An improvement in many ways over the original, still lacking in level design in later areas that force you to redo the same relatively simple grinds and jumps just to get another chance to try that one annoyingly hard one that always feels like it's near the end. A lot of backtracking too that just makes a lot of this game's length feel artificial. Having no button to stop grinds when it's this easy to accidentally jump onto them is criminal. Music and visuals however are absolutely on-point and once again make it a lot easier to suffer through some of the more frustrating moments and at least this time there's satisfaction to be had when the level design allows for it. I wish more levels felt as open as Shibuya Terminal. The sewer level is, naturally, the worst in the game.
I don't mind most of the redesigns but I prefer the originals. I don't like what they did with my girl Cube, making her taller and more 'well-proportioned', they made her personality horny as well (going by one of her lines about her henchmen), I miss when she used to be chill and friendly and listen to Rob Zombie. Gum also inexplicably has cleavage now. I get the impression they tried a bit too hard in places to appeal to what they thought western audiences wanted at the time after the original did a lot better outside of Japan. The designs still rule for what they are, same with the new muted but consistent colour scheme, but I still have a preference for the more childlike and colourful attitude of the previous game which seemed more obviously fun, where here DJ K is a huge prick who insults you every time you plummet from a skyscraper or drown in a river. I thought you were cool, man! Must be that crazy hypercapitalist society they have in the far-off Future Year of 2024.