"A better, gorier game"

Bloodrayne 2 is the sequel to Majesco's first Bloodrayne, obviously. It follows the adventures of Rayne, an agent for the Brimstone society. The sequel has improved upon the first game in every way possible.

Story

The story, while not unique, is certainly enjoyable. Rayne, after being robbed the pleasure of killing her father, the vampire Kagan, has decided to kill all of his family. This includes full fledged vampires and dhampirs such as herself. Her interests intersect with the Brimstone Society, and she's sent on a mission for them. She eventually uncovers a plot by her family to release the Shroud, a mystical barrier that will enable vampires to walk during the day and create hell on earth. Again, not unique by any standards, but there's enough twists and soap opera like back stabbings to keep things interesting.

I did have a problem with Severin. He was there to basically tell Rayne how to get past a certain level or defeat a boss, but he became annoying. I was wanting to see him get in on some of the action, but he never did. He simply said he was doing "what he does." I wish I could've seen what that was. It's a small nitpick, but I felt it was worth mentioning.

Graphics

Compared to the first game, the graphics are stunning. Rayne has much more detail, the enemies are more varied, and the backgrounds have much more detail. It is a stunning game. This is seen in the first few levels when Rayne attends a ball at a posh estate wearing a killer black gown. Unfortunately, a lot of the environments become bland settings such as a sewer or a factory, and there's simply not a lot of detail.

There are also clipping problems and the sort. Sometimes, Rayne or an enemy would simply melt into the wall or floor. Also, when Rayne would throw an enemy down a far distance, he would bounce on the floor and then suddenly be standing again. I also noticed that when I threw one dhampir out of a glass bridge, she simply landed on thin air and stayed there.

Gameplay

This is where the game excels at. It's not really a game where you think, "How can I get past these thirty something guards?" It's a game where you think, "How can I kill these thirty something guards in the most gruesome way?" Luckily, the game provides plenty of ways to kill enemies. You can chop off limbs like in the first game, or shoot people, or suck their blood.

But Majesco has added an entire new way of killing. If you're feeding off someone, you can perform a fatality, such as cutting off an arm, head, then slicing them in half. Or you can stick your guns in them and drain their blood.

The harpoon is an awesome weapon in this game. You can use it to throw enemies into virtually anything. Using the harpoon, you can fling enemies onto sharp objects, through windows, into walls, into garbage trucks, etc.

The guns are a mixed bag. Gone is the way Rayne could simply pick up a weapon, empty the magazine, and throw it down. Now, Rayne has two guns called the Carpathian Dragons. They use blood to power themselves, creating the necessity to drain enemies of blood every chance you get. If the guns run out of blood and you continue to use them, it will begin to drain Rayne's blood. The guns have about seven or so different modes. They get powerful near the end, but some can also hurt Rayne if she fires them too close to an enemy or an object.

Rayne herself has many more moves. It adds to the depth of the fighting, since there are so many new ways to kill people. There's a lot of combos that can be pulled off to make Rayne fight in style.

Majesco also added to Rayne's super abilities. Aura Vision, Dilated Perception, and Blood Rage can be used at the start of the game, but each one comes with two upgrades that can be found in the game. Aura Vision upgrades to Ghost Feed, in which Rayne's soul feeds on an enemy while Rayne fights another enemy. Blood Fury is basically a stronger version of Blood Rage. Rayne does more damage and pulls off better moves. The second Dilated Perception slows everything down except Rayne. She moves at the same speed she always does. Great for fighting faster enemies or running from a torrent of water. I won't spoil the third abilities. You'll just have to find them yourselves.

On the negative side, the levels do get repetitive. Go through an area, solve a kill puzzle, beat some baddies, repeat. And since many of them look alike, it feels as if you're not making any progress. Plus, there's just not a whole lot of variety in them. Sure, it's fun slicing up bad guys, but that's about it. Being able to grind and jump from and fire from pipes are cool features, but aren't enough to give the game much needed variety. Neither are the kill puzzles. All of them involve flinging bad guys into some machine to make it blow up. Fun at first, but by the end of the game you'll be wishing for more inventive kill puzzles.

Villains

I know there isn't usually a villains section in the reviews, but I felt they needed recognition. I enjoyed the bad guys in this game. It was fun slicing up Nazis, but even more fun slicing up the many varieties of vampires.

It was cool being able to fight other dhampirs with blades similar to Rayne's. Plus, each one you defeated unlocked a new move or power.

The bosses are also a treat. Slezz, a giant vampire demon, is an early boss found in the sewers. What makes her a stand-out is her mode of attack. She shoots acid from her breasts. It's quite disturbing.

Rayne's family also makes for enjoyable bad guys. There's Xerx, who looks like a patchwork quilt, Ephemera, who has a wave of darkness following her, Ferril, who has tattoos on her body that are constantly moving.

The boss fights are also good. With some, you have to find the pattern and beat it, while others you just go all out guns blazing and swords swinging. I was disappointed with the final boss, though. It was too easy. There was no real sense of urgency like the first game. There, you had to kill the boss before he reached a certain height and leveled the building. Here, the worst that can happen is that the villain jumps in the fountain of blood and refills his life.

There's enough variety to the villains that it keeps the gameplay interesting for the most part. Some villains will be easy to kill, while others will require more than a few stabs or shots to be taken down.

Audio

The voice work is done well, though sometimes over the top. I didn't really pay attention to the background music. The rock that starts playing during the big fights got old fast. Some variety would have done nice.

Replayability

After you beat the game, nine different costumes become unlocked. Most are just a variation on Rayne's black gown. The best one has to be Dark Rayne. The worst is a tie between Schoolgirl Rayne and Cowboy Rayne. Since the costumes don't add to Rayne's ability or change the gameplay any, there's no real incentive to play the game through with the costumes. Unless you want to see Rayne performing her kicks in a short skirt.

I do like the fact that you can go back to any level you've played. This way, if you had a favorite level or boss fight, you can play it again without having to go through the entire game just to reach it. This adds to the replayability factor. There's also the fact that you might want to master certain moves or ways of killing people. But otherwise, there's no real reason to replay it.

Extras

The game comes with unlockable extras. You can view some of the movies in the game. This is a nice feature, since some of the in game movies looked so awesome. You can also view a gamplay demo, but that's kind of a wasted feature since you're getting to play the game itself. There's also a Bloodrayne trailer. It doesn't make the movie look good. It looks like a cheap, horrible movie that will go straight to video. Hopefully the footage is very raw and will be improved.

Overall

I enjoyed this game a lot. It's just fun to go around slicing people up and performing all kinds of gruesome fatalities. Rayne is such an enjoyable character. It looks good, plays awesome, and has a very dark tone. It's not afraid to go to a lot of dark places, and it does. Look at how it ends. A very gusty move, IMO. Yes, there are some problems with the graphics and the lack of variety in levels, but there's enough inventive ways to dispatch enemies to balance it out. This is a definitive buy for fans of the first, and just fans of gory games in general. I'm eagerly anticipating a sequel, since the ending left it wide open. Maybe Majesco is planning on making it a trilogy. Who knows? At least we'll have the comics to give us our Rayne fix until a third game comes out.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/15/04