Deadly Premonition 2: A Blessing in Disguise

A good, blood-chilling mystery is a wonderful way to pass the time. In Deadly Premonition 2: A Blessing In Disguise, you’ll not only be trying to solve a mystery, but also deal with some paranormals that want you dead. Deadly Premonition 2 is likely to be the weirdest game you have ever played. During the game you’ll play Francis York Morgan, the quirky detective trying to solve crimes and stay alive in this incredibly strange world.

Terrible Graphics

It’s very likely that the graphics are poorly done on purpose, to help give you that early 2000’s vibe while playing. Even with that in mind however, the graphics look even more dated then intended. There’s some hints that the graphics are possibly intended to be this way—there’s some cel shading and other minor details that are nice. Unfortunately, these details are overwhelmed by the utter lack of detail in everything else. Backgrounds have little to no detail in them, and reflections are also poorly rendered shadows of what they ought to be.

Frame rates need work

The worst part of the game isn’t the graphics, or the weird plot, or well---the everything else. The worst part is the frame rates that regularly cause stuttering and make all the mini-games unpleasant to play. Inside of a building is okay, but walking around takes forever and can be a very jarring experience. The frame rate issues are also noticeable when you try to play mini-games like stone skipping. The game often does a little skipping of its own when you don’t plan on it, making the games very difficult to play. The good news is that while the game is still just as terrible on Switch, the PC version merely makes you wait forever on loading screens instead of glitching you across the whole map.

Not very mysterious

In the original Deadly Premonition game, players had at least some opportunity to help out in the search for clues. You could knock down bird nests for example, to find some new clues. In Deadly Premonitions 2, this is entirely dropped in favor of you essentially clicking from clue to clue. Actual sleuthing has never been a big part of this series, but it’s lack here definitely makes the game less interesting. Sub-Par Combat

As you progress through the 20+ hours of storyline, you’ll get short sequences where you get to fight monsters. When this happens your arm and gun fuse together into a weird sci-fi look, and you’ll be shooting at comically slow-moving mobs in a hallway. These sequences definitely could have been more interesting, with mobs that react differently, higher speeds, or some sort of tension.

In short, there are lots of better games out there with similar themes. The Painscreek Killings lets you be more hands on in solving the mystery and also has some paranormal elements. Resident Evil has stunning graphics and a much better storyline.

Pros:

• 20+ hours of game time

Cons:

• Frames constantly drop
• Poor graphics
• Poor gameplay