It is amazing. I would never call it dumb fun though. There are tricks to getting up through things used in getting secrets and challenges that would leave most anyone staring in disbelief at how pixel-perfect you have to be.
"dumb fun" is what i pretty much call anything i can pop in, play, and enjoy without too much thought(example, contra, you run around, and shoot things). and, yeah, there are parts in the game which made me think (figuring out bosses for example, or even certain parts of a level) but for the most part, shootan, grapplan, and the fundamental thing which makes a good game, fun.
not to mention, infinite continues makes getting killed not such a big deal. but i mean, if anyone somehow didn't like the original (or like me, didn't play the original until recently) this game, while very similar, improves apon the original quite a bit.
but uhh to mortified, its one of my pet peeves in games is mainly in rpg's(FINAL FANTASY GAMES ARE A MAJOR OFFENDER), but "stuff you can miss, and never get again". i mean, im sorry i don't want to use a faq for the specific purpose of not missing something i can't get later in the game. because of this, im just not going to get said item in the first place. checking a faq every 5 minutes =/= fun. i mean, i am a heavy faq user, but dark cloud 2 isn't one of those games you really need a faq for. anyway, so far, i am enjoying it (again), lets see how many dungeons i can last and keep the experience fresh.