I'm a big fan of the first game, so I knew this was gonna be my thing - and 'Sparks of Hope' is a more than decent time. The game, first of all, is a solid evolution of it's predecessor in terms of combat, the turn based action flows better and every hero is absolutely viable (not something I can say about the first one). The sparks mechanic adds another dimension and the battles in general just feel much more grand in terms of invention and scale.

Thankfully the fun battles makes up the bulk of the game, which is a good job because everything else is mid as hell. The story doesn't have any of the charm of the first one and the busy work which fleshes out the gameplay on each of the 5 worlds you visit becomes old fast