There is little time to explore new planets when everything is trying to kill you. Risk of Rain 2 from Hopoo Games and Gearbox Publishing sets you down on alien planet and turns everything loses. A rougelike non stop battle, Rain has you dividing your time between shooting and exploring. The enemies are some of the most visual interesting that video games have ever produced. Prepare to die, a lot.
Once you spawn on a planet, you have to search for items that can buff your character. These stack, so getting a duplicate can help. Your mission is to find a teleporter so you can move on to the next planet. This is not as simple as just pushing a button. Once activated, boss enemies spawn in and you have to kill them in order to charge the teleporter. The normal foes are still there and things can get pretty crazy as you dodge and shoot. Some locations can you give an added challenge, such as a shrine that invites more “friends” to the party.
Each area feels different. You might be on a desert planet in one stage and a ice planet for the next. Rain takes the idea of alien lifeforms to the extreme. Some look like demons and others seem like a hodgepodge of common things. One can only be described as a spider pot. Every alien in Rain looks distinctly different, even if you won’t have much time to stare. Oh, some of them fly too. The difficulty continues to go up every second, so you can’t just stay on one world. The difficulty bar eventually starts saying how bad things are getting directly to the player. Why say “Very Hard” when you can say “I’m Coming For You”?
Rain seems like a game that you need your buddies to have a fighting chance. You can play solo, but you need luck to get the things to make you powerful enough. When you get through a set number of worlds, it starts over. The difficulty is the same, but you keep all of your buffs as well. Completing worlds unlocks new characters with special abilities. This gives it quite a few hours of replayablity.
Risk of Rain 2 is a fun and addicting game. It takes a bit to learn how to play, but you will be having so much fun you won’t mind. Join up with a squad or go it alone. Just know that everything is hostile and they are all coming for you.
9.5/10
Available on PC, Xbox, PS4 and Switch.
https://www.gearboxpublishing.com/game/risk-of-rain-2/