• Roguelike co-op shooter
  
• Permadeath
  
• Iconic soundtrack
  
• Colorful
  
• Permanent unlockables to discover
  
• ...and get obliterated when you least expect it.

So, if you are still here... Let's get down to it:

Originally posted by Creedence Clearwater Revival:

Long as I remember, the rain been coming down
Clouds of mystery Wisps pouring, confusion instant death on the ground
Good men through the ages, trying to find the sun steal legendaries
And I wonder, still I wonder
Who'll stop the rain tank another Shrine of The Mountain?

Following the premise that Hopoo could bring the magic of the original RoR to a 3D environment, which I heavily doubted, not only did they succeed but also expanded upon the foundations that made it unique among the so oversaturated genre of roguelikes. The main gimmick remains the same, explore to find loot while fighting continuously stronger enemies and ultimately fight a boss to gain access to a teleporter for the next stage, the twist being that the more time you spend looting between stages, the stronger the enemies get, with no true limit to how hard the game can get or how extremely overpowered you can be. Often times leading to very fun moments when you are clearing the whole stage in the blink of an eye and melting your GPU with thousands of active projectiles, and on the next, a single opponent does the same to your whole squad... And that's it, end of the run and back to stage 1 for you.
Risk of Rain 2 continues the loose narrative of the first game, following the hijinks of the survivors arriving at Petrichor V over a rescue signal from UES Contact Light (the ship that brought the survivors of the first game), upon arrival you find no trace of the survivors nor the ship, and quickly discover why. The place is full of dangerous lifeforms, both animal and sentient and all of them are interested in seeing you, inside out.
Permadeath and randomized loot make each playthrough different as you can't know what you will be going against, flying enemies with hit-scan attacks? Stationary enemies with poison or incendiary auras? Invisible enemies? You must always compromise something to have any chance of prevailing. For the beginners or what the veterans like to call "casuals" like myself, the game does offer ways to enjoy a more diluted lethality, besides the lower difficulty setting which gives you health regen and fewer enemy spawns, later you get access to items that change the rules of the game, one of them removing even the random aspect of items, making the experience enjoyable even if you are not into roguelikes.
With multiple characters that bring new flavors to the game and suit most gaming styles and items that can change a specific run experience completely from another, RoR2 is about finding synergy and balance between getting stronger and dealing with the ever-growing onslaught of enemies craving your blood. Surprising is that the expansions add truly useful content and lore to the base game, making it a nice addition, now that GearBox is leading the development of the game, long-time fans are cautiously optimistic even though their content drop has been pretty consistent so far.


TL-DR: This game made me have belly aches from laughing so much with my friends and also ripping out my hair at the very same session, and being able to still pull that off after hundreds of hours and still giving me new stuff to discover even now makes it more than worthy. If this does not sell you on it, there is nothing else I have to say.

[h1]When you love to hate something so much, that you love it again[/h1] [list] [*]Roguelike co-op shooter [*]Permadeath [*]Iconic soundtrack [*]Colorful [*]Permanent unlockables to discover [*]...and get obliterated when you least expect it. [/list] So, if you are still here... Let's get down to it: [quote=Creedence Clearwater Revival]Long as I remember, the rain been coming down Clouds of [strike]mystery[/strike] Wisps pouring, [strike]confusion[/strike] instant death on the ground Good men through the ages, trying to [strike]find the sun[/strike] steal legendaries And I wonder, still I wonder Who'll [strike]stop the rain[/strike] tank another Shrine of The Mountain?[/quote] Following the premise that Hopoo could bring the magic of the original RoR to a 3D environment, which I heavily doubted, not only did they succeed but also expanded upon the foundations that made it unique among the so oversaturated genre of roguelikes. The main gimmick remains the same, explore to find loot while fighting continuously stronger enemies and ultimately fight a boss to gain access to a teleporter for the next stage, the twist being that the more time you spend looting between stages, the stronger the enemies get, with no true limit to how hard the game can get or how extremely overpowered you can be. Often times leading to very fun moments when you are clearing the whole stage in the blink of an eye and melting your GPU with thousands of active projectiles, and on the next, a single opponent does the same to your whole squad... And that's it, end of the run and back to stage 1 for you. Risk of Rain 2 continues the loose narrative of the first game, following the hijinks of the survivors arriving at Petrichor V over a rescue signal from UES Contact Light (the ship that brought the survivors of the first game), upon arrival you find no trace of the survivors nor the ship, and quickly discover why. The place is full of dangerous lifeforms, both animal and sentient and all of them are interested in seeing you, inside out. Permadeath and randomized loot make each playthrough different as you can't know what you will be going against, flying enemies with hit-scan attacks? Stationary enemies with poison or incendiary auras? Invisible enemies? You must always compromise something to have any chance of prevailing. For the beginners or what the veterans like to call "casuals" like myself, the game does offer ways to enjoy a more diluted lethality, besides the lower difficulty setting which gives you health regen and fewer enemy spawns, later you get access to items that change the rules of the game, one of them removing even the random aspect of items, making the experience enjoyable even if you are not into roguelikes. With multiple characters that bring new flavors to the game and suit most gaming styles and items that can change a specific run experience completely from another, RoR2 is about finding synergy and balance between getting stronger and dealing with the ever-growing onslaught of enemies craving your blood. Surprising is that the expansions add truly useful content and lore to the base game, making it a nice addition, now that GearBox is leading the development of the game, long-time fans are cautiously optimistic even though their content drop has been pretty consistent so far. [table] [tr] [th]Feature[/th] [th]Rating[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]Length[/td] [td]Around 100 hours for the base and another 100 for DLC content[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Combat Difficulty[/td] [td]Easy if your allies know how to share[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Graphics[/td] [td]Cartoony and colorful, but can be hectic in later stages[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Soundtrack[/td] [td]Chris Christodoulou mix of slow techno with synth-rock is both head-banging and deeply sad at times, Chef's Kiss[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Gameplay[/td] [td]Takes a while to get going but when it clicks... it is so so good.[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Story[/td] [td]Crash land on a planet to save the last crew that crashlanded there... but who's taking us back?[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Shrine of The Mountain[/td] [td]There will always be that survivor who thinks they can solo the whole planet, I know... I'm one.[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Closest Thing[/td] [td]Learning to ride a bicycle on a highway at rush hour, you can either do very well or not at all[/td] [/tr] [/table] [b] TL-DR: This game made me have belly aches from laughing so much with my friends and also ripping out my hair at the very same session, and being able to still pull that off after hundreds of hours and still giving me new stuff to discover even now makes it more than worthy. If this does not sell you on it, there is nothing else I have to say.[/b]