One of the most overrated game I've played.
It was "ok" for me. The gameplay straight up sucks, and feels bad. It mostly relies on easy parries and backstabs.
The exploration and level design is fun though (besides the swamp, man, this + the sh#t gameplay? Nah).
I also enjoyed the boss fights and their soundtrack, so I was expecting too much for the final boss that was complete garbage. All of that "excused" with lore to explain why the final bossfight is garbage and FromSo devotees telling you how much a masterpiece and genius ending that is, while it's just bullsh#t

MAAAAN, that's the kind of thing I needed last year!
Dude made the game alone, along with help of a mocap and EDM artist.
The soundtrack is absolutely badass, and the violence along with it.
The game is a beautiful mix of Hotline Miami and Arkham games.
The combat is so satisfying and so are the finishers, you can throw guns, weapons, etc after you used them, and a lot of blood/bodies on the ground showing the carnage you went through.
Of course some levels are gimmicky or can get annoying, but man this indie game is just a blast of fun. Definitely recommend

I didn't have a bad time, but there are some problems that need to be pointed out.
Story is well written, and the development of the characters was good, but oh man oh man the pacing of it in the first half of the game was pretty slow. Also I don't like the fact that even in modern days, we still force you to walk for listening the dialogue.
Now apart from the story, the biggest part for me that I need to talk about. The gameplay.
First of all, it's in the era where we implement useless RPG mechanics in whatever franchise that didn't initially have them. It's annoying on higher difficulty that it also relies on that a lot, I don't play GoW for that part.
Also, even though it can be forgiven, I'm not fan of the camera. It's good for that cinematic experience, during exploration and such. But during combat ? I don't feel comfortable with it, its FOV is too close.
I didn't like the Crowd control either, ESPECIALLY with the first weapon, it gets a little bit better when you get a certain second weapon. But the gameplay along with the cam is just not that good for combat with more than 3 enemies, I mean yeah okay they have Atreus and the little arrows to yell at you when something is coming from behind, but that's just a lazy solution from the devs.
I'm a bit critic about the gameplay but it's not entirely bad, the feel of impact from the weapon and animations are really great.

Fun (and funny) game.
Some dialogues makes no sense but that's the charm.
The details, setpieces, gameplay and more were pretty advanced for its time.
People warned me about some kind of backtracking but that wasn't an issue at all here, unlike Metal Gear 2.
Anyway, worth a play 👍

Such an amazing sequel!
Expanded on so many things.
We have several zones and more fun abilities to get.
The story gets right after the events of 1, which is cool to see.

They've put more effort on the metroidvania aspect, game is pretty chill and not that long. The final boss fight was really fun. I definitely recommend

Most fun and complete platformer you can play.
Banger Soundtrack
Over 13 stages
Level layouts that lets you choose many paths
Knuckles have exclusive stuff
Two Super Sonic forms, and an epic True Ending level.
I definitely recommend you play this!

The game had an interesting story but I was left really disappointed with this conclusion.

Raiden was a really good character that I loved to see evolving.

But anyway, the game design of this MGS was really annoying. You arrive to point A codec "you need to get item at point B to proceed!" and every damn time.
You'll tell me "but Alb, it's the same in MGS1", yeah! I never minded backtracking especially when it's not that annoying, in MGS2 you're doing it in FUCKING Big Shell.
Big Shell was the weakest and least fun zone/environment I've seen in a MGS game (yet). So big shell exploration with this gameplay, nah, I can't. (and let's not start with the escort/vip mission)

Overall it's an "ok"-tier game where it had potential but big shell just doesn't do it for me.
MGS2 fans selling the game as the best one just because of the Tanker and Arsenal G sections isn't enough, that's only a little % of the game's content.

This game is such a step up of direction in the franchise.
The gameplay had more thoughts on it, and the game tries to give you a survival feeling.
It's the most immersive MGS game I've played, I was really absorbed by that adventure in the jungle.
Game gives you more options to complete a task but sadly the mostly viable one is when you go ape mode.
The healing system is really cool aswell.
And storywise it's still equal to the quality of the other two MGS, good and fun.

Just... horribly boring.
The game totally ruins the DNA and the purpose of the original version.

First of all, why the stupid blood censorship? (they didn't hesitated to add sixaxis on girls chests, hmpf, double standards)

Secondly, there are barely any enemies in the game. The number is so toned down, it gets boring, because the gameplay of Ryu isn't meant for such small numbers.
As a counterpart, they increased the enemy's health and the damage they deal (a one shot from a grab?!). Amazing game design from them, wow.

Also, the game completely ruins the flow of the gameplay by forcing you to play Rachel and Momiji, such forgettable parts. Ayane is decent at least.

Anyway, the added features doesn't totally save the removed ones. If you have an xbox360 or higher at hand, do the original instead. It's totally crazy