Gravity Rush 2 (2017)

I'm still in love with the world, characters and aesthetics of this duology, but I don't really enjoy playing the games that much. The controllers are imprecise, the camera is unwieldy and the narrative is a mess. If it wasn't for the charisma of Kat and company I wouldn't even bothered with this sequel.

That and the optional quests. Those are incredibly fun and varied. There are many mechanics and ideas that are only used one time and that makes them kinda special.

What I dislike the most is that the intriguing lore hinted at in the first game doesn't resolve neatly. There are a lot of unexplained things or explained in a way that doesn't fit in this universe. There's a lot of cool anime bullshit here, but is just here because it looks cool, not because it makes sense.

Anyway, I love Kat, Syd, Raven and would play a third game.

This game is gorgeous; it's fun to explore and move around in the world, and the story, while absolutely nonsensical, is charming enough to carry you through. But everything—and I mean everything—to do with this game's stealth mechanics/sections, combat, camera work, lock-on targeting, upgrade path, and side missions is absolute trash (without even touching upon how god awful the slide mechanics are and how those sections turn the camera into just the twitchiest fucking thing). Also, the side missions, both in terms of narrative and variety, are just not worth it, not even a little. Not to mention there are so, so many new mechanics added with it feels like every single level, all of them requiring pauses and new tutorials, which means you never really fall into a groove with playing the game—not like you do with the first, which was a more polished affair, despite having a truly terrible final boss.

All that without even mentioning the tragedy of episodes 11 and 12, which are so aggressively poorly designed and unnecessarily dizzying that I considered quitting then.

They took a lovely, simple premise and overworked it to the point of damaging any interest I might have had in seeing this idea or franchise revisited by another studio down the road.

All that said... best not-Iron Man Iron Man sensation of flight in any game I've played. It's fun enough to move around that I wish there was a way, Soma-style, to somehow turn off the combat and just play this as an adventure. It's a good premise that so clearly got away from the developers. And without a strong supervisory hand to slap them and say "no, pare it back, keep it simple."

I was surprised how much I enjoyed this game considering I have never heard or seen anything about it, I found it by accident. I haven't played the first title yet so I my impressions were based on the sequel only.

The graphics are awesome, loved the cel shaded characters and the design of the cities. The overly colorful menus and the comics dialogue and story are very different and work really well.

The music is so on point with all the environments! I was so impressed with the background music that came along with each new city area I explored.

The real highlight of this game for me though was the gravity shifting concept: it is just so much fun. I never got tired of flying around from one place to the other. It's just so well realized and it feels free and special, the movements of the main character really feel natural and I really enjoyed flying as her.

The fighting didn't always feel super smooth compared to the gravity shifting but it does give a lot of freedom in how you want to defeat your enemies. The side quests are also fun since they let you do all kinds of everyday things.

I will surely be flying around with Kat some more :)

I'm not big into impulse buys, especially not with games, but this was a rare instance where I picked up a game based solely on the trailer (and the fact that it was on sale), without reading any reviews first. And you know what? It was about as fun as I thought it would be, which is to say, pretty fun. A surprisingly robust game for the price tag, too, and they introduce new areas and mechanics at just the right intervals to keep things interesting. Having not played the first game I have no idea if the story would be less erratic if I knew anything about the previous events, but the themes and emotions the story is based on are so archetypal that I didn't have trouble following the general thrust of the narrative. And the world is pretty damn cool, a weird combo of magic, steampunk, and sci-fi that's a blast to explore. The controls can be a little frustrating...okay, a lot frustrating, but the game over state is forgiving enough to make up for it in a lot of cases (to the point where sometimes it's actually in your best interest to die and try again.)

So, yeah, surprisingly good game, and a steal at the going price.