I feel like this runs counter to the emerging consensus, but I enjoyed Oxenfree II significantly more than its predecessor. Your mileage will vary depending on how deeply the first game resonated with you (it left me a little bit cold). But I found the sequel to be a subtler and more mature story, set in a more beautiful environment, with more compelling secrets to find.

Alas, the biggest problem from the first game returns here, which is that the characters still stammer and ‘um’ their way through every damn line. The script is full of ellipses, filler words and other sources of artificial hesitancy that I imagine were intended to make the dialogue seem more naturalistic, but they don't. Obviously I can’t get into the writers’ heads, but it feels like somebody tried to write the voice performances into the script. I always prefer when writers focus on clarity and concision, and trust the actors to lift the language off the page. A few stretches of Oxenfree II are beautifully written, but this mannerism is so pervasive that it makes the characters hard to listen to. I see that other reviewers have been praising this game’s dialogue. To each their own. I tended to enjoy what the characters said, but not how they said it.

Nevertheless, if you can see (and listen) past these flaws, you’ll find a game that exceeds its predecessor as an explorable environment (at times it feels like a third-person Firewatch), that uses its horror gimmick more judiciously, and tells a lovely, melancholy story about two people who are desperately trying not to waste their precious lives. You need to have played the first game to understand it, and I’m not sure I’d recommend playing that game just for the purpose of getting to this somewhat better sequel. But if you’ve played Oxenfree already, I think this is well worth your time.