I think the devs ambitions for a bigger sequel were well-placed. More levels, more weapons, more interactable objects, more enemy types, longer game time, you get the picture. All of which are welcome and appreciated if only in a limited capacity. I say that because the level design has changed from clearing rooms of all enemies with set paths to randomly generated levels with enemies spawning from anywhere on the map. The latter are presented gauntlet style for each "node" or set of levels with 5-15 levels each. Death anywhere in the node is a restart from the beginning until you reach the end. I didn't mind this change for the majority of my time with the game. To me, it made encounters more dynamic and unpredictable. The new enemy types adds to the unpredictablity, for better or worse. It only started to wear thin towards the end with longer stretches of levels forcing restarts more often than not. The new gimmick of hacks - random upgrades given within a node - are helpful in one breath and useless in another. You'll have a large pool of abilities unlocked halfway through the game, but you may not see them utilized more than a handful of times between nodes. Some like health pickups (which you have 2-3 HP now in each node) become essential in the randomness of the levels. Others - like being able to stomp on enemies by jumping - are cool but too niche to be helpful in levels. Story is much the same thematically as the first game. I won't bother too much with analyzing its meaning or implications. Still very meta, self-referential, and not necessary to enjoy what is on offer here. If you don't mind the more mindless (no pun intended) gameplay here with increased goodies and mini-areas to play with then this can kill some time for you. I did receive this for free so that does factor into my review. Still more or less satisfied with my time.
