One hour of preview, that’s all our happy priesthood. We wake up in a coffin, worshiped by a sea of petrified hands as a compelling divine mission strikes the soul of our avatar, the Penitent. Its editorial line is more “flagellation and atonement” than “a minute blagounettes”. With a long cone circled with brambles as a headdress, the Penitent ventures into a strange cave. Three statues present him with as many instruments of death: the flail, the longsword and the daggers of twins. It’s up to us to choose our poison. Once our selection is made, the other two weapons disappear with a loud crash. It’s up to us to travel the world to find them and prove ourselves worthy of handling them. At the same time, a mysterious city blessed by the gods rises in the sky, carried on the backs of giants. Above her, a heart beats. He is ready to vomit out the Miracle Child, an embryonic Antichrist conceived in a literal bloodbath. An angel quickly instructs us to destroy the unholy thing to achieve atonement. This is the whole plot necessary to run the countryside and slaughter hordes of spirits by the dozen in the name of a very mysterious religion.
deadly sin
Because if the prerogative of the Sacred is to be impenetrable, The Game Kitchen particularly retains the balance between generosity of narration and judicious silence, often preferring to let their universe speak rather than extend into long palavers. Like a Dark Souls, Blasphemous 2 is told through its small objects recovered on the side of the road or its enigmatic NPCs. Each character speaks as if straight out of a religious parable. The ins and outs of their strange religion, focused on the Miracle, are forbidden to us. Is the Miracle benevolent? Is he a false prophet? Perhaps he is as terrible as a comforter for these dreadful sinners? It is arguably all of this and more.
Thus, the artistic power of Blasphemous 2 still strikes us with all its weight, magnificently embodied in a pixel art always neat. The animations are very clear, allowing creators to give free rein to their sadistic impulses. Because if this metroidvania is not to be ranked among the most difficult games in history, it cultivates a culture of pain. Our pilgrimage necessarily takes place in blood and death, sometimes our own. To resurrect, you must first find altars and pray there, which activates them as checkpoints. Another problem: our mana gauge gradually shrinks over deaths. If we are unable to return to our grave, then we must consult an expensive confessor who will take care of alleviating our pain… in exchange for a few obols, which are fortunately kept after each death. The first enemies are apprehended rather well for the experienced player, but we quickly commit an excess of confidence and take a powerful tinkle which significantly cuts our life bar. Two small health potions accompany us and that’s it.
We have chosen the flail, the heavy weapon of the title and we will have plenty of time to find our faithful sword in the full game by then. Each weapon has a very complete skill tree where multiple combat techniques will be acquired as you go. The flail can ignite, slowly consuming our mana in exchange for increased damage. The first improvement unlocks a new combo allowing us to turn our weapon off or on without missing a beat in the middle of a fight. The sensations are particularly good: with a slide to dodge and just enough weight in the animations to make us feel our power and ask for a little precision without being clumsy, Blasphemous 2 improves on the basics of its predecessor by injecting a bit more variety.
Crucifiction
And let’s talk about variety! It would be almost suffocating as we can equip different spells and passive bonuses. As part of this demo, we mainly focused on the songs and verses; understand, the slow spell and the quick incantation. In exchange for a bit of mana, we can cast a whole range of spells, such as a boomerang effect blood scythe or a scorched earth flame wave. Mana recharges easily by hitting in melee. A well-oiled combat rhythm is induced where ranged attacks find their place without unbalancing anything. The Penitent also carries an altarpiece, a kind of wooden panel with religious engravings on which he can slide statuettes of pseudo-biblical figures. A blind sculptor takes care of carving them for us, as long as we find him good tools and fragments of memories conducive to inspiration. From the start, we receive the Traitor Statuette, which provides a small statistical bonus. We can carry up to eight statuettes, which are joined in pairs of two, and Blasphemous 2 assures us that certain combinations will generate specific synergies. Rich ambition when we consult the inventory and see five pages of miniatures staring back at us.
Because that is perhaps the only pitfall of Blasphemous 2, a possible overflow of content in a body too narrow to accommodate everything. Because other charms to equip are hiding in the inventory, even if we haven’t gone far enough to really exploit them. The strength of the first episode was to offer a metroidvania at an almost perfect pace with a fine management of spaces and secrets to discover. Pour into the collecta-thon doesn’t seem like such a good idea. Blasphemous 2 will give pride of place to customization and that is certainly commendable, but be careful not to get lost! When you have such a good skeleton, it is better to remove fat than to add it.
But this is all conjecture. Maybe you just have to digest all that stuff as you go through the levels. Because the level design, he is still as solid, offering a nice introduction before spreading his wings. We have already spotted a plethora of blocked passages where to return with the right items to continue our journey. Exploring, finding a relic, retracing our steps, overcoming an obstacle and sinking deeper and deeper into the bowels of the earth in search of biblical creatures to lacerate: what more could you ask for?