This is a tight, mechanically sound and incredibly satisfying game that gradually completely falls apart as you unlock higher difficulties and dig deeper into the systems that the devs are still tangibly struggling to balance 6 years in. Going from the fun action RPG that Dead Cells starts out as, and ending up in the stat check-bloated wreck it becomes in the late game (in individual runs but especially in the overall progression), is like seeing a child prodigy grow up into a tweaking crackhead. Don't get me wrong - there's still enjoyment to be had even in the depths of the unrepentant inferno that is 5BC! It's just that the punchy and well-paced core gameplay gets molded into this incongruous twitchy mess where if you're not blowing up an enemy in one hit the nanosecond they're in your line of sight, you're playing it wrong and your deaths start to feel more and more bullshit. And at that point, the whole variety in weapons, mutations and enemy design becomes almost irrelevant; which is a shame because it's initially one of the game's strongest points.

Whatever Motion Twin's next project is, I hope they at least build on this foundation because the actual moment-to-moment experience of Dead Cells is immaculate.

Sometimes I think "it would be cool if Konami was still putting out weird Yugioh games with unusual gameplay styles" until I actually play one of said games and experience the definition of licensed third-party shovelware. The developers were probably given the terms "Yugioh" and "kart racer" along with a 6-month dev cycle and had to make the most of it, which is why the game's "meta" consists of summoning Sonic Chick and holding on to 3 copies of Rush Recklessly until the final lap so you can stand a chance against the comically overtuned rubberbanding. The game is over in 2 hours and little Timmy's christmas is ruined.

The definition of "overstays its welcome".

An improvement over the first game all across the board - gameplay, visuals, soundtrack and writing - and an inexplicable attempt to be the next big epic open world RPG while barely being deeper than a Diablo clone. One of the most bizarrely expensive video game productions of all time, with all the money and effort seemingly going into meaningless padding and fractaling fetch quests. A deep dive into the series' lore with some interesting development and worldbuilding, while also making the universe come off blander than expected and ending with a lame surprise reveal in the final act. Eventually spawned a sequel, but not before fatally bankrupting the original studio due to the over-investment of its production.

Basically it's like a playable contradiction