Dishonored 2 Review

Dishonored 2 is an intense adventure set in a brand new location alongside a new roster of supernatural powers and targets. However, for those searching for an innovative new experience, the game may not be for you as Dishonored 2 focuses on a brand new story whilst also building upon the features of the original title rather than establishing multiple new features making the game an interesting continuation to its acclaimed predecessor.

Dishonored 2 sets off 15 years after the events of Dishonored and its DLC counterpart, The Brigmore witches, and sees Corvo and Emily battle a new foe in the form of Delilah a powerful witch with a lust for power. Bethesda has taken full advantage of this new timeline by introducing the ability to select a character you will follow as the world around them crumbles. The first big addition to this is each character’s abilities as Corvo centrally focuses on returning powers from the first game, each possessing slight changes to their function, whilst the debut of Emily as a playable character sees the debut of several new abilities ranging from the brutal shadow walk, to the stealthy domino ability.

However, the game does not only see the debut of new abilities but also the introduction of an exotic new location in the form of, the beautiful yet corrupt homeland of Royal Protector Corvo, as well as the home of Delilah’s conniving plans. Accompanying this new location is also a range of both new and returning enemies ranging from the Brigmore Witches to clockwork soldiers. Due to this variety of enemies, players are forced to face each situation in a different way, allowing them to enter each level in a unique and different way. To complement each level’s range of entrances and exits, players are also able to eliminate their targets in a number of different ways, ranging from a lethal takedown, to a more creative non-lethal route. However, each route has a large effect on the game’s overarching plot as players who mercifully defeat their targets are rewarded with low chaos during their playthrough, those who continue to kill their enemies and targets throughout each level will be awarded with a high chaos or possibly evil playthrough during the story, leading to altering relationships with characters as well as multiple drastically differing endings.

Unfortunately the game does experience several issues with regards to performance as players are often faced with tedious issued throughout the game. Firstly, on several occasions the player may encounter severe FPS drop as they enter larger areas, or the screen contains too many enemies or textures. In addition to FPS drop, players may also encounter irritating controls as they utilize their newly found far reach ability, which poses an issues when the player is required to select the location they wish to leap to. This is due to the fact that the aiming system often glitches resulting in players missing their target location or leaping to a different location resulting in either detection or death.

However, the game redeems these errors with the debut of its drastic graphical improvement, ranging from more detailed environments to a wider enemy model variety. In addition to this, the game’s improved graphical capabilities have allowed the developers to increase the size of each location throughout Karnaca. Thanks to this, players are now able to explore drastically larger areas in search of runes, bone charms, stores, and different routes to their marked target. Not only does this offer an incentive for the player to explore the world, but also allows players to act in more unique and creative ways as they eliminate their enemies and targets whether they are following the merciful low chaos path, or the brutal path of high chaos.

In conclusion, Dishonored 2 is a suitable sequel to its acclaimed predecessor, keeping several of the game’s successful features whilst also building on the game’s large range of abilities, and introducing multiple new features. In addition to this, the game’s exotic new location adds a new layer to the series’ expanding world, making the game a great title for those looking to further explore Dishonored’s world. However, for those looking for drastic innovation the game may be a disappointment, as Dishonored 2 merely builds upon the features established in the original game rather than introducing a new roster of features.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Microsoft Xbox One code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.