Rage 2 is definitely a step up from the original, with a bigger world that feels a lot more desolate (in a good way). It has a variety of lands to explore, unique bosses to run into, and a bevy of leveling trees that will keep you motivated throughout the gameplay. What it needed and didn’t get were a better story and less repetition. The game has grown, but it still has more than enough room to continue to grow.
It has felt like ages since I reviewed the first Rage game. It was one of those games that dripped with potential, but somehow fell short on content, and just glistened over story, while not quite sparkling in the sunlight as if it were Edward (yep, I went there — congrats to our new Batman). Who didn’t want to see a mutant-filled world that felt more like Mad Max than what Mad Max could deliver (at the time)? Again, it was a game filled with potential.
Making it just under a decade later, Rage 2 launched last week, an Avalanche Studio work that took the best parts of its Mad Max title and merged it into the Rage universe. A match made in heaven? Potentially, but it certainly feels like a bigger and better world than the original game. Let’s dig right into this puppy.
Rage 2’s story puts you right in the midst of action, while setting you up with main characters that, in hindsight, feel thin. You play as either a man or a woman named Walker, who is forced into becoming the last ranger after acquiring a special ranger suit from a fallen soldier. The game doesn’t give you a chance to get to know the characters or care for them, which is a crying shame. You are quickly introduced to your adopted parent, a rough and tough soldier, who is almost immediately slain by antagonist General Cross, someone that looks like Robocop mated with several pieces of Warhammer armor. In the first five minutes of the game, you’re asked to care about this fallen character, which only has details about them provided by quirky comments about Walker’s past. This five-minutes is supposed to create some sort of revenge motivation but honestly doesn’t give you a chance to give a shit. Back to the story, Cross’ intentions are to rule all of the desert wasteland (and other places that aren’t desert), and your job is to stop him. If you’re going to deliver a Mad Max plot, then this is the way to do it. If you’re into some sort of narrative substance, then this ain’t it chief. As quickly as the plot rolls into act one, it disappears as soon as you leave your home base to go searching for characters.
And that’s a good and bad thing, I suppose.
Firstly, starting with the negative part, you will lose sight of what you should be doing with the story, as I lost sight the first few hours of the game. The story should certainly hook you and bring you along with it, like Skyrim or Fallout 3, but it shouldn’t disconnect as soon as you see a neat thing in the background. Sticking with Fallout 3, the joy of Fallout 3 is that you’re looking for your father, which is personal. Everyone has a parent, and some of us actually have a parent we couldn’t imagine living without. Bethesda tugged at our heartstrings by simply saying ‘go find your dad’. And the game left bread crumbs that were mixed with exploration but never strayed from by asking the player to forget the quest. The quest was always in the back of the mind, even today. Rage 2 essentially says ‘go stop this guy because he killed that one person you love, but they weren’t related to you, so it’s a hard sell’. There is a thick disconnect because the game didn’t provide any details about the fallen pseudo-mom. It just threw her in there, killed her, and moved on.
The lack of any character development at the beginning makes me simply not care that this pseudo-parent died, or that General Cross and his band of freaks might take over the desert. To boot, there isn’t a real sense of urgency to push this narrative along. I played for an insane amount of time off the story, and it never pressed me to get back on track. The game didn’t even remind me that I had better stop Cross before it’s too late. It simply waited there until I got done exploring. Give me reason, show me some repercussions for not getting to Cross. Hell, have territory on the game’s giant map slowly be taken by Cross’ folks, even if it was to prove I had better get my ass in gear. Anything would do. Get the story involved and motivate me!!!
Having railed the story a bit, there is a positive light from this lack of narrative design — the exploration. I would imagine that Avalanche and id both counted on keeping the player exploring the land and its wonders to extend the game’s longevity. That’s not a bad bet to count on. By putting an infinite amount of goodies around the land, you are encouraged to keep your eyes peeled for cool things. Cool things in this sense mean violent mutants, race cars (occupied and not), violent convoys guarded by well-armored vehicles (war rig stuff), Arks (which upgrade your character’s attributes), and out-of-the-way missions that could be bounties, or simply blowing up fuel tanks guarded by enemies. To say there is a lot to do or find in Rage 2 would be an incredible understatement. There’s a shit ton to do and explore, but what’s your motivation, if it isn’t a story?
The level tree(s) in Rage 2 is motivation. When you kill enemies, as well as take over bases, you’re granted access to explore and discover storage cases. Within the cases, you will find either money (valuable for replenishing weapon stock) or you’ll find nanotrites. While I don’t have to explain the purpose of the money, the nanotrites allow you to upgrade certain attributes of your character that you gain from the Arks. This could include increasing your focus (sensing enemies) or improve the overdrive effect of Walker, which is a temporary superpower state that allows you to kill everything and anything without much damage in the process. Gaining more power and using it without regret is good motivation when you’re trying to find a reason to stop and kill groups of enemies. As a side note, nanotrites can also be used to upgrade weaponry, so don’t waste it all on attributes. Having superb weapons will make for a fun time.
The level trees also extend to something called projects. By completing certain missions/bounties, you gain project points. The project points allow you to increase things like bullet bags, how many grenades you can throw at a time, and/or certain boosts like sprinting. It’s additional attributes that play by numbers and percentages. The need to upgrade and improve projects will also provide motivation to continue being a dominant desert rat.
To get more locations without actually touring the desert randomly, you can go to certain trade towns and pick up bounties and/or missions, which again is in addition to the main story. There is a bounty board in nearly every town so you won’t be shy of content. You will have plenty of opportunities to gain points, nanotrites and money from this additional content, as well as find out how large the Rage 2 world truly is compared to the first game.
What about the cars? Vehicles were a big deal with the Rage 2 announcement last year, and after Mad Max Fury Road came out in 2013, and probably gave Avalanche a few ideas, the studio didn’t disappoint in the variety. First and foremost, there are quite a few vehicles with their own unique attributes attached. The first vehicle you will get is called the Phoenix. You get this armored dune buggy that will absolutely wreck places. In addition, you also get a very sarcastic AI inside the vehicle that keeps you well informed on how terrible you’re doing with damage. Still one of my favorite vehicles in the game.
There are other vehicles, including a giant monster truck that has infinite ammo, but weak armor. The monster truck is great because you can absolutely crush the hell out of bikers and enjoy their death. It also has some damage dealing pushing that will dispose of weaker vehicles quickly. Like stated prior, there are a variety of different vehicles to choose from, which also makes exploration fun, as you can find them throughout. I have thoroughly enjoyed trying out new vehicles.
Much like the weapons, you can upgrade the vehicles by acquiring gear parts that are earned by completing missions. For example, the gears will purchase things like cruise missiles, reinforced armor, and even an ejector seat (for those times you need to send your vehicle into oblivion, while blowing the hell out of your enemy). While the idea of vehicle upgrades is nothing new, the upgrades themselves are quite entertaining and worth their weight in gold.
Shifting gears just slightly, the controls of the vehicles and the first-person shooting part of the game are on point. Starting with the vehicles, the game does slip and slide a bit, but it compensates for it by avoiding a lot of damage from making a mistake…like falling down a small cliff. The game understands that you’re going to launch yourself off the board at least once (or, in my case, like 10 times), but you’re going to have fun doing it, as I did for the majority of my stay with vehicles. It also takes into account what vehicle you’re using when it comes to controls and complication. If you’re riding a motorcycle, you’re going to take turns tighter. If you’re in a monster truck, it’s going to be a moose of vehicle to control. The vehicles all handle different ways, and that shows the love and attention the studios had with the designs.
On the ‘out of the vehicle’ movement, it’s what you would expect from an FPS game. The controls are tight, slightly forgiving at times, and just not burdensome. They’re quite good. Getting into a gunfight is fun and there are no complaints in this department. It’s honestly the best of both worlds for vehicles and FPS.
Before we move on to presentation, one big downer of this game, in spite of how incredibly huge it might be, is that there is a fair amount of repetition. You’re going to run into the same type of enemies for the majority of the game, as well as some of the same road instances — even across multiple lands. The latter usually involves teams of different wasteland residents fighting each other. You will find mutants versus punks, with always a mutant on fire somehow. Even when you make it to bases you will find some uninspired repeating of enemies. There will be occasions where you will happen upon some unique mini-bosses. For example, I ran up on a junkyard and took down a guy robot-ed up as an armed lifter from the movie Aliens. While he did take me down a few times, taking him down just required some patience and repeating of strategy — also hiding underneath a dock. Anyway, more often than not you’re going to find more of the same, so expect it for the majority of your exploration. This repetition did allow me to appreciate the unique moments, but it also gave some dullness to the enemies.
On the presentation side of the game, you will be in awe. The game has an incredible draw distance that isn’t rivaled by many games on the market currently. You will see massively detailed mountain ranges that provide you with some visual joy and reassurance that this game is big and ready to explore. You will have a few instances of texture rendering along the way, but the sheer visual girth of the game will leave you breathless at times, especially when you get into the more jungle regions of the desert (yes, they have those). In short, it’s a gorgeous game.
Overall, Rage 2 is definitely a step up from the original, with a bigger world that feels a lot more desolate (in a good way). It has a variety of lands to explore, unique bosses to run into, and a bevy of leveling trees that will keep you motivated throughout the gameplay. What it needed and didn’t get were a better story and less repetition. The game has grown, but it still has more than enough room to continue to grow.
