The Talos Principle 2

In general, Talos Principle 2 is everything Talos Principle was, except bigger. Instead of three worlds based on ancient Greece, ancient Egypt and medieval Europe, we have four main biomes based on the climate. Some areas will have you walk through snowy mountains, others will have you walking through forests or sandy deserts. The visuals are breathtaking, it's a good showcase piece for Unreal Engine 5. The nature looks great, landscapes look realistic and the brutalist style architecture is very impressive. Even minor elements like grass have a lot of detail put into it and the view distances are great allowing you to see entire islands at a time. There's much more variety here than in Talos Principle 1. Each of the 12 subworlds introduces its own mechanic. From rotating and moving platforms to hole generators, there's a lot of new items and there's interesting interactions between those. The game doesn't come with some flaws however. The difficulty level is very uneven. The game starts off easy and stays relatively easy until about 3/4 of the game when the difficulty level soars. Also, because each subworld introduces a new gameplay mechanic, first few levels on each subworld is a tutorial, which doesn't help the difficulty. The gold puzzles which unlock after beating the game provide a proper challenge however. They vary from moderately difficulty to very difficult and will be challenging even for veteran Talos Principle players. Other flaw is the world size. The worlds are large, but mostly empty, and it takes a long time to travel between puzzles. This is especially noticeable during the last few subworlds, which consist of mountain ranges and long winding linear paths. Tetris bridges are a controversial feature, personally I liked the Tetris assembly from the original game more. Overall, it's a must have for any Talos Principle 1 fan and fans of the first person puzzler genre..

After playing and loving the first game I was expecting more of the same, and would have been happy with that. Instead, The Talos Principle 2 greatly expands on the original in every way. I know I shouldn't be, but I'm legitimately surprised :)

Fantastic puzzles and compelling writing make this a great sequel to The Talos Principle, which was already one of the best puzzle games of recent years.

We all know it's a great game but to get it working with Linux, you'll need to install both DXVK and VKD3D. The initial menus need (DXVK for Direct X 8-11) and VKD3D (for DirectX 12). Wine version 9.19, DXVK version 2.41, VKD3D 2.13.