A much bigger and more dynamic sequel which while that lends itself to having more exciting locations and more diverse characters, kills some of the simplicity that made the first game one of my favorite indie games.

HM1's tighter level design allowed a greater sense of surveying the environment and greater control over what has happening. The bigger levels in the sequel do allow for more sprawling and exciting environments but it comes at the cost of being overstuffed as there's way too many enemies with some being out of sight unfairly sniping you without even being registered on your radar. It leads to a lot of deaths feeling cheap and the feeling of having to restart after making good progress on a floor even more frustrating.

This game's structure functions around the non linear story taking place before, during and after Jacket's rampage in the first game. There's multiple characters you play as throughout so different characters may have different abilities and level design suited around what the story is. A lot of it is really cool with one character having cover shooting come into play and others coming with fun twists on the formula like duel machine guns and a duo character. However this does create some issues like a lack of consistency and apparent progression as the mask system is way less emphasized with the characters that use them being spread out far in the campaign. The story was unfortunately a confusing mess with very little time spent on one storyline before it's jumped around and eventually wrapped up making it's shocking ending leave less of an impact on me.

I was harsh on this game but that's mostly because I loved the first game so much and this game really did change things that made that one great. It's still a fantastic top down shooter and is endlessly replayable thanks to custom levels via Steam Workshop.