Do you ever wake up in the morning, so fed up you would just like to slaughter everything in your path? Well fear not, there is no need to go to jail or get shot by the coppers, you can take out your frustrations by sitting in front of a screen for a few hours with Ninety Nine Nights 2.
Spare a moment however as you take control of Galen – an ultimate warrior whose family has been killed and his home city destroyed. He has had an even worse day than you so yeah, its clobbering time.
Many action fans will already be salivating at the thought of being able to mutilate every enemy that strays into your path, however sadly the game falls far short of the mark …. it is very repetitive and rather boring.
This sequel is very much like the 2006 original which received mainly negative reviews because the ‘Dynasty Warriors’ based combat system is just a mindless romp for as long as you can stick it. You push a few buttons, swing at enemies, kill them in a handful of ways, and continue to do so. Forever. Well for 8 hours or so anyway.
Galen is a pissed off warrior, his family were killed, he could do nothing about it and while he is clearly dealing with the loss of his beloved, he is trying to protect Orphea Castle and the Light Orb inside from the clutches of the evil Lord Of The Night. That is as complicated as the story gets, and its so corny that its hard to take even remotely seriously. Not that you have to take it seriously however, as you never really end up paying attention to a script, or indepth story line. Hack, slash, hack slash. Yawn.
To be fair I did enjoy some of the game as the combat can give some reward. Galen has a plethora of special powers at hand which make the slaughter fun, but it really is hard to stomach it for such a long length of time. I found myself playing for 30 minutes, then saving and coming back to it later when I had a break.
What they haven’t changed is the friendly Artificial Intelligence system – the soldiers who ‘aid’ you, end up just standing around looking like drugged idiots and instead of offering any real help in your mission you just walk around them while killing every enemy on the screen. Oh how I wish I could have hacked them to death also, it might have at least offered some comedy relief to the proceedings – decapitation style.
While you start off with Galen, a huge ass fighter with no brains and plenty of brawn, you get the option later to take control of other characters. Sephia, the Queen of Orphea; Lew, the goblin assassin and Zazi, the gun carrying guardian. They all have side stories, equally as stupid as Galens and each immediately forgettable. All the characters have a special, unique attack which adds little to the overall game.
Graphically, the game is little more than average by the high standards we expect in 2010, and while its not ugly I found the overall texture work and environmental design rather bland and nondescript. The audio is perfectly fine, but also immediately forgettable.
The game offers multiplayer as well and while it is more enjoyable than single player, it really didn’t offer up a huge level of longevity to the overall package. My buddies were bored within a couple of hours and I wasn’t going to argue, it was a shortlived affair.
Overall I can’t profess to claim that I had a great time playing Ninety Nine Nights 2 on the Xbox 360. There is a lot of combat, but it is just so bland that after a few hours you lose all will or desire to play. I wouldn’t recommend this at all, but if you liked the original then you might also enjoy this.
