Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number

Is everyone playing the same game? This game and the first are great.

This game should have been as amazing as the first one. Actually, it should have been the same as the first one. But it isn't. The levels are horrible, almost every enemy has firepower, so you can't do cool combos (and the worst is that most of the time you don't see who is shooting at you), the characters are boring and I miss the large number of masks. I usually buy awesome games on GOG. This is an exception. Would be nice to get my money back.

I just finished the game and have mixed feelings about it. In the beginning I didn't like it very much. The controls are messy and levels are vast. Difficulty is up because some scenes are simply not predictable (being gunned down from of the screen). But the longer I played I learned how to deal with it. The thing is, that HM2 plays very different than HM1 - you can like that or not. They tried to bring a new experience to the game. I did not have any crashes or problems with save games - thank god for that. The game definitly has some bugs, but the did not interfere my game. My biggest problem with the game is its unpolished state. The developers put a lot of effort into the story arc and presentation, but on their way they sacrificed some of the gameplay. In some levels the AI is so stupid that it takes out all the fun. Many times I stood in an open doorway and the guys didn't see me. So I could easily take out everone before entering the room. In other situations you just have to enter the room, exit and wait for everyone stepping outside to be slaughterd. It didn't took much thinking for the levels. All the gameplay feels like it should only support the story arc. More like "ok, before we tell you more, play this one". Thats a pity, once solved I do not have any ambition to play it again (unlike HM1). Also the different upgrades through the masks were reduced. The story is like the levels: sometimes a bit vast. I didn't get all the details and to be hones I lost interest in it halfway through the game. So many characters and episodes - if you like movies such as Magnolia or Pulp fiction, you will love it. HM1 was weird but told straightforward which I liked much better. But maybe that is a matter of taste. So in the end complicated story, mediocre gameplay and little replay value.

Simply put this is the best modern video game. It should be measured against the all-time greats such as PacMan, Pong, Quake, Half-life, etc. Never has story, music and gameplay come together so completely and thoroughly that you will die endlessly and yet still be driven to respawn and try again. No longer, as in HLM1, can you simply memorize the pattern as the game randomly changes the enemies pathways but rarely, if ever, will you feel cheated. And those who complain that they cannot storm through the map as they did in the first game are unfortunately just not up to the task. In fact if you are striving to get A+ or higher as a level completion grade you will most often be required to combo the entire map. I'm a plus 40+ year old man with other 700 games in my steam account, 77 on here and pretty much every console released and numerous arcade machines including robotron, smash tv, Mortal Kombat and Initial D stage 3 racing. If i was forced to choose a single title...that title would be Hotline Miami 2. It also holds the honor of being my highest rated game out of my 150+ steam reviews.

The game itself is good. Maybe not as good as the original, but it has interesting moments. That being said, the Mac version needs a patch ASAP. It crashes after about 30 minutes of game play, which ruins the gaming experience.