I suppose I'll kick this off, since I just finished a game last night.
Lufia II: Rise of the SinistralsThe Lufia series is one that I've always had in my peripherals. Lufia 2, in particular, always seemed to sort of game that you'd hear one or two voices shouting for amidst the hundreds screaming for Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, or Earthbound. Having never played it, my thoughts were "This must be decent, but likely sits outside the top tier of SNES RPGs". Lufia was the first game released by Never-Land, a company that would end up releasing a few even-more-obscure RPGs for the SNES (Chaos Seed and Energy Breaker), along with Record of Lodoss War on the DC, and the Rune Factory series. I've read that Never-Land was initially developing a game very similar to this for the PC98, but it was either cancelled, or Never-Land pulled out and decided to re-use some assets on what appeared to be the new RPG powerhouse, the SNES. As of Lufia II's launch, the company had released only it, Lufia I, and Hat Trick Hero 2 (A soccer game), so they were quite the fledgling studio at the time.
In case it seems odd: Yes, my first experience with Lufia was with Lufia II. That is because Lufia II is actually a prequel to the first game. Now, while many games are linked through various means, and it often doesn't dictate the order those games should be played in, the Lufia games are very directly linked. The start of Lufia and the end of Lufia II are the same, and thus playing the first game first would actually spoil the ending to this game. On top of that, Lufia II seemed to be held in much higher regard, so I figured I may as well jump in at the best point available.
The first thing that always stood out to me in Lufia II was its graphical style. Its... odd. Its certainly of a higher quality than the first Lufia, and many early SNES efforts. That said, it also feels like it falls short of its piers at its time of release (1996 in NA). Its really colorful, and lacks nuances tones often found in games around this time. Its sprites are big and chunky, with simple character design and no facial animation to speak of. It always came off as a simple design, and it is, but... as I spent more time with the game, I fell for this style more and more. It became apparent to me that this was a design choice, and not a lack of ability, as the game eventually begins to show some truly beautiful work. Some of the latter boss sprites and magic spells can trade blows with even the heavy hitters of the SNES. The game's story, ironically, follows an almost identical arc. It starts off very traditional, with many cliche "Help this town" quests that happen to introduce you to party members. While admittedly the game takes just a bit long to get there, the story does come into its own, with a few rather impactful moments. As others had recommended to me, I would highly suggest to play this game before the first if possible, as the game wraps up in quite a special way, and it certainly left a mark on me.
The player explores the world in a similarly-familiar way, traversing a world map to go from town to town, eventually upgrading to vehicular movement to cover more ground. Yet again, the game goes a step further than it may initially appear, and on top of providing air travel, eventually even lets the player explore under water! This opens things up quite a bit, not only letting the player access more of the map, but providing access to even more hidden areas. As someone who was introduced to the genre via FFVII, this brought a huge smile to my face.
Where Lufia II is more of a grower when it comes to graphics and story, quite the opposite can be said about its gameplay elements. Lufia II does quite a lot to set itself apart from its peers here, to the extent that its almost silly. Combat itself is familiar, a simple turn-based system with no active time meters or anything. You control each character, and are able to attack, cast spells, defend, or run from battle. To add to this, each character also has an IP Meter, which functions similarly to later Final Fantasy's "Limit Break" meters, where the meter fills the more you take damage. Each piece of equipment your characters is using can have an IP Ability on it, and you can use some of your IP Meter to use those abilities in battle. This not only mixes up traditional combat, but makes judging equipment upgrades far more interesting than usual, as there are a wide variety of IP Abilities available. Lufia II also strays away from random battles (except for the world map), and instead uses on-screen sprites to represent encounters, similar to Earthbound. However, unlike Earthbound, Lufia actually allows the player to interact with monsters by stunning them, or trapping them in areas to avoid battles. You won't be insta-killing foes here, but being able to actually avoid enemies is great, and lets the player tackle the game at their own pace.
Interacting with sprites isn't the only thing you'll be doing out of combat, either. Lufia II's dungeons are also chalk full of Zelda-esk puzzles. As you traverse the world of Lufia, you'll unlock different accessories that you can use outside of combat, such as Arrows, Bombs, and a Hookshot (These are also how you stun enemies). The puzzles, accordingly, will become increasingly demanding as well, involving lots of block-pushing, switch-hitting, hook-shotting, etc. The game is not shy about its puzzles, it is a feature focus here, and often times are surprisingly clever. Things can get a little ridiculous at times though, none more present than what the game itself dubs "The Most Difficult Trick in the World", an optional puzzle that is obscenely tough. Someone had a computer generate the most optimal solution here, and the puzzle still takes a whopping 116 moves to complete.
Lufia II isn't done setting itself apart yet, though! On top of having up to 4 player characters on your team at a time, you will also find Capsule Monsters thoughout your journey, which will take a spot as a 5th party member, though they act on their own rather than being player-controlled. There are 7 total, and on top of leveling up with your team, they can also be fed to increase their "Change" meter, which, once full, will cause them to evolve. Each Capsule Monster has forms I-IV that can be obtained by feeding, and a final "Master Form" that must be obtained via a special item. Not only does each monster have its own stats and moveset, but each evolution does as well, and you can freely select between forms to suit different scenarios. While an interesting aside, it is rarely useful, as higher evolutions tend to have higher stats, and once you are in Master, you can't freely switch back without feeding another special item. Each monster has different behaviors too, meaning some will run from battle more quickly, or use specials more often. Its not a hugely complex system, but I think that benefits the game, as it is something fun and enjoyable to do during your journey without distracting. It also makes grinding more beneficial, since fully evolving these monsters can be quite costly, and if you are switching between monsters, you'll need to level each of the 7 separately.
Lufia II still isn't done making its mark, as outside of its general mechanics, it goes above and beyond in other areas too. The game has a sort of pseudo "New Game+" mode, here named "Retry". This is essentially just a new game, but with a 4x modifier applied to both Exp and Gold received. This puts the game at a nice middle ground between just playing again at normal difficulty, and most NG+'s "completely OP" difficulty. The game also has Dragon Eggs hidden about its world, and collecting 8 of them means the Dragon will grant you a wish. These are pretty great wishes too, greatly boosting the team. Once completed, the Dragon will scatter the eggs, so you can find them again. Do this enough times, and you can challenge the Dragon itself, which presents here as the game's "Super Boss". Interestingly, the player is never forced to either find these Eggs, or traverse to the island where the Dragon is, so this is a through-and-through side quest chain.
Probably the most well-known side quest in the game, though, is the Ancient Cave. A little over half way through the game, the player can visit an optional town residing near this cave. The Ancient Cave is a 99 floor, procedurally-generated rogue-like dungeon, in which the party looses all gear, levels, items, etc, and must progress and find everything within the Cave itself. Not only are the floor and enemy layouts random, but the items, gear, and spells you find are too. To give some purpose to this, the player has a chance to find Blue Chests, which will contain items that the player can take outside of the dungeon (Everything else stays when the player leaves). On top of already being awesome for just including such a wonderful side quest, Never-Land went the extra mile and made it so that, if you clear the game in Retry mode, your file will be given a 2nd star, and you can now access "Gift" mode, which lets you pick any party/monster loadout and tackle the Ancient Cave without having to play up to the point in the game where you'd meet or have those characters. You can even make cannonically-impossible loadouts here. It is a truly wonderful addition to an already very fleshed out game, and I can honestly see myself coming back and clearing in "Retry" just to have quick access to this mode. There is even a small speedrun community for this mode. Yes, not the entire game (Though that exists too), but just this one side dungeon of the game has a community that have been playing and working on optimizing loadouts and playing to RNGsus for years.
As surprising as the absolute wealth of content that Lufia II provides, what surprises me even more is that the game never has a "Everything but the kitchen sink" feel. Its never overwhelming, and honestly feels more accessible than RPGs with even less content. The game is balanced, from the difficulty curve of its fights and puzzles, to what it reveals to the player, and how much it lets them explore. This isn't a "2 hour intro tutorial" game. It is snappy, well-paced, and... intentional. Everything here feels intentional. Well, almost everything. The NA release does have a few bugs, most notably in a few zone names being mucked up (a town called Gantze ends up reading 3ye when entered), and one small area having its background sprites completely jacked, to the point where you might think the game cart was kicked mid-play. Those minor things aside, though, Lufia II far and away surpassed my expectations. Its a turn-based RPG with Zelda puzzles, no random battles, Pokemon, Dragon Balls, Limit Breaks, NG+, and a side dungeon so cool it could be its own game. That sentence is ridiculous!
I fully enjoyed my time with Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals, and give it the highest of recommendations.