Attack on Titan 2

Bad news for people who played the original 2016 game, because this is largely the same game, with the same technical issues and repetitive play that made that one underwhelming. Surprisingly, Attack on Titan 2 has many of the same story cutscenes from Attack on Titan -- along with technical issues like stuttering gameplay on consoles and even higher-end computers. Series devotees are most likely to love this game anyway, and will appreciate the detail and feel of the world: Sometimes you'll wonder if a cinematic playing out is the game or something lifted straight from the show's second season, not yet out in America. But, without exaggeration, after you create your own character, you're in for nearly 10 hours of re-experiencing the first game's story with missions, fights, and story scenes you've seen before if you played the previous game -- which itself was repetitive and only average. It's absurd, but this game truly lacks new content to be a proper sequel. Once you've gotten into the gameplay, you'll be worn out and fatigued by the dull journey of getting there.

What's new here is a more refined interface and more complexity to the game's controls in operating the omnidirectional mobility gear (a mix between a jet pack and Spider-Man's web-slinging). There's also a new friendship system, designed to give your downtime between missions a little more focus: You'll have conversations with other soldiers, and if you answer correctly enough times, your bond will unlock abilities they can share, like extra healing out in the field. Otherwise, you're in for a bumpy ride, because the controls are hard to learn. When you pull one trigger, almost all the buttons do something else. You're expected to swing around a battlefield, target specific parts of gargantuan enemies, lead your squad, and give orders (by holding another button that further re-maps all the buttons). It's just a lot, especially since sometimes your hits won't "count" if you're going too slow, weren't targeting anything specific, or were at the wrong angle. The friendship system is similarly clunky, even inconsistent at times. It's unfortunate a series so action-packed and swelling with interesting stories gets such a dull game. You'd be better off watching or reading what inspired it instead.