Infinity Blade was a bit of a smash hit in the mobile gaming realm this year (it was released at the end of last year)—it won praise and awards and deservedly so. In one swipe, it highlighted that iOS and iPad/iPhone is a gaming platform that the industry (read: Sony and Nintendo) should take seriously. No doubt iOS has already eaten into the mobile gaming market share of those two companies.
Riding on the coat tails of the first game and a week shy of a year later, Infinity Blade 2, the sequel has dropped in the app store. I bought it without thinking about it—that’s the kind of App Store hero that I am. As it is a hefty AUD$7.99 I wondered if I’d done the right thing—I can buy a few fun apps for eight bucks!
Story wasn’t much of a priority in the first game—if you can call walking into a castle and sword-fighting everyone you meet, a story. This time however, the story seems to have been given more depth.
The game starts off in some non-descript Asian world. One of my biggest bug-bears in gaming and movies is the bullshit Asian pastiche where Chinese and Japanese culture and art are so poorly mashed together. This first stage was a drainer on me for this very reason—most people won’t care though. Oh, don’t get me started on the casual American accents either. Maybe I missed something in the story, but those accents feel rather out of place.
Anyway, I’ve still not got my head around what is actually happening. One moment I’m in pseudo-Asia, the next I’m entering a castle in the Scottish Highlands. Between that? There’s this freakout scene where I wake up naked on a table in some modern world. It is enough to make me want to find out WTF is happening. Nice hook Epic Games.
Interestingly, the player has the opportunity to replay a stage and alter their pathway. There are plenty of doors and chests that must be unlocked, some requiring different keys, which are only acquired as you progress through the game—thus adding to that replay value.
When (or if you’re ever) defeated, you now have the option of choosing between revisiting your last save or doing a rebirth. Perhaps I wasn’t paying attention, but I don’t remember this option in the first game. If you opt for a rebirth, you can opt in or out of accruing all your gold and experience.
The fighting and customisation has been improved. There’s a bit more subtlety built into it. For instance, if you dodge too much in a fight, you’ll pick up scratches from the opponent that will sap little bits of your energy.
You can now also have dual wield weapons and two-handed heavy weapons. I haven’t got that far yet, but I’m looking forward to using them. I’m guessing I won’t have a shield though… I like hiding behind that shield!
The tutorials are pretty good too, so as with the first game, learning new tricks is a synch and you get plenty of opportunities to practice them.
The game looks fantastic—it’s beautiful. I’ve uninstalled the first one already, so I can’t compare directly, but I think it looks better. It still uses the Unreal 3 engine, but perhaps the developers have mastered its secrets more. Vistas, lens flares, textures and models all add up to breathtaking visuals. It’s really hard to believe that a mobile phone game can look this amazing. Nintendo and Sony—if you weren’t fazed by the first version, you should be by its sequel.
Infinity Blade 2 is going to do as well as its predecessor. Is it worth the eight bucks? Yeah, for what you get, I do think so—I’m even getting over the Asian pastiche stage. I might even finish this one!