Thousands of years in the future, a technique known as “lifting” has been used for sport and by military, as lifters use ref boards supported by a body of particles in order to fly through the air. Our introduction begins with the story of a lifter known as Sumner, who is in search of an old feeling he feels may be found by winning an LFO in a contest. LFO’s are simply giant robots, who may be piloted and lift in larger boards in order to perform aerial combat. Not only can they perform melee attacks, but they are also capable of transforming into vehicles for ground warfare. These are some of the activities you will be participating in, during today’s events.

If Eureka Seven Vol. 2 were a review, it would be like the former paragraphs you’ve just read --plain, boring, and seemingly impartial to entertaining or annoying you. In fact, throughout the entire game it seemed as if the interspersed battles were slowly being killed off in favor of the cutscene-heavy storyline. A while back, XPlay or some game show had a special on whether or not cutscenes were getting too much screen time in games. While it may have been a questionable issue at the time, Eureka Seven Vol. 2 would certainly be a shining example in arguing against in-game cutscenes. Too bad it’s supported by average gameplay.

As far as the gameplay is concerned, lifting takes a while to get used to so it’s a good thing there is a tutorial available to play around with. Of course, this is coming from someone who is somewhat new to the Eureka Seven series and had not played Vol. 1 of the games. I did, however, borrow Vol. 1 from a friend and found it to be more enjoyable for the couple of hours I tinkered around with it. Accordingly, the story also picks up where Vol. 1 left off, with the subtitle of “The New Vision.” Sumner is still lovesick over Ruri and spends all his time pursuing her in hopes of revitalizing the energy he had in the past, while a military soap opera plays out alongside everything else. I digress, the gameplay itself is still wonky, regardless of a tutorial or not. Even in the first lifting competition, I found myself stumbling into wild variations of the direction “forward” and “left” or “right” by simply ending up flying headlong into a wall or the ground.

Needless to say it took me a bit to get used to, but once I found myself lifting without frustration the rest of the game became very mediocre. Things are spiced up a bit by placing LFO combat on the ground and in the air. By spiced up I mean that sometimes on the ground you aren’t sure what exactly your objective is, and that in the air you will doge, dodge, and then use a melee attack until you destroy whichever LFO you don’t like at the moment. Usually aerial mech combat means lots of fast-paced melee combat and the like. Unfortunately, this isn’t such a usual mech fare, and players will find themselves in some of the most uneventful dogfights around. The controls are fairly simple while lifting, I might add, with the X button functioning as the accelerate/jump function, square button for braking/grabbing, triangle for all your awesome shooting skills, and circle for melee combat. Simple, easy, boring.

The story itself is concerned with some military hubbub, an affair that I understand the series is normally affiliated with. In a small, tiny nutshell, the military has been using records of LFO pilots to improve the LFO’s themselves, but when the pilots jack in they start feeling a little bad about it –and some don’t. The good versus evil story is just enough to heat up some popcorn over and relax while watching. I’d call the game a nice supplement to the show, and if a third volume comes out, a smart move may just be to follow something like the Metal Gear Solid Digital Graphic Novel, where minimum interactivity is required and the title simply served as a nice supplement to the show. Kindly enough, everything is voiced over this time, making cutscenes more bearable.

With a sub-par visual style, and uneven cutscene/gameplay balance, Eureka Seven Vol. 2 isn’t a game for anyone who enjoys playing video games. I can tell that BEC cares about story, but maybe next time around they could focus more on gameplay by including more of it and featuring objectives that actively move the plot forward in the game itself. Since the developer paid so much attention to the story and I came in expecting to pay more attention to gameplay, it’s easy to feel good about getting to playing a little bit between cutscenes. However, making players feel like they are being rewarded with playable sections does not excuse boring gameplay by any means. The story is a romantic, treacherous, philosophical muse that resides in the Eureka Seven series, but not important enough to shove what could have been an improvement over Vol. 1’s original effort. I’d be hard-pressed to recommend this game to anyone except a hardcore fan who already owns it, and especially not at full price. If you’re especially curious about Eureka Seven Vol. 2, go ahead and rent it, but that’s your decision.