BloodRayne 2

"Vastly improved sequel that surpasses the original by far..."

Bloodrayne 2 is most likely going to go overlooked by most gamers, simply because the franchise thus far has not received the popularity it deserves. The first game, released a few years back, was a great game on its own but had its share of flaws. Terminal Reality has seen to it that each and every one of these flaws has been addressed and corrected, and what we have here is probably one of the best sequels I have seen in a long time. So why is that? Let's explore.

Story: 8/10

The story in the previous game wasn't that good at all, it seemed a little rushed and thrown together. The sequel has a reworked storyline that seems a bit more realistic (provided you think vampires exist ) and is molded a lot more throughout the game.The story is, in a nutshell, Agent Rayne is hunting down all the relatives on her father Kagan's side of the family to slaughter them. Why, you ask? Her mothers entire bloodline was wiped out by Rayne's own father. She seeks vengeance, and vengeance she brings, oh yes she does.
While not entirely fleshed out to the point that it is an excellent story, it is quite an improvement over the originals.

Graphics: 10/10

The graphics as well in the original game were lacking, good but not great. In this game, every aspect is more detailed and beautiful. The blood, the characters, the animations are much smoother, the setting and scenery is suitably much darker than the first game etc., Rayne has a bevy of new moves and abilities, which take full advantage of the beautiful new graphics engine. There's not much else to say about these, they rock...end of story.

Sound: 9/10

The sound, once again, was lacking in the first game also. The environmental sounds and the music was very repetitious and got annoying fast. One thing the original game did establish that is continued here, are Rayne's comments throughout gameplay. Witty and clever, most of her comments will make you smile, either with laughter, or because they are naughty. The voicework in the game is mostly outstanding, and with all that being sad, one would think that the sound would receive a perfect score. But the one glaring flaw in the sound, is the enemy voiceovers. They are repeated constantly, and you will sometimes here the same line 3 times in one minute. This, needless to say, gets very annoying, and might even aggravate you to turn the dialogue completely off. However, that is the only flaw I can think of.

Control: 8/10

This was also lacking in the original (are you sensing a pattern here?). It is improved, but the jumping controls still feel weak. Which is sad, because controlling most of the other aspects of the game works very well. The feeding and combos are executed smoothly, and mostly are easy to pull off. Besides the jumping, the other thing that can be tedious is the newly-added pole swinging element. This feels more like a knock-off of Prince of Persia than something that Rayne might actually be able to do. Though, once you get the hang of it, it can be fun at times. However, another feature added is much cooler and a lot more tolerable throughout the game. This is the addition of pole grinding. This means that when you jump on a pole that Rayne will grind down it with her feet, enabling you to stick your blades out and cut enemies in half, or you can shoot your bio-guns (more on these things later).
It is quite easy to control most of the games new additions, the only gripe being the still-unimproved jumping module, and the frustrating pole-swinging.

Gameplay: 10/10

And now we have the cream of the crop, the gameplay. Despite the minor flaws described in the sections above, most everything in the game has been improved. This holds true in the gameplay as well, so much so, that the gameplay feels new from the first game. So, where to start?

The game is a pretty linear affair, but also nonlinear in many ways. The levels themselves are fairly straightforward and it is pretty difficult to get completely lost. But, each area that you go in has so many things and opportunities incorporated into the environment, that each area can be played a number of different ways.

Lets start with Rayne's arm blades. In the first game, you really didn't use the blades that much, because you were constantly running and gunning with all the various guns you picked up. It was very rare to run out of ammo except in long boss fights. Plus, the combat engine overall was not polished and felt very dry. Not so in Bloodrayne 2. The blades are almost all you use this time around, and a brand new combo system has been introduced. There are a lot of combos to learn, but they are mostly for showing off, since they aren't necessary to winning the game.

The staple of the first game was the ability to feed on your enemies, the ability that explained Rayne's species, dhampir. That is, half woman-half vampire. Feeding could be done to nearly every enemy except a few elite guards in the first game, and bosses since feeding was pretty much an instant kill. There were only 3 ways to feed: from the back, from the front, or jumping on someone while they were on the ground. Now, you can only feed from behind and in front. But wait a second, that subtracts from the original, right? Not really. You see, Rayne now has around 20 “feeding fatalities” to execute. You could call it a stylish way to end feeding. These range from impaling the enemy on the blades and holding them in the air, to cutting off their arms, then cutting them right down the middle. Yes, this game is gory if you hadn't heard. Probably the goriest game to come out in 2004. But I digress. Alas, you can't feed on everybody, and if an enemy is holding a crowbar or some other implement, you have to disarm them by kicking it out or harpooning them (explained later). So with the blades and feeding alone, you have plenty of options to slice and dice your enemies.

Then there are the guns. Now, this time around, you don't take guns from enemies. Instead, early in the game you acquire the “Carpathian Dragons”. These guns feed on the blood of their host and must be replenished by feeding. How fitting. And yes, if you were wondering, there are many ways to replenish the supply with different gun fatalities as well. The guns can take different forms throughout the game, ranging from a blood shotgun to a blood machine gun etc. In using these different forms of the guns, they gain experience, which means that every gun form can be upgraded and morph into another. The only problem with the guns is, unless you are a hardcore run and gun fan, there are so many better ways to dispatch your enemies that you will hardly ever resort to using the guns. There are some boss fights which require uses of the different forms of the guns, but for the most part they will go untouched.

Lastly, probably the best feature in the game and most improved, is Rayne's harpoon. In the first game, this was only used to grab enemies and pull them towards you for feeding. That's it. In this game, you now can lock on to an enemy, and using the directional stick, fling an enemy anywhere on the screen. In fact, in nearly every area, there are appropriately placed spikes and spears jutting out of the walls to impale the enemies on. Or, you can hurl them off a building, or into a fan, or into a trash compactor, or into a burning object, or into each other…There are just so many ways to use this, its uncanny. However, against stronger enemies the harpoon won't work. But these types of enemies are few and far between.

There are some things that I haven't mentioned, like all the 3 tiered abilities you can learn, like ghost feeding, enthralling, freezing time etc. These powers are acquired throughout the game. You start out with the Dilated Perception (i.e. Matrix Mode), Aura Vision (night vision) and Blood Fury (umm… Rayne goes crazy and dismembers people). And as you progress they can be added on to: Dilated Perception becomes Super Speed, Blood Fury becomes Blood Rage and so on. But don't worry, all the original powers as well as the new ones can be accessed whenever you want. The only thing that will keep you from using some is insufficient rage points. You earn these with Carnage Bonuses, which translate to harpooning enemies into spikes and such.
With all these things to do, you can probably understand what I mean when I say that there is more than one way to clear a room.

So yeah, that's about all. As such, it warrants the gameplay a perfect score.

Replay Value: 8/10

Unfortunately, this years Bloodrayne seems shorter than the first one, and is really not that hard at all. This means you will finish quickly, but that's not to say you won't have a blast the entire time playing it. Once you beat it, you unlock tons of Production art, slideshows, all the cutscenes, and even a plethora of new costumes for Rayne, each seeming to satisfy a different fetish. The only drawback is, when you beat it once, you unlock ALL of this. Of course, there are numerous cheats to use, which can bring a whole new life to the game. But, when all is said in done, the game is just too short. You will replay some levels just for variety of ways to play them and kill the enemies, but overall, it won't have a very long lifespan.

Overall: 9/10 (not an average)

So, with vastly improved graphics, mostly improved sound and music, and enormous gameplay potential and new features, it would seem that it would get a perfect score right? Unfortunately, the length of the game, the finicky controls of some features (jumping and pole-swinging), and downright annoying repetitious enemy comments, bring the score down. But just one point. It is hard to say to buy it because it is 50 bucks right now, and some people may feel shortchanged by the games length to justify buying it. But, if you loved the original, you will adore the sequel, and if you haven't ever played the first one, this one is still a good start. The ending of the game alludes to yet another sequel. I can't wait.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/26/05