A serious shooter Sam in a not-so-serious game.

A nostalgic entry I've played as a kiddo and got to replay recently and enjoy it.

My brother loved this game, maybe he still does.

Somehow this one manages to be sillier than the previous two games, but there is still a lot of fun to be had here, especially in co-op.

The map variety is really impressive ranging from jungles to cyberpunk cities, all filled with fun little secrets. Main issue for me was that sometimes the enemies would get stuck out of bounds and you couldn't progress.

Fun game to just kick back and turn your brain off after a long week.

O Serious Sam mais controverso da franquia.
A Croteam quis dar uma mudada na direção artística, tornando o jogo mais cartunesco e bobinho, e embora eu não tenha gostado muito (prefiro mais o estilo "realista" dele, ainda bem que voltaram atrás no terceiro jogo), é um aspecto que fez o jogo envelhecer bem graficamente comparado com os seus antecessores. Além disso, o jogo apresenta uma variedade maior de inimigos, fases com areas maiores, diferentes cenários, armas novas, adição de veículos etc. No mais, ainda é um jogo divertido como todo Serious Sam deve ser.

Uma das adições que o jogo trouxe tbm é um foco na história, com cutscenes a cada começo e término de uma fase. E é aí que vem um dos maiores pontos negativos do game, a história dele é completamente sem pé nem cabeça, e pra piorar o jogo é cheio de piadas bobinhas e completamente sem graça. Outro ponto negativo é a duração da campanha, que é desnecessariamente grande pra um jogo desse tipo (zerei ele em torno de 15-16 horas), o que pode tornar o jogo enjoativo. Algumas fases introduzem mecânicas exclusivas que servem só para encher linguiça e que fariam nenhuma falta se fossem retiradas.

Apesar disso, ele ainda é um jogo OK.

I'm not even mad about the new art style. Having a creatively uncreative look is the least of the game's concerns and perhaps what has helped its visuals age a little better over the years. What's more concerning is how much of the Serious Sam formula is lobotomized in favor of extremely derivative and condensed level design that fails to challenge or satisfy. Not to mention, the creatively over-the-top style of the original has been replaced with painfully unfunny, incessant jokes and attempts at humor that have aged like milk. If they didn't make you cringe then, they'll certainly make you cringe now. Whether Croteam wanted to escape its roots or simply make compromises to release simultaneously with console, I don't know, but I'm glad that the series moved past this mis-step.

𝟗/𝟏𝟎
The best co-op fun! Nice graphics, humorous plot, although there is very little of it. A bunch of interesting funny Easter eggs+cool design of weapons and monsters from 1 part of Sam. It's fun to play the game alone, but in a co-op with friends - well, just gorgeous, and you can play in a co-op of up to 16 people! "Launch the Cockerel", "Bulya", "Space Shreks", examples of nicknames you can think of for creatures in the game) ) At the final level, a fairly epic battle. The game has no drawnbacks. If someone completes the game as a child, then it will be one of his favorite childhood games, I replayed the game with friends at 22 and did not change my mind

Subscribe on my Steam Curator`s page: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41977550/

"A Serious Mess, But One That Has Its Charm"

Serious Sam 2 is generally seen as the red-headed stepchild of the Serious Sam franchise (you know, if you don't count the spin-off games). This game got rid of the generally more "realistic" tone of the first few titles in the series, and instead opted to go for an over-the-top, cartoon-like, goofy adaptation. While this might turn off some more hardcore fans of the series, I for one was intrigued by the change in tone. I always felt that the Serious Sam franchise needed to accept its goofy personality and embrace more colors, slapstick, and crazy encounters, and this title seemed to have all of that. I felt that a change of the surface material may also have reflected some fine-tuning towards gameplay, something I personally desired after playing the first set of games in the series. These titles were good fun, but I always felt they were limited by their lack of plot, somewhat dry worlds, and less than intriguing weaponry styles. Finally, a Serious Sam made for me! Yet with all of this newfound experimentation, did Croteam finally nail the formula for this beloved franchise? The answer to that question is...no.

If you've played any other Sam games before, the first thing you'll probably notice is the enhanced visual and audio presentation this game offers. While characters still look really goofy and strange, the textures have been tightened up, the audio felt more crisp than previous titles, and there is voice acting and NPC's EVERYWHERE. It's really quite jarring at first, but you become accustomed to it as you progress through the first few levels. While the voice acting is pretty crap, it's at least "there". Still, there could have been some better takes for these dialogue sequences, and more professionalism would have brought a huge amount to the VO side of things.

Let’s start with gameplay. As you chug through the first level, you'll notice that there is a new physics engine in the game. You'll solve a little puzzle by pushing some boxes onto a switch...and proceed to pretty much never do this again. This was extremely disappointing to me, as I thought the introduction of some puzzles would help to shake things up during a playthrough. Instead, this serves as a "look at our new engine" moment before the player continues onwards to engage in the classic Sam experience - shooting enemies. What surprised me about this title is that it has the most competent gunplay of the entire series (at least to the point of this game's release). There are some interesting guns, and each has a much cooler look and feel to them compared with the previous titles. Another change that took place was the addition of turret/vehicle sequences which were fun at first, but showed their frustrating jank by the halfway point of the game. This was a pretty shocking setback to the momentum of the gameplay, and while not unbearingly numerous, you will likely find more than one for each world you travel to.

Next up, the level/enemy design. Yet again, this game loves to throw you in large open areas, though there is more detail in these areas for this entry compared to before. It's still not my cup of tea, as these fights in these segments always wear out their welcome, but it was at least better than TFE and TSE. However, what got annoying were some of the enemies you faced. While there aren't really any hit-scan/lock-on target enemies, there are many extremely mobile ones that are difficult to hit. These proved to be much more irritating than I initially believed they would be, and I was constantly harassed during combat by these chumps. They proved a challenge, but it wasn't a very enjoyable one. I felt I had to waste more ammo and life than I desired on these guys, and they really just became distractions from the more "in your face" enemies that tend to pop up. Adding on to this, there are no real improvements to how an open area functions. You just tend to go around in circles strafe-running while trying to kill hordes of enemies, which gets old yet again. I already thought these sections dragged down prior games in the series, but it really got unbearable at times for this entry, especially with the game’s bad pacing.

This game is the definition of "barely any meat but a whole lot of fat". This game should have been half as long as it ended up being. I thought that there would be maybe one extra world on top of the (five!) worlds that were presented, but nope. The game nearly doubles the amount of worlds you go to, and each world lasts way too long for its own good. The game has horrid pacing, and you generally play through the same gameplay loop for over a dozen hours. This is the biggest problem with Sam games as a whole, but instead of ramifying the issue, Croteam decided to beat it to a pulp. If the game had a somewhat interesting story this would have alleviated this major flaw, but they failed there as well.

This game's story is garbage. Stinking, leaking, soggy garbage. There is no coherent structure, no real plot points that are quality, and the characters (while funny at times) are useless for the majority of it. Sam loses a lot of his charm from previous games, and instead acts much wackier in this title which doesn't fit his character. I loved his snarky responses from previous games, but here he is just a complete moron. As for the levels in this game, each world is just filled with either randomly offensive characters (China-world, really?), completely random settings (magical fairy land with midget Elvis people?), or just plain boring environments (Kleer planet with fire, lava, and Kleers…snore). At no point did anything in this game feel connected, and it dragged down the pacing heavily. By the end of the experience, I was only enjoying the gameplay, but the pacing also wore that down to a bitter pulp. This really soured the mood of the game, and it's a shame Croteam didn't try harder in terms of story.

Finally, I'll wrap up some other aspects of the title I encountered. The game is randomly buggy, with moments where I would get stuck on environmental pieces and see weird texture glitches. There are some power-ups strewn throughout the game that give a nice power trip, but feel out of place yet somehow underdeveloped and underused. Finally, this game is enjoyably random and funny but really doesn't have any sort of filter, so a lot of terrible jokes and gags are included throughout the experience. I found them to be equally entertaining and cringe-worthy, but it still kept my eyes glued to the screen during cutscenes so...success?

Overall, Serious Sam 2 is a strangely mixed bag. It provides some pretty good combat and quirky humor, but has an awful story, terrible pacing, and some lazily constructed levels. It looks and sounds fairly good during combat, but the voice acting is atrocious and characters have really strange behaviors. The worlds are varied and colorful for the most part, but there are no solid themes and consistency to any of them. After completion, I can see why this is the most divisive Sam game, and I was proven wrong about both my desires of change for the franchise as well as my future desire in it as a whole. This was the series' shot at reeling me back in, but instead I feel further away from being a real "fan" of the series now more than ever. While I can Recommend this game due to its fun gameplay and unique personality, I also think its a complete failure at progressing the Serious Sam formula any further, and likely capped the series’ future potential as a result. It's an entertaining and colorful shooter, but not one that will blow anyone's mind.

Final Verdict: 6/10 (Above Average)

Gameplay-wise, this is the same Serious Sam you've come to expect. It's the art direction and the tone that sets this game apart from the other entries in the series. It's as if everyone at Croteam had a goal to make the most ridiculous game they could, and they succeeded. That doesn't mean the game is bad - far from it. It's a lot of fun in co-op, and the crazy art direction and tone really suits the game. It's the odd one out in the series, but I'd recommend checking it out. I'd recommend enabling combo weapons and sprinting, since they are disabled by default for some reason.

Serious Sam 2 is not a bad game, it's a victim of publisher meddling and a bad reputation for going in a different direction than its predecessors. Croteam produced and released the PC and Xbox ports simultaneously, alongside the development of Serious Engine 2 which is no small feat to a small dev team, and that alone is deserving of my respect.

Whether you like the direction it went or not, it's undoubtedly a good game, not perfect, but it stands on its own and aged well.

If you are reading this for whatever reason and bounced off the franchise before, maybe you should give Serious Sam 2 a try. Chances are it's different enough that you might like it.

[Full review at https://bluedemonarchive.blogspot.com/2021/07/serious-sam-2.html ]