This review contains spoilers
Better than the first part of the DLC, this time having an actual story to playthrough (however short). But this DLC's story still has it's own little developer time-saving twists that you'd expect from this game by now, such as skipping the first SSj Blue Goku vs Freeza fight, and removing the new Freeza Force characters entirely. But hey, there are a few really nice looking cutscenes now, like in the main game, whereas the Beerus "story" had still images for the God ritual itself.
Funnily some of the things they did that were clearly done to cut costs were actually kind of a bonus. Seeing Goten, Trunks, Yamcha and Chaozu at the scene of the Freeza battle was pretty neat, and depending on who you picked for your party they'd even get small but unique one liners before the fights with the Freeza Force members. Speaking of which, reusing Dodoria, Cui, Zarbon and the Ginyu Force instead of putting in the effort to make the new characters allows for some more banter of established characters whereas the new ones didn't really get any interaction with the heroes.
The 3 subquests were all pretty fun, although they fell into the exact same two types of quests as the game has always done (collect stuff or fight), but it's really always been about the dialogue in these quests that make them worth it. Goku's wish in that first quest really had me laughing.
This time we get two max level boss fights, in the form of Beerus (again) and Golden Freeza. Personally I found them to be far easier than the DLC 1's Beerus fight though. I beat Freeza on my very first try, while Beerus only caught me off guard with his clone technique, which I think is new to this DLC? I don't remember it anyway. The last DLC made the Beerus fight feel like a true endgame challenge, this time it felt like beating two strong, but otherwise unnoteworthy opponents.
Horde battles are a new type of battle here that really over emphasise just how much of a button masher this game is, as if that wasn't already obvious. Buuut I think it works because easily spamming through hundreds of mooks is exactly what that part of the movie was about.
Overall I enjoyed the DLC for what it was. It felt like a true expansion to the game, even if it was kinda short. After the lackluster first part which was basically just two new fights repeated dozens of times, in a single empty location with next to zero story, this gives me hope for the third and final part of the DLC which is supposed to be an original story for the game.
Funnily some of the things they did that were clearly done to cut costs were actually kind of a bonus. Seeing Goten, Trunks, Yamcha and Chaozu at the scene of the Freeza battle was pretty neat, and depending on who you picked for your party they'd even get small but unique one liners before the fights with the Freeza Force members. Speaking of which, reusing Dodoria, Cui, Zarbon and the Ginyu Force instead of putting in the effort to make the new characters allows for some more banter of established characters whereas the new ones didn't really get any interaction with the heroes.
The 3 subquests were all pretty fun, although they fell into the exact same two types of quests as the game has always done (collect stuff or fight), but it's really always been about the dialogue in these quests that make them worth it. Goku's wish in that first quest really had me laughing.
This time we get two max level boss fights, in the form of Beerus (again) and Golden Freeza. Personally I found them to be far easier than the DLC 1's Beerus fight though. I beat Freeza on my very first try, while Beerus only caught me off guard with his clone technique, which I think is new to this DLC? I don't remember it anyway. The last DLC made the Beerus fight feel like a true endgame challenge, this time it felt like beating two strong, but otherwise unnoteworthy opponents.
Horde battles are a new type of battle here that really over emphasise just how much of a button masher this game is, as if that wasn't already obvious. Buuut I think it works because easily spamming through hundreds of mooks is exactly what that part of the movie was about.
Overall I enjoyed the DLC for what it was. It felt like a true expansion to the game, even if it was kinda short. After the lackluster first part which was basically just two new fights repeated dozens of times, in a single empty location with next to zero story, this gives me hope for the third and final part of the DLC which is supposed to be an original story for the game.
Review contains spoilers, of course.
But starting with a non-spoiler, the graphics in this game are gorgeous. Definitely a great way for the PS4 to go out before we move onto the PS5, and leaving big shoes to fill.
Ever since games have advanced to the point they became interactive movies, games like TLOU are kinda hit or miss for me due to extreme pacing problems. It used to be that you’d get cutscenes, then gameplay, while now they essentially mix the two, and have you walk through environments at a painfully slow pace while the characters converse. It has tarnished so many games for me, but it never bothered me during The Last of Us due to me just loving the characters and the writing, and the sequel delivers on that front. I actually CARE what happens to these characters as much as I would as if I was watching a movie. Hell there are many scenes that evoked reactions and emotions from me far more than any other game, and I’d possibly say most other forms of fiction. The characters are just that well developed and written that they feel real.
I’ve also often felt like way too many stories involving dangerous situations are too soft when it comes to killing characters, it gets boring when your good guy characters goes through hundreds of life or death fights but you know they’ll never actually die because plot power. This game absolutely shatters that idea within the first 2 hours or so when THE main character from the last game is unceremoniously murdered. It sets the tone that no one is safe, and I actually spent most of the game expecting that Ellie herself could die, because the standard rules are already broken. While Ellie and Abby (the 2 main characters of this game) do end up surviving, almost all their friends die in realistic and swift ways. It’s a game that fully embraces the danger of the world and I love it.
Moving onto gameplay, TLOU is funnily enough one of the few times I actually find myself wanting the gameplay to take a backseat to the story. It’s not bad by any means, but it can be a bit repetitive. It also feels a little broken; obviously stealth is a huge mechanic in the game, but I found I could rarely ever position myself to stealthily take down opponents without notifying the rest of the enemies of my position because the takedown animation takes so long and enemies are placed in ways that they rarely leave each others sight for long. This meant I tended to do 1 stealth kill and perform the rest of the battle in a shootout more often than not.
That said there’s a ton of options in battles, and you can help keep a stealth approach with things like crafting silencers or using throwable objects to distract enemies.
Just like the first game the scare amount of ammo means every shot counts, every single enemy, no matter how “common” they are, demands a decision of how to take them down.
I think the worst thing about the game for me was the level designs. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with them in general, but they’ve made them more pseudo open world, so even though the way forward may be near enough a straight line, there’s an entire mini-world to explore. That SOUNDS great, and it would be, but the collectables real ruin this experience. If it was just crafting materials it’d be fine, but the game hides weapon and ability upgrade materials, along with new weapons and training manuals which will provide extra ability stat trees. Having these hidden in large open areas, with no kind of map or other way to track progress meant that I spent pretty much the ENTIRE game having this nagging feeling that I was missing stuff. I could never fully enjoy myself because I was thinking “What if I missed an important item? What if I end up underpowered because I missed too many materials?” It’s far worse when you accidentally take the right path straight away, and the game blocks the path back meaning you could actually miss an entire area of collectables because you accidentally went the right way without knowing. Most games reward exploration, this game makes exploration an anxiety-inducing near impossible fare, while straight up punishing the player for going through the story-progressing door.
Going back to the story for a bit, I think it’s worth talking about how the game splits you up into two campaigns that go over the same 3 days, one from Ellie’s point of view and one from Abby’s. I think it’s a great idea, and helps highlight how both have their good qualities and look completely evil from the other side. It’s an idea that has literally divided the playerbase into who was right and wrong. It does feel like a huge risk to make you play as the character most players likely hated at that point though. I’ll admit to letting Abby die on purpose while playing as her multiple times.
I do feel like there’s a huge missed opportunity here though, despite both stories taking place over the exact same 3 days, it isn’t until the last day that we start to hear about Ellie’s story while playing as Abby. It seems like the entire point of doing it this way was to open up so many possibilities to see “So that’s what she was doing while Ellie was doing this” but the two pretty much never cross each other’s warpaths until the end. The closest I can think of is in Ellie’s second day, when she ends up in the hospital basement/lower floors one of the WLF soldiers asks “Why is the power on?” which we later find out was due to Abby turning it on in her playthrough. It’s a neat little detail, but it feels like it would have worked much better if the power came on during that scene, rather than it just being on beforehand.
The playable character swap also introduced a problem in regards to a complete character reset in terms of weapon upgrades and abilities. It feels kind of bad to grow your weapons and character only to be pushed back into factory reset mid-way through the game and have to do it again.
And now I’m going to end the review by talking about the end of the game and its pacing problem. When the game looks like we’ve reached Ellie and Abby’s final confrontation, the game skips ahead about a year to show Ellie and Dina at their new farmhouse. It feels like an epilogue, but it keeps going… Then you’re playing as Abby and you think “Well okay it makes sense to see how both characters get to live their happy endings”, but then a brand new conflict happens to Abby, and suddenly Ellie still has desire for revenge so we get an entire extra chapter that not only feels out of place, but paints Ellie in a really bad light after we got an ending that put her on par with Abby. It’s such a weird decision; the game had already had its climax, having to play an extra 3 hours after that felt way too tacked on.
Good game, not without its flaws. Would have been an 8/10 if the last chapter wasn’t a thing.
But starting with a non-spoiler, the graphics in this game are gorgeous. Definitely a great way for the PS4 to go out before we move onto the PS5, and leaving big shoes to fill.
Ever since games have advanced to the point they became interactive movies, games like TLOU are kinda hit or miss for me due to extreme pacing problems. It used to be that you’d get cutscenes, then gameplay, while now they essentially mix the two, and have you walk through environments at a painfully slow pace while the characters converse. It has tarnished so many games for me, but it never bothered me during The Last of Us due to me just loving the characters and the writing, and the sequel delivers on that front. I actually CARE what happens to these characters as much as I would as if I was watching a movie. Hell there are many scenes that evoked reactions and emotions from me far more than any other game, and I’d possibly say most other forms of fiction. The characters are just that well developed and written that they feel real.
I’ve also often felt like way too many stories involving dangerous situations are too soft when it comes to killing characters, it gets boring when your good guy characters goes through hundreds of life or death fights but you know they’ll never actually die because plot power. This game absolutely shatters that idea within the first 2 hours or so when THE main character from the last game is unceremoniously murdered. It sets the tone that no one is safe, and I actually spent most of the game expecting that Ellie herself could die, because the standard rules are already broken. While Ellie and Abby (the 2 main characters of this game) do end up surviving, almost all their friends die in realistic and swift ways. It’s a game that fully embraces the danger of the world and I love it.
Moving onto gameplay, TLOU is funnily enough one of the few times I actually find myself wanting the gameplay to take a backseat to the story. It’s not bad by any means, but it can be a bit repetitive. It also feels a little broken; obviously stealth is a huge mechanic in the game, but I found I could rarely ever position myself to stealthily take down opponents without notifying the rest of the enemies of my position because the takedown animation takes so long and enemies are placed in ways that they rarely leave each others sight for long. This meant I tended to do 1 stealth kill and perform the rest of the battle in a shootout more often than not.
That said there’s a ton of options in battles, and you can help keep a stealth approach with things like crafting silencers or using throwable objects to distract enemies.
Just like the first game the scare amount of ammo means every shot counts, every single enemy, no matter how “common” they are, demands a decision of how to take them down.
I think the worst thing about the game for me was the level designs. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with them in general, but they’ve made them more pseudo open world, so even though the way forward may be near enough a straight line, there’s an entire mini-world to explore. That SOUNDS great, and it would be, but the collectables real ruin this experience. If it was just crafting materials it’d be fine, but the game hides weapon and ability upgrade materials, along with new weapons and training manuals which will provide extra ability stat trees. Having these hidden in large open areas, with no kind of map or other way to track progress meant that I spent pretty much the ENTIRE game having this nagging feeling that I was missing stuff. I could never fully enjoy myself because I was thinking “What if I missed an important item? What if I end up underpowered because I missed too many materials?” It’s far worse when you accidentally take the right path straight away, and the game blocks the path back meaning you could actually miss an entire area of collectables because you accidentally went the right way without knowing. Most games reward exploration, this game makes exploration an anxiety-inducing near impossible fare, while straight up punishing the player for going through the story-progressing door.
Going back to the story for a bit, I think it’s worth talking about how the game splits you up into two campaigns that go over the same 3 days, one from Ellie’s point of view and one from Abby’s. I think it’s a great idea, and helps highlight how both have their good qualities and look completely evil from the other side. It’s an idea that has literally divided the playerbase into who was right and wrong. It does feel like a huge risk to make you play as the character most players likely hated at that point though. I’ll admit to letting Abby die on purpose while playing as her multiple times.
I do feel like there’s a huge missed opportunity here though, despite both stories taking place over the exact same 3 days, it isn’t until the last day that we start to hear about Ellie’s story while playing as Abby. It seems like the entire point of doing it this way was to open up so many possibilities to see “So that’s what she was doing while Ellie was doing this” but the two pretty much never cross each other’s warpaths until the end. The closest I can think of is in Ellie’s second day, when she ends up in the hospital basement/lower floors one of the WLF soldiers asks “Why is the power on?” which we later find out was due to Abby turning it on in her playthrough. It’s a neat little detail, but it feels like it would have worked much better if the power came on during that scene, rather than it just being on beforehand.
The playable character swap also introduced a problem in regards to a complete character reset in terms of weapon upgrades and abilities. It feels kind of bad to grow your weapons and character only to be pushed back into factory reset mid-way through the game and have to do it again.
And now I’m going to end the review by talking about the end of the game and its pacing problem. When the game looks like we’ve reached Ellie and Abby’s final confrontation, the game skips ahead about a year to show Ellie and Dina at their new farmhouse. It feels like an epilogue, but it keeps going… Then you’re playing as Abby and you think “Well okay it makes sense to see how both characters get to live their happy endings”, but then a brand new conflict happens to Abby, and suddenly Ellie still has desire for revenge so we get an entire extra chapter that not only feels out of place, but paints Ellie in a really bad light after we got an ending that put her on par with Abby. It’s such a weird decision; the game had already had its climax, having to play an extra 3 hours after that felt way too tacked on.
Good game, not without its flaws. Would have been an 8/10 if the last chapter wasn’t a thing.
2014
These dumb idle clicker games are so pointless but they draw me in. This one is pretty neat with all the RPG elements. There's certainly a lot of things to unlock and upgrade so even after starting over a week ago there's still elements to it that I haven't touched.
2020
I actually like the idea of a gacha song system, it let's you find new songs and get excited about unlocking your favourites. And the gameplay is simple enough for a phone game, but surprisingly difficult. There's a few little problems I have, like the note hit counter goes "great" "perfect" and "perfect+" instead of the more logical good > great > perfect. And since perfect and perfect+ are the same colour, it's super hard to tell which one you can't take your eyes away from the notes to check.
The problem with this is that it's basically EVERYTHING wrong with free phone games. Full of ads, exclusive paid content, pointless wait times for things like opening rewards etc.
The problem with this is that it's basically EVERYTHING wrong with free phone games. Full of ads, exclusive paid content, pointless wait times for things like opening rewards etc.
It's okay, but the location is very boring for a Dead Rising game, although it does do what it can to make it worth playing after DR2, like new combo weapons. It has some story stuff that maybe goes somewhere in the future, maybe not - I haven't played the sequels yet. Assuming it does carry on, then this was a pretty necessary epilogue to DR2.
The way survivors are implemented is kinda interesting. There's no notifications anymore, instead you just kinda gotta stumble in to them. And you don't have to lead them back either, it's just a case of finding them and "saving" them. Though some of them do still have requests. Not sure if this is really better or worse. The game definitely gives you plenty of time between cases to find them, but that time can also feel surprisingly long if you're only in this to quickly experience the story. After all, there's only so many ways you can entertain yourself killing zombies in such a limited environment when you've had much more options in the main game.
It's a fun enough, short ride. Nothing special. The gun enemies do suck some fun out of it though.
The way survivors are implemented is kinda interesting. There's no notifications anymore, instead you just kinda gotta stumble in to them. And you don't have to lead them back either, it's just a case of finding them and "saving" them. Though some of them do still have requests. Not sure if this is really better or worse. The game definitely gives you plenty of time between cases to find them, but that time can also feel surprisingly long if you're only in this to quickly experience the story. After all, there's only so many ways you can entertain yourself killing zombies in such a limited environment when you've had much more options in the main game.
It's a fun enough, short ride. Nothing special. The gun enemies do suck some fun out of it though.
Interesting physics based puzzle game which is kinda let down by the flappy bird mechanics and unnecessary auto scrolling.
It is a very hard game, but luckily its super generous with checkpoints and load times, so a death is never a big deal and you find you'll just brute force your way through most levels. God help the person who tries to 100% the game though.
A big issue I have with this game is the structure. For the first 60% of the levels it has a very constant process of introducing a new mechanic/power-up and then having 10 levels based on that before introducing a new one. But the levels are pretty long, so 10 of them in a row gets very repetitive. The thing is, after you get through those first 60 levels the last 40 (20 main game + 20 bonus levels) all take a different approach of having a different gimmick for each level, making them all fresh and make the game feel far better paced. If it was just bonus levels I guess I'd understand, but I don't get why the last 20 levels in the main game itself has such a massively different, and better, approach compared to the stagnant feel of the majority of it. If the whole game was like these later levels, I'd probably give it a 2.5, or I might have even given it a 3.
It's a port of a mobile game on consoles and yeah it feels like it.
It is a very hard game, but luckily its super generous with checkpoints and load times, so a death is never a big deal and you find you'll just brute force your way through most levels. God help the person who tries to 100% the game though.
A big issue I have with this game is the structure. For the first 60% of the levels it has a very constant process of introducing a new mechanic/power-up and then having 10 levels based on that before introducing a new one. But the levels are pretty long, so 10 of them in a row gets very repetitive. The thing is, after you get through those first 60 levels the last 40 (20 main game + 20 bonus levels) all take a different approach of having a different gimmick for each level, making them all fresh and make the game feel far better paced. If it was just bonus levels I guess I'd understand, but I don't get why the last 20 levels in the main game itself has such a massively different, and better, approach compared to the stagnant feel of the majority of it. If the whole game was like these later levels, I'd probably give it a 2.5, or I might have even given it a 3.
It's a port of a mobile game on consoles and yeah it feels like it.
2009
A lot of improvements over the past games, including a bunch of new towers catering to different playstyles (I especially liked the idea of a tower that shoots where your mouse is - giving direct interaction with the player for each round), interesting map types that demand different tactics, making some towers useless on some stages but vital on others. There's also finally a fast forward button.
One thing I'm mixed on is the upgrades. While I do like that each tower now has an extra, super-powerful upgrade, I dislike how they turned 2 upgrade trees into one big one, so you have to buy upgrades you won't necessarily benefit from (like boomerang monkeys being able to pop frozen balloons in stages you have no ice towers). Some of the final upgrades are also so ridiculously priced that there's no way you'd realistically get them by the general completion-criteria point for a stage, only really able to use them in free mode or sandbox mode.
The game is also SWARMING with microtransactions, holy shit. Literally everything in the game has an option to be paid for. More lives? You can buy that. Exclusive tower upgrades? You can buy that. Premium courses? You can buy those. Double money mode? You can buy that. While you never need it for completing the game, the fact it's always there, constantly shoved in your face makes this game feel so damn sleazy.
Still a fun game, but not quite the leap it could have been if many of those ugly freemium choices were either gone, or able to be unlocked in other ways. I mean the game even has a challenge mode (which I assume isn't updating any more). Instead of forcing me to buy the ability to sell my towers for 100% of the price (instead of 80%), or the ability for dart monkeys to throw exploding darts, why not let me earn them instead? Bleh.
As an aside, the quality of this game looked awful when I played it. I doubt it's the games fault since I'm playing this via the Ninja Kiwi Archive on steam, but compared to the previous games it's just to pixelly and low quality.
One thing I'm mixed on is the upgrades. While I do like that each tower now has an extra, super-powerful upgrade, I dislike how they turned 2 upgrade trees into one big one, so you have to buy upgrades you won't necessarily benefit from (like boomerang monkeys being able to pop frozen balloons in stages you have no ice towers). Some of the final upgrades are also so ridiculously priced that there's no way you'd realistically get them by the general completion-criteria point for a stage, only really able to use them in free mode or sandbox mode.
The game is also SWARMING with microtransactions, holy shit. Literally everything in the game has an option to be paid for. More lives? You can buy that. Exclusive tower upgrades? You can buy that. Premium courses? You can buy those. Double money mode? You can buy that. While you never need it for completing the game, the fact it's always there, constantly shoved in your face makes this game feel so damn sleazy.
Still a fun game, but not quite the leap it could have been if many of those ugly freemium choices were either gone, or able to be unlocked in other ways. I mean the game even has a challenge mode (which I assume isn't updating any more). Instead of forcing me to buy the ability to sell my towers for 100% of the price (instead of 80%), or the ability for dart monkeys to throw exploding darts, why not let me earn them instead? Bleh.
As an aside, the quality of this game looked awful when I played it. I doubt it's the games fault since I'm playing this via the Ninja Kiwi Archive on steam, but compared to the previous games it's just to pixelly and low quality.
2019
Story is still as convoluted as ever. Exploring Disney worlds is fun and all, but the game definitely tries to make itself out to be far deeper than it really is.
2000
One thing that becomes abundently clear early on is that this kart racer is not a Mario Kart clone. I only managed to get to stage 7, but in that time I only had a single race. In fact every single stage is a different type of game, and honestly I respect it for that. They make these wide open stages to accommodate the playstyle too.
And then there's the items which they didn't just paint over the standard MK items like a lot of Kart Racers, these items feel truly unique. I didn't even learn what every one of them did.
And the roster is massive and each has fun voicelines that add personality to them. The fanservice in this game is insane.
So why the low rating? It's the damn physics. Nothing feels good in this game. Whenever you get hit your kart reacts as if it's made of cardboard. The irony is if this was a straight kart racer it'd probably get a bare pass as a PS1 game because the controls themselves are fair for the era, but the type of gameplay here involves way too many precise movements.
And unlike the standard cup format of Mario Kart, or any racing game, this game has you try to win all 14 stages in a row, with only 5 continues. Honestly I could probably even let the game slide if it just separated into cups of 3-4 stages, but the difficulty of the physics, combined with the fact you need to learn a new gameplay objective every single stage makes getting 14 wins in a row pretty damn hard. Like I said I only got up to stage 7 so I can't say what the last half of the game is like. And it's such a shame because they really tried so hard to make this game stand out from the competition and went full force with the South Park brand.
And then there's the items which they didn't just paint over the standard MK items like a lot of Kart Racers, these items feel truly unique. I didn't even learn what every one of them did.
And the roster is massive and each has fun voicelines that add personality to them. The fanservice in this game is insane.
So why the low rating? It's the damn physics. Nothing feels good in this game. Whenever you get hit your kart reacts as if it's made of cardboard. The irony is if this was a straight kart racer it'd probably get a bare pass as a PS1 game because the controls themselves are fair for the era, but the type of gameplay here involves way too many precise movements.
And unlike the standard cup format of Mario Kart, or any racing game, this game has you try to win all 14 stages in a row, with only 5 continues. Honestly I could probably even let the game slide if it just separated into cups of 3-4 stages, but the difficulty of the physics, combined with the fact you need to learn a new gameplay objective every single stage makes getting 14 wins in a row pretty damn hard. Like I said I only got up to stage 7 so I can't say what the last half of the game is like. And it's such a shame because they really tried so hard to make this game stand out from the competition and went full force with the South Park brand.
2016
Pros:
+Tight and responsive controls controls
+You can feel yourself improving and it's satisfying as hell.
+There's an addicting mini-game you can unlock
Mixed/Not important enough to be a pro or con:
~It's an extremely short and simple game. I got it from PS+ a long time ago, and I don't think I'd ever have been happy paying for this, but it was a fun little thing to get for free
Notes:
•I played this solely because there's one day left until Animal Crossing comes out and I needed a super short game to play in the meantime. This was at the very top of my list of PS+ games and it fit that bill nicely.
+Tight and responsive controls controls
+You can feel yourself improving and it's satisfying as hell.
+There's an addicting mini-game you can unlock
Mixed/Not important enough to be a pro or con:
~It's an extremely short and simple game. I got it from PS+ a long time ago, and I don't think I'd ever have been happy paying for this, but it was a fun little thing to get for free
Notes:
•I played this solely because there's one day left until Animal Crossing comes out and I needed a super short game to play in the meantime. This was at the very top of my list of PS+ games and it fit that bill nicely.
Could have been a fun game if it was its own thing and fleshed out. Being stuck as an afterthought in another game made it very forgettable and hard to invest in to.
1995
Solid run and gunner. Feels smooth to control. Very nice aesthetics for the sega mega drive/genesis, particularly the stage art.
The graphics can make some enemies quite hard to see coming though, especially the little bug-like robots that swarm all over.
The TV system is a really nice way to give identity for the game. Breaking the various TVs throughout the stage can reward you with various things like points, health, lives, a permanent extra hit point, temporary gun power-ups, or even transformations. Finding a TV and blasting it to see what you'll get out of it is always fun. Even though 90% of the time it's just something useless.
Some cool bosses too, my personal favourite being the group of vector-people who transform into various objects like a spring, or a bigger vector-man.
One of my least favourite parts was that each level is timed, despite the fact the aforementioned TV-hunting system seems to encourage players to explore as much of the level as possible. It feels weird to have half the game telling you to take your time and explore, and another half telling you to hurry the fuck up.
It also suffers from some problems that many games from this era did, like enemy placements that just fuck you over before you can really see them (though far less than many others of its type), or the lack of continues (God bless save states).
But it's a generally positive experience overall. Feels good to play, feels fun to explore and find the secrets as long as you don't watch that timer too much.
The graphics can make some enemies quite hard to see coming though, especially the little bug-like robots that swarm all over.
The TV system is a really nice way to give identity for the game. Breaking the various TVs throughout the stage can reward you with various things like points, health, lives, a permanent extra hit point, temporary gun power-ups, or even transformations. Finding a TV and blasting it to see what you'll get out of it is always fun. Even though 90% of the time it's just something useless.
Some cool bosses too, my personal favourite being the group of vector-people who transform into various objects like a spring, or a bigger vector-man.
One of my least favourite parts was that each level is timed, despite the fact the aforementioned TV-hunting system seems to encourage players to explore as much of the level as possible. It feels weird to have half the game telling you to take your time and explore, and another half telling you to hurry the fuck up.
It also suffers from some problems that many games from this era did, like enemy placements that just fuck you over before you can really see them (though far less than many others of its type), or the lack of continues (God bless save states).
But it's a generally positive experience overall. Feels good to play, feels fun to explore and find the secrets as long as you don't watch that timer too much.
Better than the first game, but also much easier (going by their relative difficulties of course, I'm sure the hardest difficulty in this game would still provide a really hard challenge but I'm not trying that). And apparently it's even easier in the deluxe version. I'm not sure I'd call it an "easy" game, but playing on normal was more like a standard platformer than you'd maybe expect.
Anyway I liked the level themes this time, they were mostly unique such as a board game land, a sewer land, a Japan land etc. The ghost theme was the only "common" one, and even that has an old black and white movie aesthetic to make it stand out. Unfortunately it's also a super short game, there's only a total of 4 worlds, not including the tutorial and final level, and each world has 3 levels and a boss. Each level can be beaten in about 5 minutes, even as low as 1 minute in some cases.
Instead of 4 characters it's now just the Nerd and he collects power-ups throughout, all of them hidden except the first one. This does mean if you're an avid AVGN it might bother you to lose those characters...maybe. But for someone who just played this for the platforming element, it was an improvement.
The wall jumping mechanic sucked though, I could never get the arc right, which is pretty bad when the game demands near perfect jumps between saw-blades across both sides of the wall. I swear half the time it just didn't work at all. I spent ages trying to get a single collectable because it required jumping on a wall and my character just would NOT stick to the wall to allow a wall jump. All this while a buzz-saw, a fire bar and a bat were trying to kill my ass.
One big improvement over the original is that lives reset on death now. No more having to kill myself 5 times before starting a level because I wanted to start with full lives. Although ironically despite this change happening, this game makes it much more possible to get through a stage with 5 lives than the original ever did, where I felt like I needed all 30 to trial and error my way through.
The humour is just AVGN humour. If that's your thing, great. For me it amounted to just a lot of cuss words appearing at the bottom of the screen every now and then. Apparently the game is heavily based on, or at least references, the AVGN movie, which I've never seen so many things went over my head. But there were some references that were still fun, I liked the sewer boss being a parody of the TNMT.
I wasn't sure if I should set this as completed or mastered - I did manage to collect all the power-ups and NES carts in my normal difficulty playthrough, and usually I don't count extra difficulties as needed for "mastered" unless it unlocks something in-game (which I don't think is the case here), but it'd still feel wrong to claim to have 100% a game like this without beating it at its hardest more so than any other game. Plus I didn't perfect all levels, which, again, doesn't unlock anything, but does have a visual indicator on the map so...
Anyway I liked the level themes this time, they were mostly unique such as a board game land, a sewer land, a Japan land etc. The ghost theme was the only "common" one, and even that has an old black and white movie aesthetic to make it stand out. Unfortunately it's also a super short game, there's only a total of 4 worlds, not including the tutorial and final level, and each world has 3 levels and a boss. Each level can be beaten in about 5 minutes, even as low as 1 minute in some cases.
Instead of 4 characters it's now just the Nerd and he collects power-ups throughout, all of them hidden except the first one. This does mean if you're an avid AVGN it might bother you to lose those characters...maybe. But for someone who just played this for the platforming element, it was an improvement.
The wall jumping mechanic sucked though, I could never get the arc right, which is pretty bad when the game demands near perfect jumps between saw-blades across both sides of the wall. I swear half the time it just didn't work at all. I spent ages trying to get a single collectable because it required jumping on a wall and my character just would NOT stick to the wall to allow a wall jump. All this while a buzz-saw, a fire bar and a bat were trying to kill my ass.
One big improvement over the original is that lives reset on death now. No more having to kill myself 5 times before starting a level because I wanted to start with full lives. Although ironically despite this change happening, this game makes it much more possible to get through a stage with 5 lives than the original ever did, where I felt like I needed all 30 to trial and error my way through.
The humour is just AVGN humour. If that's your thing, great. For me it amounted to just a lot of cuss words appearing at the bottom of the screen every now and then. Apparently the game is heavily based on, or at least references, the AVGN movie, which I've never seen so many things went over my head. But there were some references that were still fun, I liked the sewer boss being a parody of the TNMT.
I wasn't sure if I should set this as completed or mastered - I did manage to collect all the power-ups and NES carts in my normal difficulty playthrough, and usually I don't count extra difficulties as needed for "mastered" unless it unlocks something in-game (which I don't think is the case here), but it'd still feel wrong to claim to have 100% a game like this without beating it at its hardest more so than any other game. Plus I didn't perfect all levels, which, again, doesn't unlock anything, but does have a visual indicator on the map so...
Still janky but much more playable than the first. The roster focuses far more on season 1 this time which might bother a lot of people, but for me I like those Digimon best anyway. Would have been nice to have at least the other 4 main Digimon from seasons 2&3 though.
Unlockables are almost all unique this time too, except for "Black" versions of certain Digimon. There's even a joke character to unlock. Overall I really enjoy the roster here, even if it's unbalanced as all hell and Digimon that start as megas break the game.
Arcade mode letting you choose a difficulty path (along with the standard difficulty option) adds a tiny bit of replayability as you no longer feel like you've experienced everything after just one run through.
The game cuts out the long ass digivolution cutscenes, now they don't stop gameplay and only last about 2 seconds. Plus they added champion forms between rookie and megas which is neat.
The worst part of this by FAR is the stages. They all try to do something different but as a result the majority of them you spend more time keeping up with the stages platforms, or dodging the hazards than you do fighting opponents. Of the 10 stages in the game, only 2 of them actually fun. And 4 of them were downright insufferable, with the other 4 all being more annoying than fun.
Unlockables are almost all unique this time too, except for "Black" versions of certain Digimon. There's even a joke character to unlock. Overall I really enjoy the roster here, even if it's unbalanced as all hell and Digimon that start as megas break the game.
Arcade mode letting you choose a difficulty path (along with the standard difficulty option) adds a tiny bit of replayability as you no longer feel like you've experienced everything after just one run through.
The game cuts out the long ass digivolution cutscenes, now they don't stop gameplay and only last about 2 seconds. Plus they added champion forms between rookie and megas which is neat.
The worst part of this by FAR is the stages. They all try to do something different but as a result the majority of them you spend more time keeping up with the stages platforms, or dodging the hazards than you do fighting opponents. Of the 10 stages in the game, only 2 of them actually fun. And 4 of them were downright insufferable, with the other 4 all being more annoying than fun.
I was expecting just a literal continuation from the last game, with the only difference being new areas, but I was wrong. Not by a lot, but still. They added a couple of things like adding more unique abilities (such as Arthur being able to repair stuff) and some quality of life changes, the biggest and best by far for me was how the new polyjuice potion works.
Unfortunately most of the flaws of the original remain, like your team members getting in the way of the annoying targeting system. Bosses are still one of the worst parts, but now instead of all bosses being a simple "press square and toss item back" minigame they've added a new boss method, which is a dueling system that's pretty neat at first but ends up being way too slow and easy to do it as much as this game does. And to make it worse, boss fights will tend to use a combination of BOTH of these so boss fights are both incredibly easy and even more dragged out than before.
The first mission kinda misleads you into thinking this game will be more daring with new gameplay ideas, as the very first mission involves a flying segment unlike anything seen in the first game. It never shows up again even at places it could have (thestral flight to London?), and the amount of tweaks in gameplay remains way too small, with most stages still just being "click things until you are able to use wingardium leviosa for the way forward". Even some of the "new" things are just repeats of old ideas, like the new parsletongue system being a 1 to 1 copy of the rune book system, which is still in this game so why bother with both? While it's better than the first in terms of creativity in mechanics, it's still way too low for what it could be, especially when the scope has opened up so much due to all the new types of environments.
And speaking of new areas, this one definitely stands out more in that regard even if it was bound to just due to the nature of the books.
Once again, music pulled from the movies which for me is just an automatic great soundtrack.
The puzzles are still super easy in this game, albeit maybe a biiit harder. But the combat is actually a lot harder, at least when playing solo as it's clear many sections are made for co-op so trying to multitask killing enemies while completing tasks can be pretty tough. The thing is...there's literally no downside to death in this game except losing a bit of money; you just instantly respawn where you were. So even if you do die more than the first game, it only really sets you back mere seconds than it would by not dying.
Decent enough game for a HP fan. Probably best played co-op with a younger person who is less experienced with games though.
Unfortunately most of the flaws of the original remain, like your team members getting in the way of the annoying targeting system. Bosses are still one of the worst parts, but now instead of all bosses being a simple "press square and toss item back" minigame they've added a new boss method, which is a dueling system that's pretty neat at first but ends up being way too slow and easy to do it as much as this game does. And to make it worse, boss fights will tend to use a combination of BOTH of these so boss fights are both incredibly easy and even more dragged out than before.
The first mission kinda misleads you into thinking this game will be more daring with new gameplay ideas, as the very first mission involves a flying segment unlike anything seen in the first game. It never shows up again even at places it could have (thestral flight to London?), and the amount of tweaks in gameplay remains way too small, with most stages still just being "click things until you are able to use wingardium leviosa for the way forward". Even some of the "new" things are just repeats of old ideas, like the new parsletongue system being a 1 to 1 copy of the rune book system, which is still in this game so why bother with both? While it's better than the first in terms of creativity in mechanics, it's still way too low for what it could be, especially when the scope has opened up so much due to all the new types of environments.
And speaking of new areas, this one definitely stands out more in that regard even if it was bound to just due to the nature of the books.
Once again, music pulled from the movies which for me is just an automatic great soundtrack.
The puzzles are still super easy in this game, albeit maybe a biiit harder. But the combat is actually a lot harder, at least when playing solo as it's clear many sections are made for co-op so trying to multitask killing enemies while completing tasks can be pretty tough. The thing is...there's literally no downside to death in this game except losing a bit of money; you just instantly respawn where you were. So even if you do die more than the first game, it only really sets you back mere seconds than it would by not dying.
Decent enough game for a HP fan. Probably best played co-op with a younger person who is less experienced with games though.