This adds 2 missions and 3 weapons to the game. The weapons are ok. 1 mission has, by very VERY far the absolute best bossfight in this game, it does absolutely everything a boss should have, from telegraphed attacks to being epic, while having a place in the game. This boss fight is followed by another less insane one but still interesting with a nice twist. I feel like the devs really took lessons compared to the base game in terms of boss design. The other mission is ok and imo the hardest mission of them all in rage mode. The extension to the soundtrack is also pretty sick, definitely listening to that banger when I want to feel motivated. Overall very well worth the money.
It's clear the devs took into account the issues most people raised with their first entry, in particular the lack of early options for fast travel and a more explicitly told story as well as secrets that are more accessible. It's got all the same goodness as well, a solid soundtrack, the mix of weird/imaginative worlds with cute things juxtaposed to suddenly dark moments or silly creatures and easter eggs. Ran perfectly fine on Fedora39, always a pleasure when you can game on Linux without needing to jump through hoops. I'm looking forward to their next creations.
GOTY 2023 for me The game features a sort of hub area, a series of loosely-tied missions and some maps for waves-based games What it does better than FEAR - Due to the design of a series of maps, they can explore more horror concepts than FEAR's single concept. Some shit felt pulled out of a SCP entry, other stuff felt like an 80ies horror film... it's much better than in FEAR where if you're not interested by little psychics girls, then yeah there's no other horror in there for you. - The combat is as intense as the first FEAR but with much more speed. - The AI is very good, they will try to flank, they react to you taking hostages, if you used a hostage an shot someone they will not hold their fire at the next hostage, when you go invisible they will shoot at where they predict you will go (and that part is really convincing imo). I had a lot of tense moments on extreme difficulty, like a standoff against a juggernaut as I have a hostage and the ennemies were screaming "oh shit I'm not trained for this" and the juggernaut said "allright boys I'm going for it" and he just slowly walked up to me and cornered me, I had no health to afford to let the hostage go and even if I cloaked they would predict I either went left or right and they'd just shoot everyhwere. it was stressful as hell and great. (I tried to throw the hostage and got shotgunned in the face) - The voice acting is simply perfect, everyone sounds appropriately stressed out of their mind, or badass, that aspect was AAA-quality, I mean true AAA. I genuinely felt bad for the panicked soldiers trying to help a man they believed was doing the right thing in one level. - The soundtrack is a perfect fit for the amount of violence and speed. That being said there's a lot where it can improve, among others: - the final boss was a bit lame - Special ennemies that spawn only on specific criteria were cool but underused - some level layouts made little sense The potential for an incredible thing is there
The Hyper Light Drifter comparisons are understandable but this game is genuinely its own thing. The Good: - the game world is full of mood and little nods - the soundtrack is a perfect fit and is well worth buying on its own - the artstyle is colorfull and full of life, I loved it - the combat is better than in HLD imo - the humour generally helped make the game not feel too dry and artsy fartsy The stuff that could've been better - The story is too vague for its own good, I barely could care - Some puzzles felt really weird and excessively complex, if it were for secondary stuff I'd be 1000% on board, but I feel like main quest puzzles should be less contrived - Sometimes the humour was really not at the right time and took me off the contemplative parts of the game, you shouldn't (imo) break the 4th wall right in a very neat and chill exploration section - Despite the gameworld being really neat, the lack of traversal options (especially in early game) combined with the frequent need to backtrack and branching paths make exploration take a lot of time and energy - The 4 previous points ended up with me not caring enough to finish the game after being stuck on a main storyline puzzle where I was pixel hunting for 1+ hour to reach a specific piece, all the while having to constantly make very long detours and backtracking. Imo the game started meh, got a really really great middle part, and then fizzled out when it should've wrapped up much more tidily. It's still an absolute recommend for me
