I have played about six casual hours of Dragon Quest: Builders2, so far. I say casual hours because I wasn't trying very hard to speed through it. I had forgotten how this game/series likes to make you either read or click-through exhaustive tutorial/story texts for the first few major missions, in order to gain basic tools, recipes, etc. which goes on forever and ever. "We need a way to protect the fields, build a scarecrow." "We need a place to sleep, make us a small bedroom." "Building/farming is forbidden! Wait, what tree is that, let it grow, here's a bunch of new missions to help that along."
So one might spend 4-8 hours before feeling like one has any freedom at all. I find that annoying but once you get past that it's largely fine, albeit the quests continue but it's not restrictive. Anyway, I do like the graphical changes (nothing super special but looks better than the first game), and (mostly) the constant companion warrior dude, who as you go along breaking/harvesting materials will auto-help out. That said, if you're into micro-managing appearance and what you want to dig up, he might annoy a bit in that sense. Not entirely decided on that yet.
But seems just as good as the first one, with some gameplay improvements like not having to start all over each island. I like how the island you wash up on is the actual "sandbox" island this time around, vs. sandbox mode being locked away for a long time, and with the idea being you go to other islands to gather resources and townsfolk to go back and turn/terraform that bare island into whatever you want, so to speak.