Finished Dishonored 2 yesterday

Here I will outline my thoughts

Overall found it less enjoyable than 1 and sometimes not enjoyable at all. At the same time it served me well for killing time which is ultimately why I played it. Ultimately reminds me of the relationship between Deus Ex HR and MD, where one is a great game and the sequel is just meh and look even worse on the glorious backdrop of the former

The good:

• Combat is better than first game, no questions asked. The addition of many non-lethal takedowns actually makes a whole new playstile of assault pacifist possible.

• The whole concept of black markets as well as the ability to not play by the rules and just rob them, which isn't as straightforward and basically a small mission by itself is really cool imo.

• Having two different playable characters allows for experimenting with a different skillset and adds replayability

• The upgrade trees are better and feature interesting ultimate upgrades (though I do feel they come in too late to matter)

The bad:

• While I think the premise behind the story itself is passable if not interesting, the presentation is absolutely horrible. The dialogues are bad, the character motivations are vague and not expanded upon, the events that transpire just feel like they happen without any deeper thought or reason. The big """twist""" at the end of ship captain being Billie Lurk is something I considered since the very first mission and never really let go of.

• The game is short, or at least it feels like it's shorter and with less things to do. This includes side content like optional objectives or extra missions.

• The level design is poor. Not only does it often require you to backtrack back and forth but it also makes this chore extremely simple and boring because almost every level will have a very obvious and very straightforward high route that is easily found, getting you from point A to B without you encountering any obstacles or enemies. I legitimately think that every outdoor map in this game had this problem, which is why I didn't like a single one of them. You can basically get by with ease only ever using blink and maybe the occasional doublejump

The annoying and mediocre

• There is a lot of bonecharms and save for some special ones they feel unimpactful. Never did I feel the need to swap them based on a situation or level, or God forbid- to craft new ones. Also you can't view which ones are new or freshly picked so good luck going through the list in alphabetical order every time you want to look at them.

• Karnaca just isn't as interesting of a setting as Dunwall imho

• The enemy variety wasn't that good in first game either, but here it is extremely apparent. There's like 2 levels where you will see witches, 2 levels with clockworks and the occasional bloodfly nest and hounds near the end. By far the majority of enemies are regular guard or bandits. The couple of times you run into overseers don't feel special in any way either cause they behave just like the guard does. Walls of light, towers, rats and similar hazards are practically nonexistent.

• There is an overabundance in resources which can make the game too easy in certain cases

• The final confrontation and ending feel anticlimactic

Overall I give the game like a 6/10, I finished it with Emily and will probably replay it as Corvo sometime, but beyond that I'm not sure if I'll feel the same desire to revisit it as I did with OG Dishonored. Death of the Outsider is the next in the series, and somehow I'm not feeling optimistic.