Great story, great setting. Probably helps that subsequent games drew more from smt I than it. I will also say however that a lot of it felt bogged down. Like that somehow I wasn't getting the fullest or richest image of the story here, which I assume is due to technical limitations.

Gameplay wise it's only really a marginal improvement over I. And to be completely honest, it was never clear to me whether separating your party into two rows ever made a difference in a way that wasn't there with how the original release of smt I did it.
And backtracking is definitely a big sin of this game that none of its predecessors shared. That definitely makes me wish for this game to get a remake more so than smt I (as unrealistic as that is).