Welcome to our review of Attack on Titan 2, including the final Battle downloadable content, we played it on PlayStation 4.
Based on the manga ‘Shingeki no Kyojin’ by Hajime Isayama originally serialized in the Monthly BESSATSU SHONEN magazine published by Kodansha Ltd. Attack on Titan in itself is already a classic in its genre and I was lucky enough to actually even come into possession of the author’s autograph. Needless to say, I am a fan of this extremely bloody manga.
This game is based upon the original 3 seasons of the anime so if you have seen the show, you know what to expect, for those unaware of this classic, here is a small copy-paste from Wikipedia:
It is set in a fantasy world where humanity lives within territories surrounded by three enormous walls that protect them from gigantic man-eating humanoids referred to as Titans.
As these titans are utmost evil, they eat humans so prepare to see your friends and your own life to come into danger. The series is extremely bloody due to this nature and you will be setting out to first become an actual scout, all in order to fight the titans. As you are a new character to the story, you will be following the adventures of the characters like Mikasa Ackerman, Eren Jaeger and many more.
Once you start to go through the big tutorial, there is a lot to learn, after all, you immediately realize this game is much more than just attack titans. You need to maintain your weapons, your ODM gear (used for “flying”) and so much more. Forge friendships, enlist friends into your squad, prioritize certain attacks over others and even after finishing the massive tutorial, you will still not know everything! The game is a little overwhelming at first and it does do a great job to teach you how to fly around, but once you hit the actual combat, it hits you how chaotic this game really is.
But!
The chaos is exactly what you need in a game like this. It is not just attack the giant titan by slicing at his nape, which is the kill shot in this game, but also taking out their arms or legs. You can also basically snipe a titan from afar, but beware not to get noticed as that will increase your chances of getting in some serious trouble. You can always rely on your squad, but a lot of times, you will feel like you are mostly doing the legwork yourself. I took the test here and it was just an impression. Your squad members do attack and do damage too! Keep this in mind so you do not end up exhausting your resources trying to take down a titan.
After I got into the actual game, I felt more and more accustomed to the controls and while I did struggle some during the tutorial, it got more and more comfortable playing. The chaos began to be more and more of a fun thing and well, not to sound strange, but when you take down a titan and its blood paints the building it was attacking….. I must say that was quite impressive.
As this game now has downloadable content, it is important to inform everyone that obviously the base game is needed, despite the DLC being available separately for purchase in the eshop. The final Battle DLC is mostly more of the same and in this case, that is an advantage. The new ‘Final Battle’ content is the Character Episode and Territory Recovery modes on the Main Menu. You can play these even if you haven’t played the base A.O.T. 2 game, which is a good thing.
Now, let us talk about the bad points. Obviously, I mentioned the chaos of fighting, which I am sure some gamers would not enjoy so much. It is something overwhelming and despite my fun with it, I can see this part being disliked.
Graphically, I did notice some slight lag/ghosting but nothing too distracting. The high speed of certain battles and the number of things going on, it would have surprised me if this game played flawlessly. This is more a natural remark than an actual complaint. The cutscenes looked very anime-like and I do appreciate the time and effort taken to make this game so close to the anime. It felt very much alive at times.
In conclusion, Attack on Titan may not be the perfect game to play. It suffers from some minor issues but none of these really prevented me from having fun! The tutorial was a titan in itself to go through and after that, I just soared through the sky, taking out titans along the way!
