Suikoden IV (2004) — The Day the Series Put to Sea and Was Told the Sailing Was Tedious

August 19, 2004: the series leaves dry land

Hello, this is Toki. Episode 32 of "Today Is Release Day." What I dug up today is Suikoden IV, released on the PlayStation 2 on August 19, 2004. That makes it exactly 22 years ago today.

Published by Konami, developed by Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo, priced at 6,980 yen before tax. North America got it on January 11, 2005 and Europe on February 25, 2005, roughly half a year behind. The date itself seems to have been fixed early: GameSpot's article of April 16, 2004 already reported "August 19, 6,980 yen."

From the thumbnail of "Suikoden IV Opening HD" (YouTube)

This fourth entry is set about 150 years before the first Suikoden. And its stage was not the continent the series had used until then. It was a scattering of islands in the sea.

A Suikoden whose headquarters was a ship

The hero is a young knight of Razril. He is present when his commander Glen falls, and inherits the Rune of Punishment, one of the 27 True Runes. It is a heavy thing to carry: it eats away at its bearer's life each time it is used, and when the bearer dies it moves to someone standing nearby. On top of that, the hero is blamed for Glen's death and driven off the island.

What he gains in exile is a ship, and the ship becomes his headquarters. You move from island to island across a sea chart, and the series' signature 108 Stars of Destiny — the hunt for 108 companions — proceeds out on the water. Battles were cut down to four-person parties, smaller than in the previous game, and the number of runes you could equip was pared back too.

In its twentieth-anniversary piece (August 19, 2024) Famitsu described the game's particular flavour as "the solitude and the exhilaration you can feel at sea" — the sensation of crossing an empty stretch of the chart until the outline of an unknown island appears. Incidentally, this fourth entry was also the first in the series to have voice acting.

30/40, and a tedious voyage

The reaction at the time split cleanly into praise and complaint. Famitsu's cross review gave 8, 7, 8, 7 for a total of 30/40 and a place in its Silver Hall of Fame — the same number as Suikoden II, one point below Suikoden III.

Sales in Japan came to 303,069 copies within 2004, short of the 377,729 of the previous game, Suikoden III.

English-language verdicts arrived half a year after release. In her review dated January 13, 2005, GameSpot's Bethany Massimilla scored it 6.7 (Fair), listing among its strengths a "large, diverse, likable cast of characters" and an engaging story — and then writing this in the cons column: time spent sailing is tedious, and there is a great deal of sailing. The very high enemy encounter rate was noted alongside it. The freedom of putting to sea came back as the sheer length of getting anywhere.

There was one point on which opinion was nearly unanimous, though: the arc of Snowe Vingerhut, the fellow knight who serves alongside the hero. IGN called his development as a character one of the best in any recent game. The same pages that blamed the slowness of the ship were praising the writing of a person on it.

The same sea, 22 years on

The opening movie above is the clearest surviving record of how much of the PlayStation 2's effort went into rendering water at the time. A ship, waves, and the shadow of an island.

A side story followed in 2005 — Suikoden Tactics, released in Japan as Rhapsodia — putting the cast of IV back in motion. Then, on August 19, 2024, Famitsu ran its twentieth-anniversary piece. In 2025 the Suikoden I & II HD Remaster went on sale, and IV is not in it. As of August 19, 2026, the fourth game's turn has not yet come round.

Your release day

When a game divides its critics, the place where they divided is what gets preserved. For Suikoden IV, that place was a single sentence: the ship is slow. What is interesting is that one writer called that same travelling tedious and another called it solitude. They are describing the same sea.

August 19, 2004. Writing the year down is the point at which this piece finally feels finished to me. Is there a game you remember mostly for the time you spent on a ship, or on the road between places?