Everything I’ve Ever Wanted in a Rogue-Lite | Rogue Legacy 2, 2022 Review
This Indie Will Quickly Become One of Your Favorites.
This Indie Will Quickly Become One of Your Favorites.
Rogue Legacy 2 is one of the best Roguelites I have ever played, with tons of upgrades and playstyles to make things interesting up through the main game and beyond into the plethora of post game activities. NameBrand
I bought Rogue Legacy 2 on a whim after I saw that it launched with warm reviews during the 1.0 launch [in 2022], and I have to say that I’m really happy I did! This game has slowly crept into being one of my all-time favorite Roguelites, and I believe it deserves a chance at becoming one of yours.
I’m going to address what I believe will be the main drawback for players: Rogue Legacy 2 is a slow burn game. It’s not one of those 20 hour, one-and-done Roguelites. We’re talking 40–60 hours here to roll credits for the first time. Before you get to the late-game content. Because of the slow burn nature of it, there will be times you’ll finish a run that’s spanned multiple play sessions with a ludicrous amount of resources. You’ll buy bunches of upgrades with it, thinking to yourself that “yeah, I’m really going to FEEL the power increase on this next attempt.” Only to find that the changes feel VERY marginal. At times, this feels frustrating when I’m looking for that instant gratification. But when you look past that, the core gameplay is, indeed, still a Roguelite, which means the best weapon in the game is not stat boosts, but your own skill. Leveling up and the upgrades were nice, and did contribute to the reason I rolled credits, but it’s more about knowing enemy and boss attack patterns. That will be what saves your bacon 90% of the time.
That said, while it is a long and slow burn, that doesn’t mean you need to commit to playing Rogue Legacy 2 for huge amounts of time, which I really appreciated. In any given play session, You can tailor the entire experience to suit what you feel like doing because of the wide variety of content that it offers. Do you have an hour or more to collect a bunch of gold, or get a really long attempt started? How about a few minutes to do some combat challenges? Should you bee-line it to the boss and attempt to memorize some of their attack patterns? Maybe you just want to collect a few relics and try fighting a new boss. Or perhaps you’ll just explore the newest area found, looking for that next heirloom. Maybe you turn the game on for a few minutes just to clear a few rooms in the attempt you started yesterday. Etc. You can fit the game in just about any time gap you have available, to fit any kind of gaming mood you’re in, and should you need to, you can save and quit at any point during a run, and return to the game right where you left off. Any time you contribute to the game makes you that much stronger.
For those of you looking for a deep, long, and rich experience, you’ll find that here! There are a LOT of different weapons, talents, and magic spells, all with their own gameplay quirks that you’ll have the opportunity to master. On top of them, you can find relics with modifiers that you can synergize with each other, and heirlooms that give you new movement abilities that allow “metroidvania-esque” access to other areas of the map. As you run through generations of heros (every new character is a descendant of the first set of heros you play as), you’ll encounter strange curses and blessings to your characters and their lineage that will continue to make every run feel like a unique experience, should you so choose it to be.
I say, “should you so choose it to be,” because if you desire, you can eliminate a lot of the randomness of Rogue Legacy 2. Many of these options are built right into the base game through a few unlockable upgrades which can help with this in just about any way you can think of, from preferring to start with a certain loadout, to freezing the random generation of the environments. If you’re looking for the game to be even more tailored, you can change the ‘house rules’, which contain tons and tons of accessibility options that are a bit uncommon in games today. I really commend the devs for including that! It ensures that everyone can have a fun experience no matter how they decide to play the game.
I kept everything normal and random myself though, and personally loved my journey through the game. The trial and error process of learning enemy attack patterns, room layouts, and cool weapon interactions was really addicting and engaging. The upgrades, though marginal at times, were satisfying to collect over time, and finding insane relic synergies was always a treat. The bosses are really well-designed, and gave me a LOT of trouble, to the point where I thought they were impossible at first. But, with the knowledge I have now, I can take down a few with ease, as a testament to all the practice and memorization I’ve put in. The soundtrack and overall sound design is really well done and all complements each other. Lastly, it wasn’t particularly the focus of my attention, but I appreciated the lore fragments scattered across the world through secret rooms which gave greater explanation to the overarching plot.
Overall, I really hope that more people get into Rogue Legacy 2 and see what it has to offer, because there is a TON here to appreciate and enjoy. And I’ve only played up to the credits! There’s apparently a whole post game section complete with its own set of bosses, rules, armor, challenges and more for me to discover, so I might just be at the tip of the iceberg, which is insane to think about next to the 40 hours I’ve already put in! But I’ll say, even if you just roll credits, where I’m at during the time of this review, I still think Rogue Legacy 2 is an absolutely incredible game that many people will be able to find a lot of value in. I highly recommend it, and hope you dive into it!
Originally published at https://backloggd.com.