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Legacy of Kain: Blood Omen 2. Now we're getting somewhere. The series is becoming larger and larger,it's no longer some small time game who get's barely recognized. It's both a danger, and a blessing for Crystal Dynamics to continue along this path of gaming. A blessing for the fans, we are getting more and more Kain, the world is expanding and swirling round and round. It's also dangerous for Crystal Dynamics because the more involved the plots become, the harder it will be to attract new people to the franchise. But complaints aside, let's look at Blood Omen 2 itself.
I won't comment on what the story is, because they are on different pages, so here goes. We first take a look at the graphics. It's hard to identify whether these are better than Soul Reaver 2's or not. The answer is, Blood Omen 2 has greater graphics. The world of Meridian is crafted so massively, towering buildings, flowing bits of newspaper down the street, lambs on cobble stone walkways sitting on the side of muddy roads. Carts, glyph energy lights, the cloud above, the cathedrals, the buildings, all of this, and then we have something which we don't usually get in video games. Consistancy with 3D models.
Everyone was impressed with the amazing way Soul Reaver 2 delivered those cutscenes with conversations between their characters. Indeed, it was stunning, but did anyone notice that every other character, (i.e. the enemy) wasn't created with the same attention to detail. The faces are moulded over, the characters weren't given the same attention to detail as Mobius, or Vorador, or even Raziel. In this game, every character's mouth moves, every character's eyes move. They are constructed in a constant way, though the mechanics of their facial expressions and talking movements are as decorative or detailed in Blood Omen 2, it's this consistency that makes the game worth while. (One of the great things about the first Blood Omen, the graphics were constant throughout the whole game.)
Other impresive touches to the Blood Omen 2 game has to be such little mechanics such as, breathing, and how the backs arch of your enemies as you telekinetically draw the blood from their chests. The flow of papers and rats down the street. And even how the AI interact with one another, talking to each other, giving clues as to what you have to do in this area to continue forward in the game. The gameplay can well vary, and the great thing is, though there is a large emphasis put on fighting, you don't always have to be fighting to progress through the game. (Only in certain stages of each level do you have to fight) Other times you might want to ignore those guards, and go about your business. Because of the Blood Vial system, (more on this later) you actually might want to fight enemies.
The game offers a large amount of 'upgrades' and 'abilities'. These are called, Dark Gifts, are you aquire them from defeating various vampire 'bosses'.The abilities you gain are giga jump, an ability allowing you to jump great distances, even able to jump on enemies from a distance. Their's mind control, (remember Blood Omen?) mist form (makes a return) where you can sneak up to enemies in misty areas and kill them. There's bezerk (a barrage of attacks performed in succession on an enemy, finishing off with a matrix styled punch) and the list goes on.
Also in Blood Omen 2 is the Blood Vial system. Similar to the Blood Vial in the first Blood Omen, but in this one, you can upgrade the maximum amount of health you can hold by drinking the blood of your enemies. (Umah calls this 'acquiring law') Basically, the more Blood you drink, the more powerful you become. There are boxes littered across Meridian that allow you to upgrade quicker.
You can also acquire different weapons, all of which vary in strength and speed. Each weapon, though sometimes the differences are hard to determine, can wear away after time and shatter. Just to clarify, it has been said this 'weapon shatter' option is nothing more than an annoyance, simply their to force you to get a different weapon. Destroying this claim, it is there for that purpose, it also makes the game harder, in some cases, you need a powerful weapon to take out a badguy, it's a good idea to switch and change every now and then.
The fighting system is actually quite good, (in campirson I'm sure to everything else you've heard). You lock onto an enemy by holding R1, like in Soul Reaver, and proceed to dodge, left or right, and attack using the attack button for your three hit combo. Other than that, this is the basics of fighting. It has been called clumsy and often benign to repeate this process over and over, but because every enemy is different, and the sheer amount of them is so large, you'll sometimes want to avoid a direct conflict. (Hence the use of Dark Gifts) Letting go of the R1 button and jumping backwards or over your enemy helps as well, and at times when you hit your enemy while he's getting back up, it will do positively nothing. It's not as bad as review centres all over the internet have claimed it is, but it does sometimes get annoying to fight ery powerful enemies while they aren't taking damage.
There is a small glitch in the PS2 version of the game (and I am of course only reviewing the PS2 version of the game) where sometimes the game might jutter and the game rate might slow down. This is a problem easily resolved by standing still for a moment and letting the area properly load. It is a bitch to get used to, but that aside, it's not an overly major problem, but it can be prevented.
Controlling Kain is a lot different than Raziel, he moves a bit more statically, but still very easily. They've managed to make a very workable control system that is different to Soul Reaver, and the 'float' aspect of the game is kinda cool. Kain can slow his desent to the ground when falling by pressin the jump button and holding it down. (thus, enabling him to land silently behind enemies and kill them)
Time for the bad points. In the sequences where the characters talk, there is some lipsyncing issues that weren't adressed before completion of the game. In some cases, the characters are talking faster than their mouth is moving. A little mistake which is no real biggy. The game has been slandered for being relatively monotonous in it's colour. There is no lush green fields and pink posies in Nosgtoh, it's a dark decaying world, much like Soul Reaver, and game reviwers all over hte world have complained about this, saying it lacks imaginative sense. If you like colour, you'll get over it, it's not that big a deal, I think the colour schemes match the enviroment and mood of the game, and the lack of colour could not be avoided. Another whine is about the music. If you enjoyed the theatrical music of Soul Reaver and it's sequel, then you might be a bit let down in Blood Omen 2. The streets are usually hit with soft whilring sounds and quiets beats of various echoey drums, still, suitable to the scene, but not as dramatic as Soul Reaver. I have no problem with the music, but I can understand how people not feel thrilled to play a game when there is no real music to get them excited (other than the battle drums that signal whenever a bad guy starts picking a fight).
Another complaint is the linear construction of the game. It's complained against because it's dividing the story of Kian up, so it's not really an epic journey, like Blood Omen was, it is more a game with levels. This is a design problem which had to be adressed and the solution saw the game chopped up into chapters. That being said, the game is sitll bloody long, (in length, it takes longer to complete than Soul Reaver 2, by a good 3 to 6 hours more). Kain's acting skills are top-notch, but his narration of things aren't as often or frequent as Raziel's or his own in the first Blood Omen. If it was more frequent, it would have added more appeal to the game, but however, it isn't, so the game feels more like a game.
Whinges asside, Blood Omen 2 is great. The gameplay has it's problems, over all, nothing to major. The graphics is solid and consistant, and very impressive. The scale of some buildings is astonishing. The character models aren't as well constructed as Those in Soul Reaver 2, but the enemy characters have the same attention to detail as Kain and all the others, so it gives you a better sense of flow. The Dark Gifts are designed differently and add enough variation in battles to keep you entertained for hours. Replay value is low, but because the experience is so fun, you'd want to replay it, just like Soul Reaver 2. The puzzles in the game can sometimes be stoic, but that is majorly due to Kain's dissapating health, it cannot allow the puzzles to be as in-depth as Soul Reaver's, but still provide enough challenge. Over all, Blood Omen 2 is a good sequel to Blood Omen 2, it has disapointed some funs, but that could major due to the fact that they couldn't really expect something of a Blood Omen sequel. All they could really expect was, they weren't going to get a game in the same style and construction as the first.
-ColdBain
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