Lost Planet 2 Review
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It’s no secret that Capcom has been moving towards co-op games with their recent offerings, and Lost Planet 2 seems to have the most emphasis on co-op play of their releases so far. The campaign of the original Lost Planet could only be played in single player, and it was a lot of fun that way, although the game did have its problems. Since the release of the original game, Resident Evil 5 and to a lesser degree Dead Rising 2 have encouraged you to play the game with a friend. Lost Planet 2 takes this idea to a whole new level, and designs the entire campaign around four-player co-op. Really, single player isn’t even an option; the atrocious friendly AI and mission design make this all too clear. It is possible to play through the game solo with as many as three AI companions, but this will serve only to make some of the missions nearly impossible on all but the easiest difficulty setting.
The Icy Environments of Lost Planet 1 have been utterly transformed
Some missions, for instance, will have you and your team capture a number of different control points across the map and then defend them for a couple of minutes. If you are playing with friends these missions are fairly straightforward; you simply divide your team to defend the multiple points. If you are playing by yourself, however, the dumb as bricks AI will simply follow you around leaving the other points undefended so that enemy soldiers can come in and take them, stopping the clock and causing you to return and capture the point. When you go to re-capture this point, enemy soldiers will go and capture the other point, meaning you have to run around the map trying to defend all of the points at once, which you will find to be impossible on all but the easiest difficulty setting. Other missions are at least playable in singleplayer, but your AI companions are likely to run off randomly and get themselves killed repeatedly. They will often stand around doing nothing, and will never attempt to enter and pilot any kind of vehicle.
Say hello to a Cat-G Akrid. They generally aren’t very friendly
Once you do recruit some friends to play with you, gameplay improves dramatically. Sadly, doing this isn’t as easy as it should be. You can only join another player’s game if you have advanced as far as they have in the campaign. There is also no way of joining a game in progress. If you want to play through the entire campaign in co-op, the best way to do this is to find three friends and play through the entire game with them. It is worth it to do so however, since the entire game is designed around co-op, from the mission design to the secondary weapon each player gets that shoots thermal energy. Missions are also chopped up into bits; they are divided into episodes, sub divided into chapters, and then divided into missions. Each mission will take from 5-15 minutes to complete, and there are usually 2 or 3 in each chapter. There are generally four or five chapters in an episode, and there are 6 episodes in total. This is also an arcade game through and through, you are timed and graded on your performance on each level, and each mission begins with the words “Ready, Set, GO!” flashing on your screen.
The enemy AI is still fairly poor, but the game is a lot of fun, especially when you are fighting the giant cat-G Akrid, which will tower above you and move about the environment impressively. Like the original Lost Planet, the best missions have you fighting these fantastic creatures with glowing yellow weak spots that spout thermal energy, your life source, when they die. Unfortunately, most of the missions will have you fighting enemy soldiers, which aren’t nearly as interesting. Luckily the environments that you fight them in are interesting; each episode takes place in a totally different environment. You will fight in the Jungle, on the coast, underwater, and in space. Each level is gorgeous and for the most part reasonably well designed.
Emergency underwater repairs are sometimes necessary
Also like the original Lost Planet, the story takes a back seat to the spectacle. The game has you switching between a number of different squads who are in a number of different factions. Eventually, each group becomes aware of a giant Over-G akrid being developed by an evil corporation called NEVEC that if allowed to reach its final form will throw the planet into another ice-age because of its massive intake of the planets thermal energy. It’s a weak story with one-dimensional, nameless characters that are almost always fully covered in battle armour and masks. At least the cut scenes are of incongruously high quality and are very enjoyable to watch due to their great composition and the amount of action that occurs within them.
The game-defining mechanic in Lost Planet 1 was the thermal energy that you needed to stay alive in the freezing cold temperatures of the game. This mechanic was absolutely brilliant since because of the cold temperature your thermal energy, and life source, was constantly declining, forcing you to continue and adding a layer of tension to everything you did. This thermal energy has returned, but it makes much less sense here since you mostly fight in warm environments. Now you collect large amounts of the stuff and only use it when you are hurt to heal yourself. Thermal energy also powers the many vehicles found in the game which explains why everyone is after it, but when you use one of the games many vehicles there is no fuel gage to speak of. You can, however, get out of vehicles and repair them when they become damaged. The giant mech-like VS’s have returned from the original game, only now there are many different ones; some will have jetpacks while others will allow you to use two weapons at once. You will also find helicopters, and little flying scooters that you can use to traverse the environments. These don’t come into play much but they are fun to use when they are around.
For weapons you get the standard assault rifle and shotguns as well as a few more interesting VS weapons, like in the original game, but this time there are more of them. Alongside the giant mini-gun and shotgun, you get huge rocket launchers, laser guns, grenade launcher, and a shield/melee weapon that can be deployed in front of you and used to wear enemies down. All of the weapons are satisfying to use, and the controls are sharp with a keyboard and mouse. There are an unfortunate number of quick-time events where you have to mash a key, usually when opening data-posts that also serve as re-spawn points. Annoyingly when you are in the middle of opening a data-post by mashing a key, any damage will interrupt the animation and you will need to deal with the threat before continuing. There is an overabundance of knock back attacks, especially during the boss fights, that seem cheap and make some of the encounters challenging in all of the wrong ways.
Stanley Kubrick would be proud
Aside from the somewhat insubstantial campaign, which will last you about 6-8 hours depending on the difficulty setting, are the competitive multiplayer and the utterly baffling training mode. There are a full suite of competitive multiplayer options with standard game types like Deathmatch and Capture the flag as well as a few more interesting ones, and there is also a leveling and unlock system present to give the game longevity. Unfortunately these elements are poorly implemented, your rewards for multiplayer games are chosen randomly, meaning that you will usually unlock an emote or some other silly item rather than a new gun. Sadly the multiplayer community is virtually non-existent, I only managed to get into one or two games with random people, the rest of the game modes I had to check out with friends, and then there were only a few of us so that didn’t work out so well. You can play these modes with bots if you like, but the AI is so bad it’s not worth it.
The other mode, training, is one of the most baffling gameplay modes I have ever seen. You are inexplicably dropped into an odd looking level full of strange geometry with a running timer and no explanation of what you are supposed to do. I’m guessing that there is some way of completing these levels and competing for the best times, but the mode is so confusing and poorly explained that it isn’t worth your time at all. The one time I managed to navigate a level from what I perceived to be the start to the finish, the words “YOU FAILED” popped up on screen. Basically if you want to have fun playing Lost Planet 2, stick to the campaign. Most of the levels are open enough, and the difficulty changes how the game plays enough, that there is appreciable replay value.
One of the most impressive aspects of Lost Planet 2 is the presentation; as a PC game this is a fantastic package. The game is extremely polished and well optimized, I didn’t experience a single frame rate hitch or notice a single errant pixel in the 12 or so hours I spent with the game. The graphics are extremely impressive from both a technical and artistic standpoint, if you have a DirectX 11 ready machine this game will take full advantage of it, but if you don’t the game still looks great and runs brilliantly in DX 9.
If you plan on spending any time in training mode, get used to this screen
Textures are of very high resolution, shadows are smooth, the lighting is impressive and the Akrid animate extremely well. You will need a fairly beefy machine to run the game maxed out with Direct X 11 enabled, but in order to enjoy the game in DirectX 9 a fairly modest rig will do just fine. Many levels are also very impressive artistically; one level in that takes place in an abandoned, flooded city is particularly impressive. The musical score is also quite good and very well implemented, although some of the voice acting is rather cheesy. Sound design is quite good with sound effects getting appropriately muffled when you are under water.
When it comes down to it Lost Planet 2 is a substantial game that simply has too many problems with its design and AI to reach its full potential. The campaign is a quite fun as long as you play it with some friends, and there is fun to be had online if you can find people to play with. If you are looking for a new co-op shooter to entertain yourself with over the holidays, Lost Planet 2 might suit your needs as long as you can overlook some design oddities.