Blasphemous II

[h1] A painful sequel! [/h1] [hr][/hr] When I first played this game, I was going to say that it made every aspect of the first game better, but after getting as far as I can with 100% map completion, I would say that the first game is actually better in almost every aspect. There's a weird issue where the game starts stuttering after I've been playing for about an hour. "Verifying the game's integrity" would fix it temporarily, but after another hour, the stuttering would come back. It became a constant battle with lag that I could never really fix, and it honestly makes me wonder if I just got a bad copy of the game. It was frustrating having to constantly reset things, but thankfully, I still enjoyed the game despite it. The actual main issue I have with the game, though, is the three-weapon system, which is sort of this game's gimmick. It just doesn't work in a satisfying way. A lot of the game's momentum is impeded by having to switch to a specific weapon, and each weapon's progress resets when you switch away from it. There's this constant feeling that you're being forced to stop what you're doing and use a specific weapon just to progress, rather than being able to enjoy the flow of the game. Then there's the lack of the boss rush mode from the first game, the area that requires paid DLC to explore, and the side content that feels like DLC and adds so much to the game that it distracts from the main game. There's so much going on in that castle area that it almost feels like its own thing. The art style is better in this game, but there's something lost from the first game. Blasphemous had this oppressive, strange atmosphere that I don't think the sequel quite captures. And honestly, thinking back on the game as a whole, I kind of just liked the bosses and that's it. I don't think Blasphemous 2 is a bad game, but the more I played it, the more I realized I was just enjoying the bosses and not much else. I went into this thinking it was going to improve on everything the first game did, but instead I ended up appreciating the first game even more. If you're deciding between the two, I'd honestly just play Blasphemous again. I can't really recommend the sequel when I think the original does almost everything better. [hr][/hr] [b]The Good[/b] [list] [*]Great bosses [*]Better art style [*]Still fun overall [/list] [b]The Bad[/b] [list] [*]Three-weapon system [*]Stuttering issues [*]Paid DLC [*]Missing boss rush [*]No dog to pet [/list] [h2]6/10[/h2] [hr][/hr]