According to Suikosource user JiN88, the Japanese demo of Suikoden II contains two debug/testing rooms.

The first test room claims to be in Radat Town, despite seeming to be in Kyaro Town. The room contains various warping and unfinished textures, out-of-place objects like barrels, and two non-functioning Warp points. Of the warp points, one can be found down near a river and loads nothing, while the other can be found near a bridge with an Anita NPC and some invisible objects. While this test room seems to be empty, except for one small area featuring several invisible objects, a pushable tree that you can talk to, and a row of NPCs that can be pushed, but cannot be interacted with without crashing the game. There are also two Gabocha NPCs, one of which can warp you back to somewhere else in the test room, while the other has some dialogue and acts like a shopkeeper. Finishing the conversation with the shopkeeper Gabocha will cause the game to crash. Interacting with any Anita NPC will cause the game to crash.

The second test room contains several repeating groups of Anita, Gengen, and Old Man NPCs in a sort of army formation. The name of this second debug room is "神様の村" which means "Village of God"/"God's village". Talking to the Anita and Gengen NPC groups will have them say a single line of dialogue (the Anitas however will have no text), and once finished will cause the game to try and load something, which results in the game crashing. It's thought that they would try to warp you somewhere with a cutscene. Raww Le Klueze, global admin of the Suikosource forums, has translated this room's dialogue as such:


This latter piece of dialogue might be a reference to the song "Nice Hot Water", a 1966 song in the "Nihon no Uta" Japanese local song series that was famously covered by the Japanese comedy rock band The Drifters. The first line before the hyphen is the same as the song, and the second line after the hyphen is almost the same as the song.

In Banner Village, the side quest to recruit Tir McDohl is affected if the game imports save data from Suikoden. If the player imports a save file with the 108 Stars of Destiny recruited in the first game, Gremio will appear in the game starting with this side quest. However, in a developer interview published in the March 1999 issue of DenGeki PlayStation magazine, director Yoshitaka Murayama revealed that should you import a save file without recruiting all 108 Stars of Destiny, Ellie will replace Gremio in the Banner Village events of the side quest.

In a developer interview published in the March 1999 issue of DenGeki PlayStation magazine, it was revealed that Rowd, a character who betrayed the Unicorn Youth Brigade of the Highland Kingdom, was the older brother of the little blind girl in Kyaro Town who disappears near the end of the game, and his motivation for his betrayal was to save more money to cure her blindless. When talking to the girl in Kyaro Town, she states that her big brother plans to use his riches to hire a famous doctor in the Toran Republic (who is suspected to be Liukan, a character from Suikoden who briefly appears in this game) to perform the operation. During the interview, programmer Akiyoshi Ohta also stated that there was originally going to be a battle against Rowd where he would die, but this was cut because "his little sister was too cute to do it."

During an interview, it was revealed that the game's illustrator, Fumi Ishikawa, was a big fan of Flik. The team created a fake set of planning notes for Nina's unite attack with Flik in case Ishikawa was to delete it out of anger for Nina and Flik's relationship.

Special events can occur within the Bathhouse of the castle after collecting and decorating it with antiques. One of the special scenes happens after setting 6 Chinese Plates, where two party members, Wakaba and Long Chan Chan, drop from above for undisclosed reasons; They sometimes appear on the side opposite to their gender.

Within the data for the Nightmare enemy is an unused Magic the Gathering card. The sprite itself is never shown in the game.

Oulan's measurements are given as "96-60-89" (38-24-35 inches) in the Japanese release, but when localized, the measurements were changed to "90-60-89", reducing her bust size by six centimeters.

In the Demo ending, other than the dialogue used in the skit, there is unused dialogue present suggesting some parts of the ending were scrapped:


It's worth noting that Mukumuku is silent in the demo while Mekumeku just doesn't load, but is present in memory. Whether it was scrapped or is still unlockable is unknown.

Also in the room, there are 4 maids surrounding Riou just out of bounds at the bottom of the screen. After some testing, it was found to be a developer trick, wherein the player is always in control of Riou, and when interreacting with any of the maids, the demo will end early.

There were 2 official demo versions released for the game. Suikoden 2 (JP) demo was given alongside Metal Gear Solid (JP) on September 3, 1998; Suikoden 2 (PAL) demo was given alongside Vandal Hearts 2 (PAL) on June 30, 2000.

In the game there are 2 modes: New Game and Battle Mode.

New Game essentially has the the gameplay it would at retail until the battle against the Mist Shade, and an additional skit as an ending. When translated to English, this reads:


In Battle mode, the player traverses North Swallow Pass, now called Trial Road, with a couple of different party members, battling against enemies and a different boss. This mode is also present in the normal game, but is inaccessible without hacking. Both modes also have their respective ending.

There is not much different from the retail version, but the PAL demo does contain the full base game (although it is translated into Spanish for some reason).

According to Raww Le Klueze, global admin of the Suikosource forums, there are three unused sprites found in the PC version that appear to be part of an unused Blue Gate summon or something similar. The three sprites are supposed to appear in different spots on the screen which would explain why they are looking in different directions.

To support that idea, in the Gensou Suikoden II 108 Stars Character Guide (published only in Japan by Konami), within a section detailing a scrapped idea to summon spirits of other elements, there are a few characters resembling the three unused sprites if they were mixed together.

In support of the New Game+ dungeon and Sindar Ruin connection, Suikosource user and dataminer JiN88 explored the Japanese demo to support the idea that Sindar Ruin underwent some major changes during development:

• In the entrance between White Deer Inn and Sindar Ruin, there are 2 statues that are generic. In the demo, those statues are gendered with pronounced breasts, and appear snake-like, resembling the Greek mythical monster Lamia. The generic statues exist in the demo, so there is no reason the developers would go out their way to make a different pair.

• At the last puzzle where you put the plate in, the plaque that you would normally read is there instead of in the room next ahead.

• The two statues of the Double Head are absent.

• In the boss room of Sindar Ruin, there is a weird sprite that isn't seen anywhere else (it's a bit grainy so to see it you will need to zoom in). The position looks like it's supposed to be for an arch, but notably it has three heads. Double Head is the boss you would normally meet here only with two heads, suggesting there was originally a boss here with three heads.

Dataminers on the Suikosource forums discovered an unused dungeon in the game that cannot be accessed other than through hacking. The dungeon is incomplete with some missing features, but is largely playable. While there is no direct confirmation from developers on how it was intended to tie in with the game's narrative, dataminers have concluded the following:

At some point after defeating the Beast Rune, the player is supposed to return to the village of Sajah. There is an inconspicuous-looking rock that does nothing, but which can be removed via hacking to reveal an entrance. While this entrance does not work, it is theorized that once entering this passage, the player would reach the lowest floor of the test dungeon. From there they would travel upward and face six or more bosses (speculated to be Bone Dragon, Stone Golem, Abomination, Double Head, Pest Rat and Harpy - though not necessarily in that order) gatekeeping certain stairs. Monsters would get progressively harder at each stage. There are around six floors and 8 orbs which the player would need to collect to pass through the final door.

In the final room, there is a purple rune that offers 3 choices; When the dialogue is translated into English, it reads:


Looking through all of this dialogue, the first option warps you back to Sajah, leaving you on your way. The second option allows you to step back before deciding again, while the third option warps you to an unknown location.

It is theorized you're supposed to end up in Sindar Ruin as there was a brief moment where Riou was left alone. In the end, you get to replay at that point in time, with previously kept items/stats, and possibly have the combined Rune of Beginning (Sword and Shield Rune) as it has been alluded many times in-game that it was considered as one.

It's speculated the reason why this dungeon was scrapped was because it was too ambitious to be implemented.

To explore on your own (for the North American version) use the following GameShark code to teleport Viki to an Unknown Dungeon (Pick Kazah Village [note: Sajah Village was originally named Kazah Village]):

8006AEAA 0080
D015DC50 E1C4
3015F53D 0009
D015DC50 E1C4
3015F53E 0011

In the game's files, in a folder called "300_MOVI", there is an FMV file titled ROCK.STR. It is unknown what this video's intended purpose was, but the answer may lie in the Japanese demo version of the game, in the demo's "MOVIE" folder. A video can be found called M_EAT.STR, and based on its name and appearance, it seems most likely it was to be used with Magic Earth Rune - in a similar way to Unite Magic (since they all play their FMV). The last changed date for the file is 1997. The last modified date for the rest of the game's FMVs is 1998, meaning M_EAT.STR was changed quite early in development, being the earliest of them all.

In other later releases like the PSP version, the ROCK.STR file can still be found in the game's data, though they similar go entirely unused.

It's possible to see an updated entry in Spoiler:Pahn's diary while in Gregminster. This is a reference to the player being able to do the same thing in the original Suikoden.

The kanji seen on Tuta's outfit (薬) means "Medicine".

An unused speech bubble appears in the data for the "Ragged One" enemy which translates to "I'll steal your money!". This never appears in the game, and remains untranslated in NTSC and PAL releases.

An unused item in the game's code, the Bath Set, is an accessory that can be equipped. Equipping the item prior to entering the bath will cause the wearer to have an item display in front of them.

There is an unused rune in the game's code called the "Solitude Rune" which can only be obtained through the use of hacking or a cheat device. The rune will increase a weapon's attack power based on how many people are in your party: the fewer, the greater the increase. It was likely removed due to the extremely substantial boost to the attack stat that the rune can create.

If the player goes through more than 108 battles against Highland Soldiers before jumping off the cliff at the start of the game, the intro sequence will be shown in full color instead of in sepia.

McDohl's name has a bizarre glitch when transferring data from Suikoden to Suikoden II. In canon, the hero's name in the first game is Tir McDohl, however the game only transfers the capital letters of the name across, so naming him Tir will result in his name being TcDohl in Suikoden II. In order for his name to be McDohl in the second name, you would have to name him something with only a capital M in the first game. If you name him something in full capitals, it will all be transferred across, for example, naming him TIR will result in his name being TIRohl.