The unique Excessive on Life was an honest sufficient title, however one which I’d by no means contemplate overly memorable. Its humor usually missed the mark, with fundamental gunplay leaving every encounter feeling overly samey. Excessive On Life 2 needs to vary this, however has it gone far sufficient?
A Acquainted Story
Excessive On Life 2 takes place years after the Bounty Hunter’s profitable journey to cease humanity from being enslaved and smoked by aliens. After a whirlwind victory tour, they discover themselves in a rut, going via the motions every day. They even begin off of their outdated dwelling, which has since been transformed right into a museum exhibit.
Issues go south when their sister Lizzie – now a freedom fighter – will get a bounty on their head. Heading out to save lots of them, it begins one other journey with the lives of humanity on the road.
The essential premise is similar to that of the primary recreation. Take out unhealthy guys, gather new weapons, save humanity. In reality, I’d go so far as to say that it’s principally only a weaker retread relating to the intense aspect of the story.
At the very least Excessive On Life 2’s humorous aspect is a slight enchancment, reducing down on a number of the compelled chatter that plagued the unique. There’s nonetheless loads of it, thoughts you, with a lot of jokes that simply boil right down to a easy bit that’s dragged on for a lot too lengthy.
Most of the stronger jokes are ones that make use of this being a recreation somewhat than a TV present. Messing with the UI, having you draw your individual face (that you simply’ll by no means see because of the recreation being in first individual), and letting you discover loads of optionally available scenes for those who stroll off the overwhelmed path.
I wouldn’t say that I discover Excessive On Life 2 to be laugh-out-loud humorous more often than not, nevertheless it’s no less than bearable even at its lowest. On the similar time, the deal with trying to be humorous does imply that any time issues are made to be extra severe, it falls fully flat.
So-So Gunplay, Now With A Skateboard
Normal gunplay is one thing that I hoped Excessive On Life 2 would massively enhance upon. The primary recreation’s fight had little actual affect and bought extremely stale by the top. Sadly, it’s typically the identical within the sequel.
Whereas your Gatlians – sentient speaking weapons – take the place of normal weaponry, they don’t really really feel that totally different from different sci-fi shooters. You have got SMG, a shotgun, and burst rifle equivalents to call just a few, and so they act typically as you’d anticipate. Every has entry to additional skills akin to time stopping bubbles or electrical spikes, however I didn’t use them a lot exterior of platforming and puzzles.
The primary problem is that you simply’re hardly ever required to change weapons on the fly throughout a shootout. Enemies don’t require particular methods (not even boss fights) and all Gatlians have infinite ammo.
Excessive On Life 2 tries to shake issues up as a substitute with the skateboard, “borrowed” from one other bounty hunter early on. Whilst you can dash round, you’ll normally as a substitute skate from location to location. It strikes at an honest velocity, and areas function a lot of jumps and ramps to utilize your new mobility.
Whereas removed from a sensible tackle skateboarding, it does add a singular dynamic to motion. It serves as a velocity enhance, wall journey, and even an extra assault throughout firefights by launching it at your enemies. Exterior of fights, you may as well make use of it in skateparks and races for some additional money and collectables.
It may be finicky at occasions, akin to killing your momentum after barely clipping a rock, nevertheless it’s total Excessive On Life 2’s greatest addition over the unique. Add within the air dashes you unlock later, and it turns into a enjoyable technique to get round each out and in of fights.
A Buggy Launch, Once more
The primary recreation’s launch was fairly tough, bringing with it loads of efficiency points and bugs. Excessive On Life 2 repeats this as soon as once more, with a framerate that goes far and wide and loads of softlocks.
Enjoying on a comparatively excessive finish system with an RTX 5070 Ti, it will nonetheless wrestle to hit a secure 60fps in some areas at 1440p excessive settings. Body era clearly helps, however even then, there’s nonetheless noticeable stuttering. Many textures additionally take a very long time to load in, staying partially (or totally) low decision till a very good 10 seconds later.
The overview construct additionally broke on me loads of occasions, one thing that has solely gotten barely higher since launch. Crashes are nonetheless current, together with different issues just like the UI breaking or enemies not spawning in.
A few of this may very well be chalked right down to the standard points with Unreal Engine 5, particularly the stuttering. Nonetheless, the present state of Excessive On Life 2 on PC (and certain consoles) is much worse than regular.
Excessive on Life 2 Evaluate | Last Ideas
Excessive on Life 2 is a slight enchancment over its predecessor in some methods, nevertheless it’s laborious to suggest proper now in its present state. Dangerous efficiency and bugs that may by no means be totally fastened get in the best way of what would in any other case be an inoffensive expertise.
Excessive on Life 2 was reviewed on PC utilizing a code supplied by the writer over the course of 20 hours – all screenshots had been taken throughout the strategy of overview.
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