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 primary gunplay leaving every encounter feeling overly samey. Excessive On Life 2 desires 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 They even begin off of their outdated house, which has since been transformed right into a museum exhibit.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 avoid wasting them, it begins one other journey with the lives of humanity on the road.
The fundamental premise is similar to that of the primary recreation. Take out dangerous guys, accumulate new weapons, save humanity. In actual fact, I’d go so far as to say that it’s mainly only a weaker retread relating to the intense facet of the story.
Not less than Excessive On Life 2’s humorous facet is a slight enchancment, reducing down on among the compelled chatter that plagued the unique. There’s nonetheless loads of it, thoughts you, with numerous jokes that simply boil all the way 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 relatively 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 particular person), and letting you discover loads of non-obligatory scenes should you 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, but it surely’s not less than bearable even at its lowest. On the similar time, the concentrate on making an attempt to be humorous does imply that any time issues are made to be extra severe, it falls utterly 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 influence and bought extremely stale by the tip. Sadly, it’s usually the identical within the sequel.
Whereas your Gatlians – sentient speaking weapons – take the place of normal weaponry, they don’t truly really feel that totally different from different sci-fi shooters. You could have SMG, a shotgun, and burst rifle equivalents to call just a few, and so they act usually as you’d anticipate. Every has entry to additional talents similar to time stopping bubbles or electrical spikes, however I didn’t use them a lot outdoors of platforming and puzzles.
The primary subject is that you simply’re not often required to modify 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 numerous 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 experience, and even a further assault throughout firefights by launching it at your enemies. Exterior of fights, you too can make use of it in skateparks and races for some additional money and collectables.
It may be finicky at instances, similar to killing your momentum after barely clipping a rock, but it surely’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 method 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 lots 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.
Taking part in 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 technology 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 evaluation construct additionally broke on me loads of instances, 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 might be chalked all the way down to the standard points with Unreal Engine 5, particularly the stuttering. Nonetheless, the present state of Excessive On Life 2 on PC (and sure consoles) is much worse than regular.
Excessive on Life 2 Evaluation | Closing Ideas
Excessive on Life 2 is a slight enchancment over its predecessor in some methods, but it surely’s arduous to suggest proper now in its present state. Dangerous efficiency and bugs that may by no means be totally mounted 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 in the course of the technique of evaluation.
