Im Gegensatz zum ersten Teil hat mich ein vollständiger Party Wipe nach 50 Stunden nicht so sehr demotiviert, dass ich kurz vorm Schluss aufgehört habe. Sowohl die Charaktere als auch man selbst sammelt Erfahrung und kann sich so den Gefahren des Darkest Dungeon immer besser stellen. Kombomöglichkeiten und Synergien zwischen den Figuren sind super, man kann genauso viel Spaß im Kampf haben wie in der Vorbereitung. Erfolg ist allerdings nicht immer vom Skill abhängig, es wird immer Runden geben, wo man erkennen muss: Es hat nicht sollen sein. Gute Musik, starke Präsentation. Nicht alles ist mackenfrei. Die ewig langen Fahrten von Event zu Event können sich ganz schön ziehen, aber ich fand sie atmosphärisch genug, um sie auch Dutzende Stunden später noch zu mögen. Das Spiel ist außerdem sehr abhängig von den Beziehungen der Charaktere. Wenn sich mehr oder weniger random eine neutrale Gruppe plötzlich verabscheut, kann man die Runde eigentlich gleich aufgeben, während ein Ringschluss aus Liebesbeziehungen selbst den Endboss ziemlich trivial macht. Ob man es als Sequel von Darkest Dungeon wegen einiger Änderungen am Gameplayloop mag, muss man selbst entscheiden. Aber unabhängig davon ist es ein gutes Spiel.
It's a fun title that had me enchanted despite all its obvious flaws and bugs (on release).
Incredible presentation, voice acting, narration, sound design - goosebumps all the way down. The gameplay is very solid, but despite the devs' best effort to remix the few enemy types, level types and weapons they had, it does get a bit repetetive.
The game wants to be artistic through speechless storytelling, but it is not very good at communicating what it wants. The combat system is solid, but on the one side it lacks depth to be very interesting and on the other side some later fights can be pretty challenging for people with below average reaction time, which is a bit of a shock after three hours of breezing through the game. The upgrade system is lackluster and new abilities don't really add anything exciting. I am disappointed that the story is all about getting parts of the protag's "soul" back which took the form of bosses to defeat and the boss abilities you get only appear in cutscenes. Anything aside from combat is pretty boring. Not bad, just boring. The platforming parts are unassuming and searching for upgrade items in largely uninspiring environments feels like ticking a "How can I extend play time by an hour?" box. It's mostly barren caves in red, green, blue or violet with a bit of grass and sunshine sprinkled in here and there. Austin Wintory's soundtrack is decent, but a far cry from his more popular works. Despite being conceptualized to be visually appealing and barely having any HUD, there is no ultrawide screen support. Fortunately there is a community patch that gets rid of the letterboxing. All in all: Unfortunately a pretty forgettable game. If you want a more entertaining experience that is similar in vibe but more on the casual side of gameplay, play Prince of Persia (2008) - absolutely the best game that almost plays itself.
Every couple of years I just get the need to replay this Prince of Persia. The gameplay is not demanding, but it is a very beautiful journey, has excellent character banter and a simple story with a bit of heartwrench to it. It's a perfect game for sitting in a warm and cozy room after having had too much food during the holidays. It's not my favorite PoP game, but I have replayed it more often than any part of the Sands of Time trilogy.
I bought this game despite the warnings that the gameplay is rather underwhelming, because it looked just so damn gorgeous - only to find out that those warnings were understatements. While the game is rather beautiful, all I did for all of the four hours I've played this game was backtrack. That would be fine if there was a way to quickly revisit places, but I spent so much time waiting for the protagonists to get places that the quite charming presentation really wasn't enough to persuade me to come back to the world of Beautiful Desolation. Maybe the game has more success marrying its gameplay and narrative further down the line, but I will never know.
I love everything about this game. The concept is marvelous and the execution is just as good. But after playing and having to replay the first level for hours, the music bore itself into my brain so deeply that it played in my head on repeat for days after having touched the game for the last time, so much so that I could hardly sleep anymore. So while it's great and all, I wish there was some variety to the music.
