- Manufacturer:Respawn
- Publisher:Electronic Arts
- Genre: Shooter
- Release Date: 28/10/2016
- Platforms:Xbox One, PlayStation 4
- Game Supplied by:EA
Titanfall 2 has finally landed, bursting will all new modes and features to rival the success of the first title, with some impressive graphics to boot.
Titanfall for me was a fresh change to the existing first person shooters already out there like Battlefield and Call of Duty, but Titanfall brought you a more fast paced run and gun game which took away that necessity to camp.
Me being a veteran player of the original Titanfall I had logged way too many hours to mention on the game, Titanfall 2 had me waiting in anticipation to be released and the only image that can best describe what Titanfall is all about is the scene in Iron Man 2 when both Iron Man and the Iron Patriot taking on huge robots one after another in a huge ground battle. This has always been my expectation of what the game should be like, but does Titanfall 2 live up to this?
First off after the first Titanfall people were jumping on Respawn for the lack of a single player campaign, this has been resolved with an emotional intro to the campaign which enticed me in with excitement.
The story revolves around a simple bond between Pilot and his Titan called BT which is creatively exploited in the campaign. The Titanfall 2 campaign has is a decent size for this genre of game, with at least over 8 hours of solid gameplay. If that’s not enough there are collectables in the form of pilot helmets hidden around to find which require your to hone your wall running skills to find them all, which provides some replay value to the campaign. Primarily the campaign is ideal for anyone who hasn’t played the original or any gamer who wants to try out the weapons that will be available in multiplayer. This provides a steady learning curve to get you hooked on Titanfall but at the same time with four difficulty settings, the hardest of course being the Master difficulty is ideal for anyone looking for a challenging campaign to complete.
As with any game it may have a great campaign but multiplayer does not quite live up to the rest of the game, Titanfall 2 does not fall into this category. From the first game I instantly fell in love with how balanced the gameplay was for both pilot & Titan movement everything seemed to work very well with familiar controls that were in the original game This allowed me to instantly move around the maps with ease, plus playing game modes such as Capture the Flag & Amped Hardpoint you pick up what are the ideal routes to get around the maps.
I could not fault the Multiplayer in any way as the servers seem to cope with the large number of players online without any lag, plus the return of region specific servers does help, the only downside is there are a few modes that can be hard to find players especially if you join with a larger group of friends. What has stayed the same is the satisfaction of dropping a Titan onto an opposing enemy player by far is one of the best moments in gaming history, absolutely brilliant.
Unlike the first game Titan weapons are not interchangeable which may annoy the Titanfall faithful as the 6 Titans that are available have set primary and secondary weapons with a core ability, but Titans can be customised in other ways with 3 categories on offer.
Titan kit – this is your Titans counter defense with 6 options to choose from Assault Chip which makes your auto titan more precise when shooting and it’s use of its weapons, to Nuclear Ejection which basically destroys anything nearby when you eject.
Titan specific kit – for example Tone has four options from Pulse Echo which creates a pulse making nearby enemies visible to Reinforced Particle Wall which allows for your defensive shield to last longer and take more hits, this is where you can customise your Titan to suit your gameplay style.
Titanfall kit – this provides two options when calling in your titan, you can play it safe with the Dome Shield which protects your titan, or Warp Fall which drops your Titan a lot quicker but is unprotected from incoming fire. This is the same for any titan you pick.
With six Titans to choose from, each Titan has their own unique set up and loadout consisting of a main weapon, core weapon, offensive weapon, defensive weapon and a utility feature such as tripwire or phase dash.
New to Titanfall you can express your artistic side as it gives you the ability to change your Titan appearance with skins that covers the body, gun and a nose decal to finish your titan off, this is great as there are so many skins to choose from the more suitable colours that wouldn’t look out-of-place on your Titan to more vibrant colours like pink, which will most likely make you a target as you could be spotted a mile away.
Another improvement is the customisation of your pilot and his abilities which can be selected from the following 7 tactical classes Cloak, Grapple, A wall (partial shield), Pulse Blade, Stim, Phase Shift and Holo Pilot. Each pilot class has a primary weapon with 16 to choose from such as assault rifles, grenade launchers and submachine guns, some of these weapons will be familiar to anyone who has played the first game but there is a lot more variety now when it comes to choosing a weapon. Pilots also have a secondary weapon this can be any of the 4 anti titan weapons or a pistol but not both which I feel is a step back from the original whereby you could have both. Each of your weapons can be modded to allow for extra ammo or faster reloading but these slots must be unlocked when your pilot level is high enough.
Other pilot features include your 2 options for your pilot kit, this can be anything from power cell which helps your Tactical cool down faster to a kill report which shows were enemies or teammates were killed. Finally you have option on how to execute pilots, from the first game you had the standard neck breaker which is the default setting but you can now purchase different execution if you feel you want to show off by using the in-game credits you acquire through experience.
As with the Titans, Pilots can customise their outfits and guns, and even though you gradually unlock these as you play some skins aren’t available until you Gen up to the next level. Your Pilot can be assigned a callsign which consists of a Banner and a patch, again some of these will be locked and can only be acquired as a gift or by ranking up to the next Generation, this option basically is something that comes from someone who likes CoD and doesn’t really belong in a game such as Titanfall, yes it is a nice little customisation touch but the game would still be great without it.
Boost option replaces the burn cards that were in the first game which I feel is something that Titanfall 2 has again taken a step back from the original with only 13 boosts to choose from, takes away the variety that the burn cards provided and creates an unfair balance within the game.
Another option is the introduction of Networks which is in line with the new Clan feature on the Xbox One were you and your friends can join up on a specific network so when you load up the game it pulls you all into the same lobby. That is the way it’s meant to work but seems very fiddly and is either ignored or doesn’t work properly.
The Titanfall 2 multiplayer experience gives players a choice of 9 maps to begin with providing a good mixture of areas for Titans and pilots to move around without getting stepped on by a Titan, some of these maps are more open than others while some provide pilots with the upper hand, with buildings and caves to manoeuvre through and stay in cover.
Titanfall 2 has increases the amount of game modes on offer with 11 modes in total with 3 New modes such as:
Coliseum – a one on one battle with another pilot, for me this was the weakest addition to the game with a sparse arena and limited weapons it felt incomplete.
Bounty Hunt – this was introduced into the Tech test and allowed players to go up against various types of AI enemies as well as other players, with kills rewarded with cash drops which had to be collected and deposited within a certain time, this mode is a welcome change and does provide something different from modes such as Attrition.
8vs8 Variety – this was similar to the original Variety game mode where you would be put into a game type selected from a list such as Capture the Flag, Last Titan Standing, Amped Hardpoint. The difference this time around is they have increased the amount of players on each team from six to eight. The only downside to this mode is the voting system which has been implemented at the end of each game, I feel variety game mode should not give players a choice and just randomly select a mode and map to play.
The one thing that has remained the same is the fast paced action with levels design for Wall Running, this for me is the core aspect of Titanfall and even with all the new features it plays like a Titanfall rather than a wannabe clone.
Another vast improvement Titanfall 2 has made over its predecessor is the in-game graphics, with vastly superior detail on the levels and not just in campaign but in the multiplayer levels as well, from the lush surrounding of Homestead to the tight canyon passageways of Crash Site.
With any sequel it can be hard to replicate familiar sounds from the original game and even though there has been a huge overhaul when it has come to the visuals, the other question to be answered is in-game sound such as weapons fire from familiar weapons like the RC 201 Carbine or the C.A.R submachine gun to name a few are perfectly recreated to sound the same as in the first game. There are so many familiar sounds that are great if you are a Titanfall fan that are instantly recognisable from when you drop in your Titan to melee kicking a pilot it all fits into place.
Titanfall 2 has become more tactical than before, because if you apply the same approach as the first game, you may not last long, that is one thing that I felt disappointed by as it all depended on what weapon you were using or what Titan you were in which meant sometimes that you don’t last long to actually achieve anything within the game.
SUMMARY
I can’t deny it I love Titanfall, and the follow-up is almost as good as the original, yes it looks a lot better, and there is a lot more variation when it comes to the game modes and the customisation options.
Titanfall 2 is a game that just gets better the more you play it, it’s just let down with the introduction of unnecessary features that personally I feel don’t belong in the game and the lack of interchangeable weapons between Titans doesn’t make it as good as the original game.
What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments!