Pretty awesome, just like EL, but with some tweaks. The map is vastly improved with proper scale for all the rooms and areas. This one doesn’t have any abilities that use stocked charges, though. In EL you often didn’t have enough charges for an entire boss fight so you had to plan 2 different loadouts and switch halfway through. In this game you can just stick with the same loadout all the time. Some bosses were tricky enough to require custom relic loadouts, though. Overall, it’s the same great game with some minor differences in mechanics.

A lot of things have been added to the new part: the economy system, improvements to relics, new equipment, the full implementation of character characteristics and their impact through relics and new equipment. The combat system has been improved, damage from touching the enemy has been removed, and references to the first part have been added. The game map and area are 3-4 times larger than the previous one.

A visual with a multi-layered parallax background effect, the foreground is amazing as always. The musical accompaniment is also from Mili, so all those who liked the sound of EL will not remain indifferent...

Lore exists, but for many it has remained unsure. Not in the sense that it's controversial, but that it wasn't enough and it was shallow, although it nevertheless adds more detail to the overall plot of the franchise.

Animations in this one seem worse somehow?..

gameplay wise i think its better, no contact-damage is a plus (they could've added that as an additional difficulty option). though i wish it was.. longer. like sure, my first playthrough was 30 hours but i was reaaally taking my time with that and i was also often just listening to the music at the bench savepoints while eating food. my second 100% playthrough took 10 hours so imo EL and EM are nearly the exact same in terms of size.

if/when there is a future third Ender Flower game i hope they make it somewhat bigger.

Man I'm having a blast, money well spent

Thank you all guys

I feel like the silent protagonist approach worked better, Lilac just sounds so flat in most of her dialogue. Otherwise, it's an overall improvement

I think Magnolia is vastly improved in terms of gameplay compared to Lilies.

Lilies itself is a good Metroidvania but not without some hiccups. Magnolia fixes most of my pet peeves in Lilies (confusing map, contact damage, limited upgrade currencies...) and improve what it is already good at (adding presets, equipment, relic upgrades...).

The only problem is that in the last 20% of the game, things start to feel rushed, especially when it comes to wrapping the story.

Originally posted by Momo Kozuki:

The only problem is that in the last 20% of the game, things start to feel rushed, especially when it comes to wrapping the story.

Honnestly I think Lilies was worse on that front, Verboten Domain and the Abyss seemed to not had as much care as the early to mid game area, and the final boss while great in term of atmosphere felt very underwhelming in term of gameplay, in contrast I enjoyed Magnolia's Upper Stratum a lot more and the Final Boss was such a huge improvment over Lilies's one and my personnal favorite boss accross both games. I will say however compare to Lilies's true ending, Magnolia's ending was a bit disappointing

Upper Stratum felt like it had more care put into it compared to Verboten Domain. However, some of the rooms in Crystalline Realm spam the same giant enemy much like Verboten did, and Land of Origin reusing the same "bosses" felt pretty cheap. Final boss in Magnolia was a better experience than Ender Lilies; however, I do agree that the Magnolia endings were disappointing compared to the Lilies ones. I personally think the story started to feel a little weak halfway through, with it getting really bad in the last fifth or so of the game. Lore was meh with some exceptions.

The main boss, Ender Lilies, is an order of magnitude weaker than in EM, but in fact it is a completely lore tie. I like how Blighted Lord's behavior gradually changes at the ending C, it becomes more apathetic and inert when Fretia takes control of the situation. Yes, there was no challenging battle, but there was a scene that was interesting to watch, and a live scene in which the player directly participates. It's all part of the Lore, which is so interesting and mysterious that all the players have come to love it.

Unfortunately, lore is smaller in EM. It really is there, and it complements the overall picture of the plot, however, I, like many others, hoped to see much more details at the end of the game.

I hope everything is going according to plan, and maybe in the new parts they will show and tell us more, and even reveal the secrets of the previous parts...

Originally posted by Radiance:

Upper Stratum felt like it had more care put into it compared to Verboten Domain. However, some of the rooms in Crystalline Realm spam the same giant enemy much like Verboten did, and Land of Origin reusing the same "bosses" felt pretty cheap. Final boss in Magnolia was a better experience than Ender Lilies; however, I do agree that the Magnolia endings were disappointing compared to the Lilies ones. I personally think the story started to feel a little weak halfway through, with it getting really bad in the last fifth or so of the game. Lore was meh with some exceptions.

There's only one room that spam exclusivly the giant ennemy in Crystalline Realm (litterally just the last one) and to their credit they are nowhere near as annoying as the one in Verboten Domain were, I will agree on Land of Origin fighting the same mini-bosses multiple time being annoying tough. Crystalline Realm was more of a mid-game area tough, the next areas were better the Magic School (don't remember the exact name), Iron District, Declan's Domain and Factory were pretty good areas for me, Biologic lab cool to explore but had some obnoxious ennemies (and the return of these damn rats).

I actually prefered the lore of Magnolia overall, I really think it was interesting, story I liked some aspect more (like interaction with companions), my main issue is I feel the ending didn't capitalize on it, and was honnestly missing an entire epilogue to see at least a glimpse of what will start to become of the realm and it's inhabitant after the ending, I just think the story was just maybe a little bit to ambitious for the studio, Ender Lilies didn't feel the need of an epilogue and felt fullfilling since... well the realm and everyone outside of Lily were all just dead, there was nothing else to tackle upon, the game was more about Lily's growth and allowing the souls of the former habitant of the country to be free from the blight and rest in peace.

I think both games are great and stand on their own merits. Both games have things they do well.

Understandable that some may prefer the tone, atmosphere and setting of the first game, i personally would not want the exact same retelling of the same story a second time around, so i'm pleased the studio explored a different tone and style for this game.

The Gameplay and level design were greatly improved and I appreciate the effort put to make those elements better but I feel like the story suffered a bit because of it, specially what you could call act 3, I the whole thing with Gilroy felt very rushed, the endings felt rushed as well,lily was a welcome addition but I can't stop thinking about the wasted potential of her character

I think that the combat was improved quite a bit, but I feel like the game fails on the exploration aspect.

The non-linear storytelling style of collecting lore notes works a lot better in a metoridvania. It's not just this game, and I feel like the release of Metorid Dread made metroidvania developers design their games a lot more linear.

You are no longer exploring unknow world - the game has rather ridgid structure where each "city hub" lets you explore 2 rather linear, disconected zones before moving on to the next hub, repeat 3 times.

Also, while the new map system looks great and is very useful, it often spoils the location of secrets.