I have been reading up on ActRaiser and it seems people liked 1 a lot more than 2?
Yes, Act Raiser 1 is incredibly fun. The game plays in two ways: action scenes, and simulation scenes. The combat, while simple, it's fast and satisfying. The story is very melancholic, just like in Soul Blazer. The music is amazingly done by the great Yuzo Koshiro.
You are a god, and you have several empty lands in a map. Once you select a land, you have to rid it of evil before humans can live in it. That's where the action levels start. Once you beat the boss, it's your job to guide the people in building a civilization and that's where the sim levels start. If you've played Sim City before, you'll know how it's like (although it's extremely simplified). There are enemy portals that you have to get rid off, once you do that, you'll go to the final action level of that land.
Act Raiser 2, while looking beautiful and having good music (even if it's a bit depressing), removed the sim elements. So now all you do is enter lands to fight. There's barely any story.
That wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the fact that combat/movement is much more complicated now. Your character moves very slow, and you are also required to glide (you character has wings now) to get from platform to platform. The problem is it's not very easy to control, and your character 'slides' when you land after gliding, so it's very easy to fall off a platform and die.
Also, the game is punishingly hard. Even on Easy the game is still hard, and you can't even reach the last boss that way. You have to play on normal or hard. And even on Normal the game can be almost impossible.
Still a good game though, but notwhere near as good as Act Raiser 1.