Monster Rancher 2 is at its heart an arena fighting game with lots of ancillary play. As the trainer of a battle monster, you must train, reward, punish, cajole and bribe your minion to grow their stats. You then take your monster to the arena where it fights with other monsters for prize money, prestige, and better stats. Like the original Monster Rancher, this game allows players to create a monster using an innovative technique: you can paste any CD you own (PlayStation, audio, PC or otherwise) and the data read from the CD is used to generate the characteristics of the monster.
