My review of Red Steel 2

by RollingSilver Fri Mar 26, 2010 1:43 pm

i haven't finished the game yet, but i'm enjoying it thus far and i can already tell it's a major improvement from the first red steel

i really liked the use of the motion controls because they're responsive to your movements; if you swing left, right, down, up, diagonal, or front, you actually swing in those directions; you have control in 3d space. and depending on the strength of your swings, you inflict light or strong damages. one cool feature is when you get to look at a sword in full view and move it around with your remote in every rotation and swing it around just for the fun of it. that's where the motion plus acts as a gimmick, but it's fun to look at and it shows what the motion plus is capable of doing.

the style in this game is beautiful. i loved the artwork - the comic-book/manga feel on the character designs, the water-color paint-style look on the environments, the shine on plated objects, and the overall cartoon look of the game comes to show that not every game needs to be overblown with realistic textures, hair follicles, or heavy lighting to be visually impressive. i actually think this style looks cooler than realism, and not just on wii but on any system. as for the combat style, i liked the "first-person brawler" aspect because of how fast-paced the fighting was, and since i'm a fan of beat-em-ups and brawlers, i can totally vouch that this game uses a wonderful concept. i don't need devil may cry on wii, i've got a devil may cry style game already, and it's called red-steel 2; isn't capcom porting mt frameworks on wii?

the audio sounds very nice and rich. does it use dolby pro logic?
the voice acting is milestones ahead of the pitiful voice acting in the first red steel. dunno why gamespot dinged this game for voice acting. i have some issues with the script because it sounds immature to me; payne's lines were the worst in my opinion and he's such a cool character. for shame

i never got into the story but i'm pretty sure it'll pick up. i'm already at the kutakari town and i'm excited to see where the plot will turn out.

my problems with the game are only pet peeves so don't flame me too much Razz

- emptiness: i know the developers were trying to give us a ghost-town feel, and it really works, but i would have liked them to add a few extra things like crows sitting in porches and flying away or rabid dogs swarming around corpses, attacking you if you get close, but those details are not important

- fetch quests: for those of you who have this game, i'm pretty sure you can agree with me on this because it's annoying to find stuff when they're scattered all over the place. i don't know if they are required tasks but i'm a completionist and this is my biggest gripe

- nauseating: i always get nauseous whenever i play first person games. does anyone also have this?

these are the only gripes i've had so far but they don't bother as much. i would totally recommend people to try this game out. hopefully this game will sell enough copies over time and encourage the developers to make more games like this. red steel has redeemed itself for me and i hope to see a red steel 3 someday