Pros
- Character customization is deep and layered enough that there could be no duplicate character designs.
- Layered combat customization allows for a deeper and more unique gameplay experience.
- Time travel mechanic is fun.
Cons
- Framerate is never consitent on either quality or performance modes, and there seems to be no real difference between the two.
- Travelling with your motorcylce feels slow.
- Story is nothing to write home about.
- Button mapping feels impractical to other Souls-like games.
In Summary
When the original Code Vein was released after Dark Souls 3 it very much felt like a stopgap between Bandai Namco souls games, but Code Vein 2 takes it to another level entirely. It feels much more like a copy/paste of Elden Ring, but something between the pasting got corrupted. That’s not to say this is an entirely bad game, far from it in many aspects (the character customization alone is worth some time). Sadly teh story is lackluster and the framerate (as of this writing) is a mess in a lot of areas of the game that needs to be optimized in an update that I hope comes out soon. There’s a lot to like here, but it feels clunkly and behind the times in so many ways, even the visuals alone feel more like a first gen PlayStation 4/Xbox One game than a mid gen PlayStation 5/Xbox Series game. If you’re interested in this game or love the first one wait for a sale and pick it up.
