With Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories coming out at the end of the month, we thought it would be a good time to catch up with NIS America to ask the creators of this promising RPG sequel a few questions. There's no denying that Disgaea: Hour Of Darkness, a tactical role-playing game that offered nearly limitless replayability and customization, was embraced by North American gamers. Fans of this game and other titles from NIS (Makai Kingdom, Phantom Brave, La Pucelle: Tactics) are obviously excited about the true sequel to Disgaea and the return of the popular characters from the first game. With that in mind we recently had the pleasure of talking to NIS America about what this game brings to the table, what's new and what remains the same. Read on:

GameShark: With improvements of the Item World, does this mean that there is a new level cap for items that go through this process?

NIS America: There are many additions to the Item World, but the overall item level caps are the same. However, these new additions do not interfere with the normal levelling up of the items. And, using the new Item Assembly, you can even improve the ways that your items level up.

GameShark: In Phantom Brave we were treated to a very unique experience, when it came to the many different weapons, and the abilities that could be used with them. With that noted, are similar items going to be introduced into the game? If so, how many?

NIS America: There are seven different weapon types, with unique abilities and attack skills. But, since Disgaea 2 is focused more on character development, rather than the weapon development in Phantom Brave, the dependence on weapons isn’t as extreme.

GameShark: Are you also going to be able to pick up an opponent and use them as a weapon?

NIS America: That ability has been replaced with the Stack Attack. With a Stack Attack, you can use the Lift ability to stack up your characters, and then attack your opponent up to the next character and so on, until every character in your stack has attacked, exponentially increasing your damage.

GameShark: How many new classes can we expect to see in the game?

NIS America: There are six new job classes featured in Disgaea 2.

GameShark: The first Disgaea game had six different levels when it came to a class (for example Cleric, Priest, Bishop, Sage, Prophet, Savior), will there be even more?

NIS America: There are still six levels for every class, but unlocking the higher classes won’t be as easy this time.

GameShark: Can you give us a brief spoiler of what will happen in the first chapter to set the stage for the rest of the game?

NIS America: In the first chapter, Adell and his family accidentally summon Rozalin, the daughter of Overlord Zenon. Adell promises to return Rozalin to her father, and everything takes off from there.

GameShark: Since many of the games that followed Disgaea had unlockable characters from Disgaea in them, like in Makai Kingdom for example, can we expect the same from this game in involving characters from these many different games?

NIS America: A great deal of characters from previous games have cameos in Disgaea 2. You’ll see many familiar faces. However, the number of unlockable characters is fairly limited.

GameShark: Can we expect that equipment items (facilities or vehicles) as seen in Makai Kingdom in Disgaea 2?

NIS America: There aren’t any facilities or vehicles this time around.

GameShark: How many different endings can we expect?

NIS America: There are about nine different endings to find.