"I cannot die... Yet, I cannot live"
A Review By TheAcidSkull
I'm a very specific kind of player when it comes to video games, I don't usually follow a lot of different types of video games nor do I have the desire to stick my hand in a lot of different pies, I most likely stick to what I like, and hack-and-slash is one the genre or style that would win my appeal any day of the week. Now I don't usually Review a lot of video games considering that fact that I don't feel that I could offer a lot due to the fact that I don't play a lot of games and I can't be considered a Gamer;Nevertheless, upon finishing this game I really do want to give it a shot so bare with me, because I really enjoyed my experience with this franchise hence why I want to get my thoughts across.
Visuals
Even if we set everything aside, the game is, as the previous one, visually stunning, though making this actually work was way harder than it was in the previous game, and here is why: In the first game the environments were mostly based on and centered at a Gothic atmosphere, ranging from dark and creepy castles to moss invested ruins, and while I am in no way saying that the first was less stunning that the second in terms of the graphics, making the environments coincide was a bit more difficult here considering that the developers had to merge a modern day/21st century environment with the Gothic-esque past setting. Which in all honesty is a hell of a accomplishment considering that not once through the game did I feel as if the current day version of the city had deviated from the castlevania atmosphere. The city is still very similar in the typical aspects to it's past version, which in case you didn't know, is a quality worth admiring.
Speaking of quality, the character designs are superb, Gabriel Belmont, or better yet Dracula, has never looked better. In my personal opinion the costume or outfit he was given is a good way of re-inventing his previous look and making it seem or appear more sinister so that it can coincide with the character change/evolution. Moving on, every single monster/boss looks absolutely amazing and threatening, there is tremendous amount of detail given to them and it makes the experience way more enjoyable. However, I did feel that the minions were payed less attention too, especially the possessed citizens/mutants, because their design, while good, did fail to compare or live up to the other characters. Still, it's a minor gripe when one looks at the whole picture.
Gameplay
The gameplay was one of the strongest aspects to this game, it combines and gives you a taste of various different abilities which you have to utilize in a very interesting manner. The greatest gift a game can possibly give you is a chance to improvise, and this is exactly where LoS 2 really shines. You have to consider the environments you are in an utilize them to your advantage, I have found specific places where I have been able to get away from a swarm of enemies while still maintaing my reach to distribute my attacks. You have numerous skills which you can combine with arial as well as grounded attacks. But the best part in my opinion is that you have to use these skills and find a specific pattern that works around specific enemies, which in my opinion recaptures that same feeling you had during the very first castlevania game, and I'm not talking about lords of shadow. Remember how during the Gameboy-esque games we had to use specific skills and create a specific rhythmic flow of movement in order to both avoid and dish out attacks? Yeah lords of shadow 2 provides us with just that.
On the other hand, despite the fact that the game has some very unique approaches to boss battles and gives us a great flow of combat/quick time event interaction, it does fall flat in some areas. I feel that the introduction of the stealth system was concept that had potential, but it was executed in the wrong way. For starters, the game has a huge gap of logic in it. Throughout the game you face one of, if not the most powerful forces of evil on earth, and you best every single one of them with our intelligence, improvisation, skill and power, yet for some odd reason, when a huge brute with a big gun comes up, you instantly forget that you slaughtered a 10 feet tall demon and decide that you are no match for this acolyte because Zobek(A character in the game) told you so. And the game doesn't allow you to fight them either, you basically die with two blows when these creatures spot you, which to me is illogical. It would have been much better if we were given another reason, like a huge door locking upon me being spotted or someone dying because of me. Also, it feels repetitive, you don't get a sense that you have much freedom when it comes to these sequences, you just have to throw bats at these monsters or turn into a rat to escape, which is a shame because it could have been a great addition to the games arsenal. However, that being said there is one more quality I forgot to mention when playing this game. It manages to utilizes it's setting and give us plenty of action packed sequences that will engage you deeply.
Story/Plot
Before talking and discussing the contents of the games plot there is something I really want to talk about. After opening sequence the game gives us a basic run down of what had happened during the Castlevania lords of Shadow Mirror of Fate game, which is crucial to the games history, and because of this, the player, who has played the first game, might still feel lost. There are specific events which were released either as DLC or as a separate game entirely which sucks because for someone who has only a Xbox or PS3 it could really take away a lot of the key/crucial points of the story. I was hoping they'd pick up where the old game left off, because that way we would have seen Gabriel becoming the Prince of Darkness an defeating the forgotten one as well as witnessing the tale of Simon Belmont and Alucrad firsthand, which as a whole would have made the game a huge epic conclusion. Also, despite all that, it's still crucial to play the first game at least, otherwise Draculas character would not make any sense because his devolution is centered mainly at Gabriels loss of fate and suffering.
Now that that's out of the way, we can move on to more interesting matters. The story does really take time to pick up, because after the opening, just as we are about to get to the good part, the story goes back to the recap of previous events and then Dracula awakes in the present day. It's pretty disheartening and for the most part, the first act is a full of confusion because there are forces that make you ask the question of what the hell is going on. That being said, when it picks up, it becomes and absolute blast. The story explores draculas past as well has his present and interconnects the events in a good way. There are some interesting quotes and the character development is pretty great, though as mentioned before, you have to at least play the first game in order to understand why these events and developments matter, but that aside props to the game for actually giving us a reason to care about Dracula even if you haven't played the first installment.
Anyways, I found the final twist to be excellent, though at the end of the game, we're kind of left with the what just happened moment. Won't even conceal it, the ending was a huge letdown. The whole game is building up to the return of satan, thus the Devil returns, and he looks tougher then ever, sadly however, you never get to fight him, in fact, he's killed by a single stab. Satan, the personification of evil is killed by the vampire killer. Wha? I'm not sure what to think of that, it just seems like a such a huge step-down from the previous Gabriel Vs Satan fight.
Conclusion
I'm sure I can safely say that this has been a worthwhile experience because I genuinely had a lot of fun playing this game, it of course isn't perfect and has it's flaws as any other game but overall it's worth it. It breaks my heart a bit because by combining Mirror Of fate and Lords of Shadow 2, we would have gotten a long and epic game with a lot of twists and developments, and the reason i say this is because the first game was so long and adventurous that essentially the second installment just couldn't live up to it's predecessor. The scale of the first one was just to great and by the time you reached the end you had this feeling of relief as if you had been there fighting monsters instead of Gabriel, Plus Los has a much more satisfying ending, where as in Los 2, it's a huge disappointment . Now don't take this the wrong way, the game is of course pretty great and awesome, but if we were to compare the first would take the cake despite the fact that LoS 2 improves on some things. Nevertheless, I recommend this game because it's still amazing and will most definitely give you a cool gaming experience.
