Remnant 2 takes the original game and improves on the formula they created. A third-person shooter with a lot of Dark Souls and rogue-lite inspiration created as a third person shooter. It is really good, and I think it hit a lot of great beats that it wanted to hit.
Gameplay:
The gameplay is third-person shooting with an emphasis on dodge rolls, mixing up between shooting and melee, and utilizing different abilities and mods to help enhance combat. You go up against a very large cast of enemies that all have different attack patterns you need to learn as you go through open areas and into dungeons in order to find items, scrap, and more. This all feels really good, though the animations can look a little awkward as it prioritizes movement over animations, which aren't blended well together for the quick pace movement. I don't think this is a super bad thing, but it is noticeable how stiff your character looks. The shooting is punchy and good, with a lot of unique weapons you can find that fit the alien aspect of these planets. The boss fights are the highlight of the game, all with their own unique mechanics you need to learn. They all feel fair and balanced, with every death feeling more like a mistake I made. A missed dodge roll, misreading the attack, not paying attention to the mobs in the arena, or missing a vital mechanic. And each time I died I felt like I learned something from it and improved in the next attempt. The randonmess with the mutators was cool as well, making you have to play slightly different each time. The one complaint I had about this was the fact that I played with the handler archetype, which was effectively useless in a lot of the fights because my dog couldn't attack the boss. A lot of them require range, so close range characters with have a disadvantage against a few of them. But otherwise, I think they were all fantastically designed, especially the final boss. It really felt like the enemy design was a focus of the game and it really shined through. The endgame content is really good: you can find secret archetypes that will stay unlocked on your account to play with as new characters, you can reroll campaign levels in the game to reunlock items or to try different story beats to get new mods or weapons, and adventure mode offers a lot of replayability and is
really good to let you continue your character after the game ends. This, combined with the trait system you can really build your character to your specifications, and you can do a lot of this with friends as well as the game has a pretty good co-op system, with archetypes that are specifically designed for it.
Story:
The story was pretty mediocre. The main story was boring with boring characters that I never felt a connection too, and the writing for them was way too simple and generic. You can pretty much predict the story because every character fulfills the exact stereotypical role you expect of them, and characters drop in and out without a care. And the side-stories or mysteries aren't interesting. You never feel attached to the realms you explore and their plight, and you're kinda just running through without paying attention to it because it tries to be complicated and interesting, but fails.
Music:
The music in this game is used sparingly, with a mixture of great and mediocre tracks. The mediocre tracks are the ones you here the most that kicks in during combat, and some of the casual exploration ones. But there are a few really good ones that add to the environment as you explore, and the boss themes are fantastic and fit the tone of the area you are in very well. It is all ambient tracks that helps solidify that you're travelling through different worlds.
Artstyle:
The game looks really good, the budget quite obviously improved from the original through screenshots alone. Each level has their own tone and feel, from a lush forest to a deserted planet. My only complaint is the lack of levels. The last level was pretty boring in comparison to the rest, and the hub world which has some combat and exploration aspects to it was pretty lacking and boring. I wish we had another one or two levels to really capture how different every single world felt. I also enjoyed how mods would change the look of every gun in the game, making them matching the style of the mod that they came from. Animations are decent but like I said before, they could feel lacking and stiff at times even during cutscenes. The bosses and enemies all looked fantastic, and there were a lot of cool looking bosses and effects.
Overall:
This game is a great experience. It has a lot to offer and features really good systems that allow a lot of creativity. My main complaints are pretty superficial: despite every gun being viable I feel like there isn't a large variety, and you're mostly going to get the variety for your shooting with the mods you get. I also feel that some archetypes are inherently weaker because of enemy design rewarding ranged combat more than close combat, so melee builds or the Handler archetype are going to be inherently weaker in comparison to something like gunslinger. I also felt like armor took a step back by getting rid of set bonuses completely, so they basically only have armor, weight, and resistances and that is the only difference (outside of cosmetic differences). I think this was a really good game with some great replayability, and you definitely can get a lot of playtime from a game like this.
Gameplay:
The gameplay is third-person shooting with an emphasis on dodge rolls, mixing up between shooting and melee, and utilizing different abilities and mods to help enhance combat. You go up against a very large cast of enemies that all have different attack patterns you need to learn as you go through open areas and into dungeons in order to find items, scrap, and more. This all feels really good, though the animations can look a little awkward as it prioritizes movement over animations, which aren't blended well together for the quick pace movement. I don't think this is a super bad thing, but it is noticeable how stiff your character looks. The shooting is punchy and good, with a lot of unique weapons you can find that fit the alien aspect of these planets. The boss fights are the highlight of the game, all with their own unique mechanics you need to learn. They all feel fair and balanced, with every death feeling more like a mistake I made. A missed dodge roll, misreading the attack, not paying attention to the mobs in the arena, or missing a vital mechanic. And each time I died I felt like I learned something from it and improved in the next attempt. The randonmess with the mutators was cool as well, making you have to play slightly different each time. The one complaint I had about this was the fact that I played with the handler archetype, which was effectively useless in a lot of the fights because my dog couldn't attack the boss. A lot of them require range, so close range characters with have a disadvantage against a few of them. But otherwise, I think they were all fantastically designed, especially the final boss. It really felt like the enemy design was a focus of the game and it really shined through. The endgame content is really good: you can find secret archetypes that will stay unlocked on your account to play with as new characters, you can reroll campaign levels in the game to reunlock items or to try different story beats to get new mods or weapons, and adventure mode offers a lot of replayability and is
really good to let you continue your character after the game ends. This, combined with the trait system you can really build your character to your specifications, and you can do a lot of this with friends as well as the game has a pretty good co-op system, with archetypes that are specifically designed for it.
Story:
The story was pretty mediocre. The main story was boring with boring characters that I never felt a connection too, and the writing for them was way too simple and generic. You can pretty much predict the story because every character fulfills the exact stereotypical role you expect of them, and characters drop in and out without a care. And the side-stories or mysteries aren't interesting. You never feel attached to the realms you explore and their plight, and you're kinda just running through without paying attention to it because it tries to be complicated and interesting, but fails.
Music:
The music in this game is used sparingly, with a mixture of great and mediocre tracks. The mediocre tracks are the ones you here the most that kicks in during combat, and some of the casual exploration ones. But there are a few really good ones that add to the environment as you explore, and the boss themes are fantastic and fit the tone of the area you are in very well. It is all ambient tracks that helps solidify that you're travelling through different worlds.
Artstyle:
The game looks really good, the budget quite obviously improved from the original through screenshots alone. Each level has their own tone and feel, from a lush forest to a deserted planet. My only complaint is the lack of levels. The last level was pretty boring in comparison to the rest, and the hub world which has some combat and exploration aspects to it was pretty lacking and boring. I wish we had another one or two levels to really capture how different every single world felt. I also enjoyed how mods would change the look of every gun in the game, making them matching the style of the mod that they came from. Animations are decent but like I said before, they could feel lacking and stiff at times even during cutscenes. The bosses and enemies all looked fantastic, and there were a lot of cool looking bosses and effects.
Overall:
This game is a great experience. It has a lot to offer and features really good systems that allow a lot of creativity. My main complaints are pretty superficial: despite every gun being viable I feel like there isn't a large variety, and you're mostly going to get the variety for your shooting with the mods you get. I also feel that some archetypes are inherently weaker because of enemy design rewarding ranged combat more than close combat, so melee builds or the Handler archetype are going to be inherently weaker in comparison to something like gunslinger. I also felt like armor took a step back by getting rid of set bonuses completely, so they basically only have armor, weight, and resistances and that is the only difference (outside of cosmetic differences). I think this was a really good game with some great replayability, and you definitely can get a lot of playtime from a game like this.