REVIEW | Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2

LifeisXbox’s Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2 review | After the release of Lovecraft’s Untold Stories in 2019, it was only a matter of time before a sequel would be brought into this world. A couple of months ago, that finally happened. Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2 is an action RPG with rogue-like elements that continues the story where the first game left off. Where the first game was well received by the public (including us, as we rated it 83%), the second one seems to be lacking. The promise of brand-new graphics, a new crafting system, and tons of new content didn’t turn out as great as one had hoped. And the initial hope (and promise) for a co-op option eventually didn’t come through. Even though the release of the game was postponed for almost a year in total. Let’s dive into this one, shall we?

ℹ️ Reviewed on PC | Review code provided by PR/publisher, this review is the personal opinion of the writer.

What we Liked!

• Charming art style | If you would rate Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2 based on its graphics, you’d end up with a positive rating. The atmosphere that the game aims to create definitely works out by using eerie and dark cartoony graphics. There are plenty of details to be found in your surroundings and running around this Lovecraftian world was definitely a pleasure. Then there are the cutscenes, which is where the art style really shines. The developers went with a comic book style here and it works so well. I’m not going to lie: I’m a person that dares skip cutscenes, but I would never in this game as they are so beautiful and fun to look at.

• Different characters | The second game in this installment introduces new characters. You start out with the Detective, the Witch, and the Professor, which you’ll recall from the previous game. However, later on in the game, you’ll unlock three extra playable characters: the Medium, the Veteran, and the Alienst. It’s nice that the developers put in some new characters to keep the gameplay fresh. Depending on the situation, you’ll need to switch between characters as they all have their own skills and whatnot.

Mixed Feelings

• Story | It’s 1926 and surrealist painter Ardoi-Bonnot presents his painting Dream Landscape at the Paris Spring Salon. For some reason, everyone went completely bonkers once the painting was uncovered and a riot took place. After this happened, the artist fell into a deep strange sleep, pretty much like Sleeping Beauty but less beautiful I guess. Rumors arise that before the artist fell victim to the ‘sleeping sickness’, he was about to finish his greatest masterpiece. And oh, it would change the world. That’s what we get from the Steam page, and a bit from the game. If you’re here for an elaborate and detailed story, this isn’t your game. Honestly, I barely understood what was going on most of the time. The story isn’t worked out well and is pretty vague. The focus of this game was definitely on the action part.

• Unfair combat | I’m an absolutely loser when it comes to difficult games and Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2 was absolute hell, let me tell you. You’re not eased into the game. Enemies are attacking you from all sides, causing way too much damage. And making you lose a lot of blood. Bleeding that doesn’t stop, mind you. All status effects ended up lasting for a long ass time, eventually killing me because I had no idea what was happening. And somehow my madness went up when I got attacked and eventually I died because of this with no clear indication of what the hell was going on. Let’s just say the combat felt very unfair and med kits weren’t infinitely available at all. There’s some bugs in combat as well so yeah, not great.

• Crafting | One of the new core features of Lovecraft’s Untold Stories 2 is crafting. All around the map you can loot a variety of items. ranging from cotton rags to bones and med kits and a lot of other stuff. It would’ve been great to get some information on what items are important and how they will be useful later in the game when crafting is possible. But alas, neither the items nor the crafting are really explained. And since your inventory only has a limited amount of space (luckily there’s a storage as well), I ended up with items I could not use and apparently didn’t pick up the items I did require.

What we Disliked

• Serious lack of explanation | One thing this game seriously lacks is an explanation for just about anything. I can understand that the story remains confusing to me, but if the gameplay itself is vague, well, that’s just plain annoying. As I mentioned before, the lack of information on your sanity, the crafting, the combat, and so much more was so very frustrating. It’s highly recommended to read some kind of (starter) guide for this game and that simply should not be the case. I like reading books, not how-to guides when I’m playing a game. I just want to enjoy the game, is that too much to ask? A tutorial on the basics would have been nice. Explaining what I’m seeing on my screen would’ve been even better.

• Camera angle and movement | The second game introduced an isometric view, and I wish they had not done this. Moving around the map became a complete drag and did not feel natural. Navigating my character often went wrong and when you’re about to die, you don’t want to be struggling with getting away because of the view point of the camera. On top of that, the movement of the characters was also problematic. Basically, they were just way too slow up to a point where this too became frustrating.

How long to beat the story | TBD
How long to achieve 1000G | 20+ hours

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