Disclaimer: When I started writing this article, I had planned on it being a standard Game EXP article, but as it went on, I realized that I would need to either split the article up into two separate pieces, or do one very long article that would have gotten out of hand. So I decided to split this one up for Monday and Friday. So apologies on that front.
Additional apologies as this article is probably going to come across as being pretty harsh on Bayonetta 2 in general, but please keep in mind that these are just the criticisms I had of the game, where as Part II will go into all of the things that I enjoyed in the game. I tend to believe to start off with the negative and finish with the positive, which is how I started writing this article, so all of the criticisms came out first.
Also, there might be spoilers to some degree, so beware on that front too.
So, I accidentally finished Bayonetta 2 the other week.
I say accidentally because at the time, I did not know I was facing the final boss in the final battle. I had also played for about 13 hours; but there are reasons for such a shorter playtime, which I will get to in a second.
But, something that I should get out of the way with before you continue reading any further, is that I feel like I prefer Bayonetta to Bayonetta 2, althought B2, does do a lot of things right [but it looks like I will get to all of those points in Friday's article].
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| These are my blind playthrough times, so I didn't go back and refine anything. |
First off, the short play time. Maybe because I was coming off of the heals of playing the first Bayonetta, but not once during the game did I spam, or feel the need to spam levels for halos in order to be able to buy accessories, techniques, or afford consumables. Now that I think about it, I feel like this comes across as an odd criticism. Maybe I was looking for a more challenging experience that required me to take a step back and rethink my strategy? But I also think that part of it was that, at least to me, the levels were not quite as memorable as the first game? I of course say this having only replayed a handful of levels from B1, and two from B2, but with B2 it was because I either accidentally exited out of the game before saving, or forgetting about the checkpoint does not equal a save point. Otherwise, I started the game and played through each level once and beat the game. Okay, I beat the story.
After the main story, there are a series of "Witch Trial" stages where you go up against enemies in a setting identical to the Muspelheim challenges; meaning a small enclosed area with somewhat limited space. I played through the first one, attempted the second one twice and haven't played since. My feeling was, "Why not just take these four Witch Trial stages and instead integrate them into the main story, or just use the time and resources to make a couple additional levels? Lastly, there is the Tag Climax mode, which is/seems similar to the Witch Trials, but designed to play as co-op, but also has the added element of gambling halos in order to earn more. I tried this once and again, as I was not feeling like I was in desperate need, I have not gone back. You could argue that the game was designed like older NES era games where one of the goals is to get the highest score possible, and/or to collect all of the Witch Hearts or other collectibles, but I guess I just do not have the time.
The only other thing I actively did not really like about B2 was the character of Loki. Other than elements of his story, I cannot think of much that I liked about this character. I did not like his design as a Caucasian-esque pre-teen kid with white hair in cornrows. Okay rewind. I feel like his design is something that I would have expected to see in The World Ends With You, and I think he would have fit in very well in that setting. In the setting of a Bayonetta game, he seemed beyond out of place. Even the voice actor (apologies to Mark Daugherty) I was annoyed with, I think mainly because the character was a pre-teen kid who was acting waaaay older than you would expect; yes I realize this makes sense as the game goes on, but that doesn't mean that even with that information that I liked it in the end. Maybe even his use of cards as a weapon for some reason bothered me; Gambit on the other hand, no problem with him. At least his cards did not summon creatures to fight for him, that would have been too much.
And while we are on the topic of characters, what was even Luka's deal in this game. He showed up a couple of times but that seemed about it. Oh, and he also filled the role that his father had in the previous game in that he left books/reports about Fimbulvintr scattered throughout the levels. Even his character design looked like a bonus outfit that Leon Kennedy would wear in NG+ in Resident Evil 4. I felt that either something better could have been written for him, or he could just as easily have been written out all together.
To a significantly lesser degree, I felt that much of the game as a whole was lighter. The easiest comparison can be made by looking at the two title cards on the left. The first game uses a lot of darker colors with a black and red logo, while the second game has a sunlit background with gradient shades of blue and bright gold/yellow. Combat was smoother and chaining combos was a little bit easier (which is a good thing), but as a result, attacks felt like they had less weight behind them. The set pieces for the game seemed noticeably lighter in tone and brighter in color palette. Which is kind of odd considering that in this game, you do go to Hell and are fighting demons instead of angels for about half of the game. But even the design of the demons I feel is a lot less intimidating than that of the angelic host you originally go up against.
I guess you could say that their color palette is similar to that of Bayonetta's color scheme in this game, and it is still similar to the attacks Bayonetta receives from Madame Butterfly. And it is not the physical design of the demons that I am not partial to, just how brightly lit they all seem to be. Maybe it is that I like my infernal demons a little less neon based and shiny? Maybe something more along the lines of Bosch? As was the case in Bayonetta, I liked the design of the hosts of angels, but something about the brightness of the denizens of hell, just does not sit well with me. Or maybe that is the whole point?
So let us leave this semi-rant fest for now and come back on Friday after we have had some time to cool our jets a bit, where I will talk about all of the things that I really did enjoy about Bayonetta 2; so much so that I pre-ordered Bayonetta 3.
By the way Conklederp, I pre-ordered Bayonetta 3.
~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
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