Cheaper and better than the original
I got Trine with the Humble Frozenbyte Bundle and was impressed with its amazing graphics and interesting gameplay. When I heard Trine 2 was coming out for only $15 I knew I wanted it. After I got it I quickly finished it on single player.
I spent considerably less time in Trine 2 than I did in Trine, largely because the achievements were much easier. I played through the game on hard and got most of the experience vials but not all of them. To a degree I’d like to get all of it for the sake of completeness, but if I don’t get something to show for it I’m significantly less motivated. It was certainly nice to not have any incredibly difficult achievements this time around though — I had to retry the last level in the first Trine MANY times to get the achivement for not dying there. Trine 2 still has quirky achievements for things you wouldn’t try if it weren’t for the achievement, like having Zoya use her grapple to swing all the way around a platform or working together to catch Zoya’s arrows on Pontius’ shield.
Speaking of Pontius, Trine 2 actually makes him useful beyond I just got Zoya killed and there are still skeletons. Partly this is done by making arrows a less effective means of combat (especially at first), so there’s a lot more incentive to switch to him whenever the goblins come out. Remember how in the first Trine all the enemies were skeletons? Well in Trine 2 they’re all goblins instead. I guess it sort of makes sense to make them all the same (it’s probably difficult for evil to find allies), but it might have been nice to see a little more variety.
An even better use of Pontius is his shield. Trine 2 introduces flowing water, acid, and lava that can actually be redirected by holding the shield up to it. Need the water just a little further to the left? Pontius can make that happen. Of course once I found out Amadeus’ conjured boxes and planks are less hollow than they look and could carry water even further, that was a lot more convenient. Amadeus is better able to defend himself in Trine 2 once you get enough experience to get the levitate monsters ability, and it’s fun to levitate a goblin right in front of the one that’s shooting arrows at you (goblin shield!)
The chests instead of having weapons and special bonus items now have poems and paintings, which sadly aren’t very good rewards. I don’t miss the bonus items you could share among the characters, but it didn’t impress me to make my way to a chest and then find it had a painting that didn’t look as good as the game itself. The levelling up from experience works differently in Trine 2 as well. Instead of each character getting a point for each level, you get one point total each level to spend on your choice of the three. This actually made more sense to me but I didn’t expect the change.
Trine 2 was very similar to what I hoped a sequel to Trine would be. A handful of welcome additions and just a couple things I missed, I consider it an improvement on the original. It’s well worth the $15 whether you’ve played the first Trine or not.
