Boy oh boy this one's pretty good.
There's a couple levels that are standouts but all of them are wonderfully detailed, satisfyingly open, and great fun to navigate. In my whole time playing I always found a solution to tricky situations and for the most part the quest objectives share that flexibility (with one major exception, which made me restart a whole level.) It is delightfully refreshing to play a game where you can just feel the game designers chuckling and rubbing their hands together saying "hehehe they're gonna love this one!" Guess what! I did! There's two levels with central "gimmicks" so strong that I'll be thinking about them for a long time, I bet.
I played Emily for my playthrough and I was pleasantly surprised to find that her toolkit is absurdly expressive and powerful, even for non-lethal runs. I enjoyed the first game quite a bit, but found myself longing for the other powers Corvo had that I wasn't able to use non-lethally. Emily changes this. Each power can be used in any kind of playthrough, with a great deal of flexibility, synergy, and flexibility. The balance in this game, as a result, can really flounder. I found that certain synergies were oppressively good options that I'd reach for instead of something more spur of the moment. Those selfsame synergies can go wild when you toss bonecharms into the mix, too. Try Domino and the bonecharm that gives you a reliable chance to get a sleep dart back for a cheap way to put whole rooms out of action from a distance.
The story is definitely Dishonored 2's weakest point. Dialogue is delivered with a strange cadence, and Emily is so poorly developed that she basically has to tell you out loud how her character is developing because it is not shown to the player through subtler means. The Outsider explains the moral choice presented in most levels to you as if talking down to the player, hoping that you'll get the point even if you're watching a video on your phone and doing cartwheels while cutscenes play. It's story delivered via sledgehammer, and the game practically acknowledges this weakness: the "hold F to skip" prompt is ALWAYS in the bottom left of the screen during cutscenes, a constant reminder that you could be skipping this and getting back to the good stuff.
That said... it doesn't really matter. The story exists, and that is enough to support a great stealth game with some extraordinarily memorable levels and a full-featured suite of powers and tools that are a delight to use and experiment with. A true sequel's sequel: leaner, meaner, and tighter in almost every way. Sophomoric only narratively, this one's gonna be a game I'll revisit in the future without a doubt. Give this one a shot.
There's a couple levels that are standouts but all of them are wonderfully detailed, satisfyingly open, and great fun to navigate. In my whole time playing I always found a solution to tricky situations and for the most part the quest objectives share that flexibility (with one major exception, which made me restart a whole level.) It is delightfully refreshing to play a game where you can just feel the game designers chuckling and rubbing their hands together saying "hehehe they're gonna love this one!" Guess what! I did! There's two levels with central "gimmicks" so strong that I'll be thinking about them for a long time, I bet.
I played Emily for my playthrough and I was pleasantly surprised to find that her toolkit is absurdly expressive and powerful, even for non-lethal runs. I enjoyed the first game quite a bit, but found myself longing for the other powers Corvo had that I wasn't able to use non-lethally. Emily changes this. Each power can be used in any kind of playthrough, with a great deal of flexibility, synergy, and flexibility. The balance in this game, as a result, can really flounder. I found that certain synergies were oppressively good options that I'd reach for instead of something more spur of the moment. Those selfsame synergies can go wild when you toss bonecharms into the mix, too. Try Domino and the bonecharm that gives you a reliable chance to get a sleep dart back for a cheap way to put whole rooms out of action from a distance.
The story is definitely Dishonored 2's weakest point. Dialogue is delivered with a strange cadence, and Emily is so poorly developed that she basically has to tell you out loud how her character is developing because it is not shown to the player through subtler means. The Outsider explains the moral choice presented in most levels to you as if talking down to the player, hoping that you'll get the point even if you're watching a video on your phone and doing cartwheels while cutscenes play. It's story delivered via sledgehammer, and the game practically acknowledges this weakness: the "hold F to skip" prompt is ALWAYS in the bottom left of the screen during cutscenes, a constant reminder that you could be skipping this and getting back to the good stuff.
That said... it doesn't really matter. The story exists, and that is enough to support a great stealth game with some extraordinarily memorable levels and a full-featured suite of powers and tools that are a delight to use and experiment with. A true sequel's sequel: leaner, meaner, and tighter in almost every way. Sophomoric only narratively, this one's gonna be a game I'll revisit in the future without a doubt. Give this one a shot.