Having played games for over 40 years, I have been very much in touch with how I feel about a title in the first two hours of gameplay. For example, I knew that Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion would consume me after the first hour of gameplay, even though I hadn’t played any Elder Scrolls games prior, thus having no expectations. Seeing the complexity of the gameplay, the background skills tree that promised a long gameplay process, and an expansive and explorable world, I knew that I was in for a treat. I wanted that treat over and over again. That type of gameplay lays out its road map without having to take you on a trip.
I love those types of gaming experiences.
That brings me to this review for SteamWorld Heist II. I had never played the first and I didn’t honestly know what to expect with the sequel. The tutorial didn’t give me much hope that this experience was going to be deep, as you’re given turn-based instruction on what looked like a platformer that didn’t want to platform. Then the experience became complex.
The game introduced the main method of gameplay but then pulled back to reveal it was a quest-based, vehicle-driven construct that allowed freedom for upgrades in an uncomplicated but interesting skills tree. In other words, there was more under the hood than previously assumed. Most importantly, I couldn’t stop playing this game, a feeling that was similar to that of Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.
While it wasn’t perfect, mainly because of its pacing, the gameplay was addictive. It provided a nice waterway of fun, gameplay balance, and reasons to come back repeatedly. I will take all of those things any day of the week as a gamer.
So, sit back, throw some water on the grill, and let’s get this steam experience going.
Frustrating but manageable
Don’t let that line fool you, there is a heavy dose of frustration with this game. But that frustration, in its simplest terms, is driven by the amount of patience you carry with you during the experience. SteamWorld Heist II runs on a turn-based platformer plan that requires you to experiment and adjust. Sometimes that can be a frustrating process for gamers, but more times than not the reward for finding the perfect strategic plan feels so gratifying.
Now, before we get to the gameplay, let’s talk narrative. The story sets your gaming experience up with a motivating storyline. You play as steampunk robots that are trying to bring down a royal navy that has all but gathered complete control over the water in the world, an element that all inhabitants of this world must have to survive. They use the water as a control mechanism to keep everyone in line, and they abuse their power to ensure that everyone does what they command. No one wants to live that way.
The beef of the gameplay is motivated by this storyline, as it begins with you entering a navy-controlled complex with certain goals in mind. Those goals change from place to place and can range from trying to simply take down all the naval folks to gathering items in a certain amount of time. The game has a variety of goals to achieve during these turn-based moments and all of them seem worthwhile as they point back to hurting the Royal Navy.
The complexity of this adventure comes with those goal-based restrictions placed on gameplay. And none of them are easy but it doesn’t mean they aren’t fun. For example, there was a mission where I had to collect valuable swag that was set on a timer to explode. If I didn’t reach the swag in time, then it was gone and the mission failed. I failed this mission many times because I couldn’t work out the strategic-ness of that situation. Sometimes I would have enemies position themselves in a way that forced me to separate my troops to get the most damage on the navy without receiving it. By isolating my troops through this separation, would lead me to more casualties but also more success. Finding that balance where I could save my troops, and dispose of the enemies while getting to the swag in time was a bit maddening. There was a heavy amount of frustration that went with failing over and over again, but it was accompanied and balanced out by the unique and intriguing shaped strategy that I had to develop which made it far more fun than not.
As I went back into the mission, I began to see the value of this platformer turn-based gameplay. Enemies would appear on multiple levels with multiple ways to kill me. Some of those enemies needed an up-close melee to deal damage on me, while others needed to be far away with guns to get me from long range. The variety of enemies and their attack methods had me thinking like a card counter at a casino, where I had to logically think through each level to figure out the best method to proceed. Again, positioning my troops for the most success and figuring out the best way to approach them while achieving the goal in time was a balancing act of sorts. It wasn’t an easy task by any means, but it was engaging and cerebral.
I found the strategy in my attacks and approach to enemies to be complicated. It felt more than just an Advanced Wars experience of guessing and more about what worked to succeed. Eventually, I found the right combination to get through the level and acquire the swag. The levels come equipped with temporary barriers to hide behind during the action and heavily armored flooring that enemies can’t shoot through. Using those in the strategic mix created such a distracting time that frustration never reached its zenith.
Once I found the right strategy, and the swag was acquired, the game would give me a star rating of how I did with rewards beyond just the swag. What’s even more interesting about this final result is that the game offered me a chance to go back and work out an even smoother plan of attack. It was a replayability note that hit the right spots for my gaming needs.
On a base level, this is how the main gameplay in SteamWorld Heist II works. You get to a location, you’re given goals, and you do your best to strategize and execute those goals to get the best results. It isn’t easy at all but it’s fun and the frustration level of the game never reaches a point where you don’t want to play it again. It just gives you a hefty push and tells you to do your best. Then pushes you back again if you don’t do your best.
And this is only the beginning of the game.
Sub-par gameplay
Don’t worry, that was a play on words. Pulling back the gameplay from the platforming part of it, SteamWorld Heist II features a submarine component. Yes, you get to drive around a submarine in this world and go to locations to start gameplay. This is a familiar old-school component that can be found in the earliest NES games out there, where you use a vehicle to traverse a map to get to the next spot of gameplay.
The reason why a submarine exists, beyond just a narrative component to develop the main character, is that you get a bigger world to explore. The game shows you different places and inaccessible spots that will encourage and motivate you to keep moving around the map. In the beginning, most of the map is filled full of clouds that hide areas in the game and those clouds part as you push through them. Underneath the clouds are action levels that you can go into for missions or just to explore, bars and skills/equipment upgrade spots that you can use to build up your character and/or vehicle, restricted areas that can be opened with progression, and secret areas that contain goodies that aren’t necessarily part of the main experience. All of this is driven by the simple addition of the submarine and all of it creates a bigger, more interesting world for SteamWorld Heist II.
Having more to do and getting a visual promise that there is more to do is a good combination that makes this game more than what was expected of it. It was certainly a pleasant surprise for me, as I felt a nice bit of relief that this game simply wasn’t a one-dimensional form of gameplay but was something akin to how I felt back in the late 80s when I played Legend of Zelda for the first time on the NES. The world opened up and the gameplay became so much bigger thanks to the inclusion of the submarine component.
Customization and teamwork
If the strategy and a large explorable map aren’t enough to quench your thirst for good gameplay, then let’s talk about the customization component of the game that stretches from submarine to team. It’s quite extensive.
Starting small, the submarine customization is neat. You can add weapons and customize how your submarine works around enemy ships. As you progress in turn-based missions, and gather goodies, you can spend those spoils on upgrading your submarine. This means adding weapons, shields, and everything in between. The additions help you to navigate navy ships and take them out to gather gallons of water from them. Those gallons can be used on characters and the submarine. It’s a nice dance and the variety of naval enemies you find ranges as you are drawn deeper and deeper into the game.
Using those upgrades is easy, as you simply move around enemy ships and are given gunsight lines to work with that automatically fire/reload when you’re around them. It’s cool to see and thoughtless (in a good way) when using them. Nonetheless, gathering resources and upgrading the submarine creates an addictive type of gameplay that motivates you to keep going and do better. All of it works well with the main gameplay of SteamWorld Heist II.
On the character side of the upgrading coin, it is incredibly complicated. The easiest place to start is to talk about how you can upgrade the skills of your players with weapons you can acquire at bars or stores (or with mission victories). These weapons help you to deal more damage with enemies and generally make your strategic life much easier with the turn-based portion of the gameplay. On a remedial level, this is just a purchase-and-shoot type of upgrade. Nothing special but it is certainly a gradual experience improvement as you get deeper into the gameplay.
Where this part gets more complicated is when each gun upgrade is built for a particular class of character. For example, if you pick up a shotgun that deals more damage it may come with an attribute that turns your normal robot into a reaper who works at a power disadvantage. They start lower on their vitals which makes them more vulnerable to destruction. Of course, the balance here is that the class change also brings with it a more powerful weapon, so that you can dispose of enemies a lot easier if you can strategically get in the right place to do so. This provides another layer of strategic thinking and whether the juice is ultimately worth the squeeze. That’s something you have to figure out and if how you’re strategizing your turn-based gameplay is the best it can be. If it isn’t, then the weapon may not be worth your time.
Now, getting back to class briefly, each class that you have the opportunity to change into comes with its own set of skills tree. The reaper class might focus more on firepower, while the initial normal class might allow you to build out your robot in defense. The complexity and depth of these skill trees add another interesting and engaging level of gameplay to the overall body of work. Much like everything else in the game, it motivates you to keep pushing and exploring the world of SteamWorld Heist II. There are so many directions you can go with this gameplay.
Staying briefly with characters, there is a recruiting component in the game where you can pick and choose your crewmembers. As you go from bar to bar, you can talk to characters and recruit them to your team. They come with particular attributes that are balanced and with skill trees that offer a variety of different types of gameplay strategies. This gives the player more choice when putting together their team and each team member is upgradable as you use them. This makes the game even more valuable and deeper with its gameplay structure. This one part had me giddy during my gameplay time with SteamWorld Heist II.
All of the above growth and expansion are based on your success in the game. This might be the only road bump in the gameplay, as success can be slow-moving at times.
Slow and steady
The only sticking point to this game is the pacing of success goals and how the game is restrictive with its expectations at times. For example, you are given a star goal to achieve that pushes the narrative forward and unlocks certain portions of the map as more of the story is revealed. As mentioned above, as you complete missions, you are given a star rating and ocean rep that helps you unlock the next part of the game. If you don’t achieve those goals, then you will find yourself repeating missions to do better.
I don’t mind that the game sets goals but I don’t particularly love being forced to constantly and repeatedly go through levels against my wishes. Much like what I have found with mobile games like Angry Birds and any other casual gaming experience, there has to be some flexibility to the gameplay that pushes you through at a good pace but also makes you want to progress far enough that you want to revisit earlier stages on your own to do better. In a way, SteamWorld Heist II does this, as you can progress up to a point, gather new weapons and customizable attributes, and then return to earlier missions with those new items. But the game is very restrictive on the amount of progression you can make during a certain stage of the game without a top-level expectation of success. This might be a way to control gamers smarter than me from zipping through the game in a day but it feels a bit too restrictive in its intentions.
This is not a dealbreaker by any means but there is a fair amount of unnecessary frustration that can build up being forced to do better on a mission without the option of just progressing to the next. I guess that is the beauty and the challenge of the game that my old-man mind just can’t wrap around. Sometimes you just need the option to change the scenery and progress so that you can come back and do better once your frustration disappears. I don’t like being stuck in one place for too long.
Anyway, the game still has far more positives than negatives in this department. And while this might be my biggest gripe, I’m sure other gamers with fresher minds will find it more of a challenge than a roadblock.
On that sweet note, that’s SteamWorld Heist II in a nutshell. Let’s wrap this review up.
Conclusion
SteamWorld Heist II from developer Thunderful Development is one of the deeper gaming experiences I have run across in 2024. It contains a hefty amount of strategy in its gameplay while offering up a bigger and richer variety in its exploration and gameplay options. It can be restrictive at times with its gameplay progression but not enough to run the experience.
