Pokemon); and each familiar had a weakness and resistance. The teammates in the original game would send out whatever familiar they used the most while ignoring the weakness and resistance system. However, in the sequel, the familiars are all gone and it’s up to each character to battle to his or her own extent. And though you can switch to these two during battle, Evan seems to be the best overall balanced character with incredibly powerful attacks.

Evan’s melee fighting style is similar to Oliver’s from the original game. You push the action buttons and Evan will perform light or heavy melee attacks that cause small bits of damage overall. Evan is also equipped with special moves that are allocated to each face button. These special moves include a group healing move, a thrashing attack that’s super powerful, a magic attack, and another strong melee attack. Evan can also block Thogg’s moves to reduce damage and evade by rolling out of the way. Unlike the original game, I found the controls more intuitive. Avoiding attacks seemed a lot easier and I was avoiding a lot of damage by just evading and rolling out of the way.

Higgledies are a new form of real-time, onscreen assistance that can help you during battle. They run around in specific groups waiting on you to activate their spells. They can heal, throw fire balls or freezing attacks during battle for extra punch. They have a cool down rate but I’m not sure how long it is. There was no access to stats or information of that kind available.

After beating down Thogg, avoiding his attacks and special power moves, I dwindled his energy down to almost nothing. Then eventually I was able to use a special move of my own and Thogg was down and out for the count. Afterward, Rolland explains that Evan has earned the right to rule, but I still don’t have a nation to rule over. So Evan tells Rolland and Tani that he is going to build a castle where everyone can live happily ever after.

"Higgledies are a new form of real-time, onscreen assistance that can help you during battle. They run around in specific groups waiting on you to activate their spells."

Interestingly enough, Ni No Kuni 2 takes place in a whole new world, but with familiar songs and musical beats. These songs may be special to the fans of the original game and they still fit in perfectly with this sequel as well. What new musical scores I did notice before, during, and after battle each had a pleasant melody that felt authentic to the franchise.

Overall, Ni No Kuni 2 shows promise for a game that’s still mostly under deep in development. Since there was nothing available to play outside of the two combat challenges, it’s hard to determine how the overall game is shaping up. What microscopic gameplay was available felt similar to the first game, so hopefully the sequel turns out well.

This game was previewed on the PlayStation 4.

The rumors that the game might eventually be coming to the PS3 or a handheld device were fueled when gamers started to notice a discrepancy between the presenter’s words, which described Ni No Kuni 2 as a PS4 exclusive, and the text shown at the end of the announcement trailer. According to Sony boss Yoshida, the words “console debut” appear at the end of the Ni No Kuni 2 announcement, instead of “timed exclusive” or “platform exclusive”, because the Ni No Kuni sequel “may come to other consoles in the future.” The title has not been given an official release date but the development teams have said they would like to be able to release the game sometime in 2016.

Ni No Kuni 2: The Revenant Kingdom is actually the fifth game set in the Ni No Kuni universe though it carries the title of “2” because this is the second game that has actually landed on consoles. The previous games were role playing games designed for mobile devices including the Nintendo DS. This is also the official sequel to Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch.

• 1. Development
• 2. Story
• 3. Gameplay
• 4. Characters

Development

Sony announced during the game during the PlayStation Experience 2015 keynote presentation. A trailer for Ni No Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom debuted during the event. A Director’s Cut version of the announcement trailer which featured more than a minute of new footage was released after the keynote presentation. Among the pieces of information that were announced at the event was that “the artistic visionaries behind the first game are back to take their creative vision of a grand adventure to even higher heights that are sure to delight video game fans.”

Studio Ghibli composer Joe Hisaishi will return to score the game’s soundtrack, even if Studio Ghibli itself appears to be less involved this time. That studio had won numerous positive reviews for the music that accompanied Ni No Kuni. There had been talk of the same team signing up for this game but at the moment, Hishaishi is the one that has officially agreed to work on this particular title.

The game was actually teased back in April of 2015, when a Twitter user started giving hints about a JRPG that was coming to the PS4 and was not a remake. After another Twitter user guessed the name of the game was in fact going to be Ni No Kuni 2 the Twitter user who had inside information confirmed the game was on the way. Neither Bandai Namco or Level-5 ever confirmed those posts were anything more than rumors and eventually the gaming world dismissed those as nothing but rumors.

Story

While there isn’t a lot known about the game, as it was just announced in early December of 2015 there are a few details that Level-5 and Bandai Namco have allowed to let slip. We know that while Ni no Kuni II picks up to some degree where the last game left off, this title will follow a completely new storyline and will have almost an entirely new cast of characters. There are a few characters from the last game that will help tie to the two stories together, but much loved characters like Mr. Drippy don’t appear to be making an appearance in Revenant Kingdom.

We know that Ni No Kuni 2 begins with a coup led by some sort of rat king that ends up deposing Evan from his throne. While he first thinks that he is largely alone, he soon meets a visitor from another world and together they fight against those who took over his kingdom. While he’s forced to flee and rebuild forces to retake his realm, he will find allies along the way that will all possess different abilities that will play a part in winning battles and attempting to take back the kingdom.

Gameplay

There isn’t much of anything known about the specific style of gameplay in Ni No Kuni 2: The Revenant Kingdom but there are aspects of the game that can be taken from common elements in previous titles. The point of view is almost always third-person and there have been a combination of role playing and a specific card battle game interwoven in previous titles. The player controls the player character in a combination of combat and puzzle game elements to achieve goals and complete the story.

Combat is generally performed by controlling a single character and attacks consist of weapons, magic or acting through an ally.

Characters

While the Ni No Kuni universe has a number of recurring characters, this game is said to have a new cast with just a few returning characters in order to turn the story from the first game to this one. From the reveal trailer, we know that King Evan Pettiwhisker Tildrum of Ding Dong Dell is the main character of this game. He is joined by a mysterious visitor from another world who is known only as Roland. There are other allies that Evan encounters along the way as well as several villains that are shown but not named in the reveal trailer.

Note: This wiki will be updated once we have more information about the game

Industry Insiders have been providing an important role in the dissemination of information in the gaming scene recently. Tidux is one such insider who provides a little bit of accurate information from time to time. Recently taking to Twitter, Tidux teased followers with the following four tweets, “Oh got a hint for y’all this afternoon, #PS4 #Exclusive”, “3rd party studio.”, “Not a fps” and “And no remake”.

When Twitter user MrPaNtsONhEaD suggested that the game in question might be Ni No Kuni 2, a rumoured sequel to the hugely popular JRPG from Level-5 and Studio Ghibli, Tidux replied, “So @MrPaNtsONhEaD figured it out! #PS4”

However it must be noted that this is not at all official and there’s no evidence to confirm his claims. This can only be confirmed at this time by way of an announcement from Sony or Level-5. As usual take this with a grain of salt but what do you think of this? Would you be interested in a sequel to Ni No Kuni?

[Source]