Posted on: March 11, 2015
Snowglobe Henry
Games: 96 Reviews: 4
Set your expectations to low.
Let's not screw around and get to the point. The very reason the first Hotline Miami was so good is due to its simplicity. It's straight forward, put on a mask, go in, kill everyone, go out. This combined with a neon induced art style, beautifully crafted pixel graphics, a soundtrack to die for and a ambiguous storyline is what made it so good. Hotline Miami 2 still has some of these elements. The graphics, the music, the art style, it's all there, what it lacks however, is a story that keeps things interesting while not being to much in your face about it and, of course, the direct approach to gameplay. Hotline Miami 2 goes for a bigger plot and more complex gameplay. These things aren't necessarily bad, but in the context of Hotline Miami and the mentioned reasons for it being so great, it doesn't really work. Instead of like the first game where you had Jacket, the only playable character who had a large selection of masks to choose from (always go for Zack!) Miami 2 changes this to instead have several different characters that have unique abilities. One can perform a roll to dodge bullets, another can dual-wield (and also reload) two SMGs etc. Instead of like the first game, where the masks where mearly modifiers to what you can do, you now have characters with one or maybe two masks that can do a certain thing. It's an interesting concept that can be entertaining but sadly, i needlessly complicates things and leads to the game feeling suprisingly repetative. On top of that, the levels are now much bigger, has more enemies and takes longer to complete. Once again, this may sound good on paper, but in terms of gameplay, it leads to one being killed by enemies off screen, one getting stuck on different props and the change of the time system, which now keeps counting once you're done with level, instead of resetting everytime you die, means that you lose the perfect score attack system of the first game where flexability and time management where key to success. It leads to a game that at times feels like a covershooter (there's a much bigger focus on firearms this time around) Once again, it goes against the very focus of Hotline Miami and leads to a game that feels needlessly complicated, more is indeed less. To sum this up, contrary to what it seems like in this review, i like Hotline Miami 2, i think it's a good game, better then most, but in comparision to the first game, it falls short, then again, the first game is hard to beat. Also this review is a copy pasta of my review on steam, sue me.
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