You know that thing you’re always afraid of happening with games released as a series of episodes? The thing where the new episodes released aren’t as good as the previous episodes? Well that thing happened with this game. It’s essentially a slightly less-fun version of the first installment of this miniseries.
In this episode, the King of Town puts a tax on emails, and you basically have to overthrow him with the help of whatever characters you can convince to help you. I enjoyed the whole faux-strategy game thing, where you conquer neighboring lands to make your way toward the king’s castle, but the puzzles and such you have to solve to get to the end are rather bland. Moreso than in the first game. At some points it just seems like you’re going through the motions in order to progress through the story, rather than having fun trying to figure out puzzles.
Don’t get me wrong, though. They aren’t that much worse than the puzzles in the first game, and the game overall is still enjoyable to play through. It’s just that the fun and replay value have suffered a little bit in this installment, and I’m definitely more likely to replay the first game than the second. Compare the scores for both games, though, and you’ll see that it’s not too major a drop. Let’s just hope it picks back up in the upcoming episodes.
Once again, there are minigames that add a bit of playtime/enjoyment to the overall experience. Snake Boxer (V? I forget) from the first episode is still my favorite, but the math brawler and new scenarios for Teen Girl Squad are certainly enjoyable diversions. The interdimensional photo booth is back, too, and you can even carry over the costume pieces from the first installment if you played it. Good news for all you fans who wanted to combine the burglar hat with the funky army pants from this episode. On a final minigame/diversion note, I hate the mini-strategy-game thing at the end, where you have to guide your pieces across the board like a crappy version of chess. It’s boring, and the mini-cutscenes that continuously pop up don’t help matters.
The best part of this game is that the humor is still on point. It would be pretty unforgivable if the jokes started being lame and boring, since the humor is the main reason to check out the game in the first place. Fortunately, this episode delivers just as well as the first one in the comedy department. Speaking of things that are the same as the first episode, the length is about the same, if not a bit shorter. You should be able to beat this game in four to five hours, depending on how much extra stuff you decide to do. If you want to go for every unlockable/bonus, you’ll be able to squeeze some more time out of it, but it’s still not going to last for a super-long time.
I recommend buying these games one-at-a-time, rather than getting the whole package. If you like the first one, go ahead and pick up the second. If you’re kinda “bleh” about it, you’d probably be better off skipping this one.
