Throughout an especially tense narrative second late in Excessive on Life 2, I attempted to do one thing foolish: I pointed one in every of my speaking alien gun companions on the villain of the story and pulled the set off. The gun stopped me. I did it once more. As soon as once more, the alien gun mentioned no. After I tried as soon as extra, my weapon good friend stopped me but once more…however warned that, subsequent time, it wouldn’t. If I actually wished to interrupt this scripted second and shoot the dangerous man within the face, it will let me try this. And so I pulled that set off once more, and the sport reacted, and I laughed. Later, whereas preventing that very same villain within the recreation’s massive last boss battle, I died and acquired caught in an infinite dying loop when respawning. My solely possibility is to restart from the start of the sport or hope an upcoming patch fixes my predicament. It is a good encapsulation of my expertise with Excessive on Life 2, out now on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC. It’s a shooter keen to react to the participant always in artistic and humorous methods, but additionally one that’s full of messy bugs, poorly applied mechanics, and different points that generally derail the hijinks.
She will get excessive, she will get excessive, on life 2 Excessive on Life 2 is a follow-up to 2022’s shock hit sci-fi comedy shooter Excessive on Life. Like that final recreation, the sequel is a wacky FPS that includes a ton of goofy dialogue, gross-out humor, and oddball references to locations like Occasion Metropolis and Spirit Halloween. This time round, nonetheless, controversial Rick & Morty co-creator Jusitan Roiland isn’t concerned, having left the corporate in 2023. For these fearful that his absence would change the sport’s vibes or humor, I can report that, for higher or for worse, that isn’t the case. After defeating the evil G3 alien cartel within the final recreation and stopping them from turning people right into a drug, the anonymous bounty hunter you performed as throughout that journey is now a star. Over the subsequent 5 years–as seen in a wild montage opening–you get together, go on speak exhibits, and take down tons of different criminals and monsters, all whereas your sister goes off to hitch a resistance group that believes people are nonetheless in peril.
That ultimately will get her into hassle with a big alien pharma firm, and within the technique of saving her, you find yourself a legal outlaw, be a part of her group, and with the assistance of some new and outdated allies, you battle again and attempt to as soon as once more save humanity from aliens hell-bent on turning us right into a managed substance.
A few of these useful allies are speaking alien weapons with faces. In the event you haven’t realized it but, Excessive on Life 2 is bizarre. Sure, the large gimmick within the first recreation returns in Excessive on Life 2. All the weapons you employ are speaking characters with their very own personalities, needs, and desires. This time round, you’ve gotten some new weapons to hang around with, together with a married couple coping with lots of drama who perform as twin handguns that spit out colourful goop collectively. My favourite new alien gun buddy is a former murderer who, after realizing the error of his methods, permits you to minimize his head off and shove it right into a burst fireplace assault rifle that may fireplace spikes. I used him loads. There are additionally some returning favorites, just like the shotgun lizard alien Gus and the SMG-like Sweezy. The pistol voiced by Roiland, Kenny, doesn’t return, although he’s referenced.
Feed your head, then shoot their heads Fight in a first-person shooter is certainly totally different than standard when your rifle or handgun cracks jokes or reacts to issues taking place on the planet. Generally I’d change to a gun not as a result of I assumed it will assist me within the ongoing firefight, however just because I used to be curious how they could react to a scenario. For instance, in a single degree, I walked below some dripping water and my gun gagged and spat it out. So I spent the subsequent 10 minutes switching between every gun to see how they might react. Noticeably, the weapons appear much less chatty than within the first recreation, but additionally have extra voice strains. So I not often heard them repeat strains, which was good and made them much less grating to hold round for a dozen hours. Again-of-the-box quote: “Lastly, a recreation that lets me shoot aliens with a speaking gun whereas skateboarding!” Developer Squanch Video games Sort of recreation: First-person semi-open-world sci-fi comedy shooter Preferred: Humorous jokes, assorted environments, a number of gags to seek out, alien weapons look nice Disliked: A lot of bugs, frequent efficiency points, so-so fight Platforms: PC, Swap 2, PS5, Xbox Sequence X/S (Performed) Performed: Practically accomplished the total recreation after 15 hours, however the last boss battle broke Launch Date: February 13, 2026 (Launching in April on Swap 2) Sadly, fight involving these speaking weapons isn’t a lot to jot down dwelling about. I wouldn’t classify the gunplay as dangerous, however enemies, whereas assorted throughout the totally different ranges you go to, don’t react a lot to photographs and appear fairly dang silly. I performed on regular issue and by no means died as soon as throughout fight exterior of two deaths throughout boss fights.
You should purchase upgrades in your weapons, as earlier than, however they don’t enhance the fight. They do aid you kill extra enemies quicker, although, which is sweet, because it helps you get by some longer encounters in much less time. The opposite massive addition to fight is a skateboard, which you purchase early on. In most areas of the sport, in addition to most fights, you’ll be able to skateboard round, grind rails, and hop about prefer it’s Tony Hawk’s Professional Skater. The sport even immediately references Tony Hawk’s video games with floating letters you’ll be able to acquire, and it reveals who made all these letters within the first place.
Driving the skateboard is a blast because it strikes quick and supplies extra methods to get round arenas throughout fights. However it might additionally trigger some complications because the controls are generally unresponsive. I often bounced off surfaces accidentally or was unable to grind one thing for no obvious motive. Nonetheless, it’s good to have the ability to skate round areas shortly, and taking pictures weapons from a skateboard is certainly cool, so I’m joyful it’s right here even when it doesn’t all the time work. Go ask Alice for a humorous joke The humor in Excessive on Life 2 is a mixture of meta references, absurdist nonsense, slapstick, and satire. I discovered the sport’s ratio for good jokes to be strong. About three out of 5 jokes landed and made me at the least smile or chuckle. That’s fairly dang good for a online game. Even higher, if you happen to simply don’t need to speak to some weirdo for 3 minutes about an elevator or hear individuals guffawing whereas delivering their strains, you’ll be able to ignore a lot of the jokes in Excessive on Life 2, which are sometimes hidden out within the worlds you go to. Ignoring all of those gags would doubtless result in a much less humorous expertise. Nonetheless, if you happen to hate this type of low-energy, improv-heavy humor, properly, skipping lots of it’s an possibility.
However like Excessive on Life 2’s new skateboard, the comedy is barely good when the sport works accurately. ©Squanch Video games Far too many jokes and gags have been ruined in Excessive on Life 2 for various causes, together with dialogue chopping off different dialogue, characters getting caught in response loops, audio disappearing randomly, or another bug taking place and derailing the punchline. I additionally bumped into bugs and glitches exterior of jokes. I acquired caught taking part in Bible Adventures (sure, the precise NES recreation from again within the day) as a result of I couldn’t again out. One other time I acquired caught within the flooring whereas attempting to play hide-and-seek. Enemies spawned underground, forcing me to desert a facet encounter. One time, I couldn’t even change my weapons, making it unimaginable to resolve one in every of Excessive on Life 2’s many easy puzzles till I reset. It’s a disgrace that this recreation is in such a tough state at launch, together with quite a few efficiency hiccups on Xbox Sequence X. There are some actually cool and humorous concepts in Excessive on Life 2.
Shatter your illusions of affection One memorable mission entails a full-on homicide thriller that you have to resolve, full with an in-game notepad that allows you to mark off clues and suspects. One other time, I visited a retro recreation planet with low-poly enemies and environments. A standout boss battle concerned the baddie digitally inserting themselves into my high-tech bounty swimsuit and clawing their manner into my pause menu, forcing me to battle them within the totally different settings menus. A favourite mission of mine takes place on a planet devoted to conventions. Exploring the totally different cons, together with a Homicide Con and Human Con, was a deal with, particularly as a result of I took the time to poke round and work together with all the things and everybody I noticed.
Excessive on Life 2 is a recreation that’s chockablock with creativity and keenness. One which rewards you for taking your time and poking at each nook and little bit of it. The individuals who made this recreation jammed it stuffed with concepts and particulars, lots of which I in all probability missed. However wacky concepts, good jokes, and bizarre set items aren’t all it takes to make an ideal FPS. You want satisfying gunplay, constant motion, and enemies which can be participating to kill. Excessive on Life 2 doesn’t pull that off. And when it does succeed at one thing, the percentages are excessive {that a} bug or efficiency concern will get in the best way and even outright break it.
Perhaps the ending of Excessive on Life 2 will utterly change my thoughts. I’ll need to hope that the sport is patched and I can escape my infinite dying loop and beat the ultimate boss. If that occurs, I’ll return to this overview and allow you to know. For now, I’d recommend individuals wait to see what’s fastened within the first replace earlier than hopping into this wonky however artistic sci-fi journey.
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