Dishonored 2
PC, PS4, Xbox One
The key to any successful stealth mission, surely, is to maintain the element of surprise. The first Dishonored dropped out of nowhere, playfully choking crowds of delighted players who had no idea how good the game would turn out to be. But the sequel, burdened with the weight of sky-high expectations, lacks its predecessor’s tactical advantage. So it’s especially frustrating to discover that many of Dishonored 2’ s best surprises have been squandered in the intense publicity drive that led up to its release. Dust storms, the Clockwork Mansion and its incumbent mechanical soldiers, the Timepiece – each a gamechanging revelation from a formidably creative team, but whose impact has been diminished by the modern marketing trend of showing customers everything they’re going to get before they get it. Even though there aren’t many surprises left to mine, the game remains an extravagant, imaginative plaything fit for an Empress – or, indeed, a Lord Protector.
In Dishonored 2 you begin as Emily Kaldwin, the girl from the first game who’s now grown up and taken her assassinated mother’s title as Empress of the Empire of the Isles. Now bored and disillusioned with ruling life, she’s protected by Corvo Attano, the formerly mute protagonist and, the sequel confirms, her father. A short way into the game – in yet another sequence that was shown, in almost its entirety, prior to release – you’re offered the choice of playing as either Emily or Corvo. While you’ll tackle the same missions as either assassin, your decision makes subtle changes to the way the central story is told. A more profound difference, however, is in how the game plays when tackled with the pair’s distinct suites of supernatural abilities.
Corvo retains the sextet of powers he was gifted by the Outsider in the first game: Blink, Possession, Bend Time, Dark Vision, Windblast, and the verminsummoning Devouring Swarm. While settling back into them feels comfortingly familiar, a revamped upgrade system means that each power can become considerably more potent than it ever was before. More than that, the options available can even change the character of some abilities as you bolster them. For example, upgrading Blink in the first game simply gave you a few extra metres of range to play with when teleporting, but here you can add augmentations that let you stop time entirely, or even deliver a fatal kick to enemies as you emerge from zipping through space.
Those looking for a fresher experience should opt for Emily, however. Where Corvo is optimised for close-quarters encounters, stealthy or otherwise, Emily’s powers are predominantly built around range and manipulation. She shares Dark Vision with Corvo, which in both cases can be upgraded to show item and enemy positions as well as enemy paths. Her Far Reach power is also a variation on Blink, but leaves Emily visible when she moves between positions (in its basic form, at least), meaning a little extra care is necessary when choosing your route. Emily can eventually also yank objects and people towards her, letting her incapacitate enemies in midair. The rest of her powers are more specialised. Doppelgänger creates one or more copies that can fight alongside you or confuse enemies. Mesmerize conjures up a Void spirit to bewitch anyone nearby so you can slip by or slit throats. Shadow Walk sees you take on the form of a wispy spirit that can move unnoticed or tear enemies limb from limb. And the remarkable Domino power allows you to tether enemies together, the bonded foes sharing the same fate as a ripple of consequence emanates out from whoever you knock unconscious, decapitate or ignite.
The effects of combining these powers are as enthralling as they are numerous. You could, for example, Domino a group of tough enemies to your own, unprotesting doppelgänger before callously executing her. Or instead, leave a building full of enemies convinced of your death as they slay your duplicate and you move past in a billow of smoke. For the imaginatively cruel, a barbaric combination of the two is also an option.
Given the broad tactical range, it’s encouraging that Dishonored 2 accommodates players’ changing whims – or, at least, the fallout from errors of judgment – to a much greater extent than the first game, cheerfully segueing between silent non-lethality and brutal combat. Despite their shadowy demeanours, Emily and Corvo are both proficient combatants, and the swordand gunplay feel satisfyingly weighty and skilful. But the sequel is also more supportive of anyone who would prefer to let neutralised guards return to their families at the end of day, and to that end it’s now possible to knock enemies unconscious via drop attacks, or grab them after parrying mid-fight before shoving them away or choking them – though, disappointingly, taking an enemy hostage in this manner doesn’t prevent their allies from murdering them to get to you.
Such inconsistencies are infrequent, but the few that remain undermine what is otherwise convincingly smart AI. Enemies and civilians continually comment on their situations, often referencing things you’ve done at an earlier point in the game or something that you’ve changed in their immediate vicinity. Soldiers may become suspicious if they spot an open door that was previously closed, for example, and they’ll notice if a colleague goes missing even if they didn’t actually witness you dragging him off into the shadows. Once alerted, guards will search areas thoroughly using dangerously unpredictable routes. It’s jarring, then, when characters react in a more binary fashion: on two
Even though there aren’t many surprises left to mine, the game remains an extravagant, imaginative plaything
separate occasions we intervene in situations where an aggressive party is shaking down a civilian, who then runs off screaming for more guards. Some thanks.
At least it’s easy to escape escalating situations by taking advantage of Karnaca’s incredible architecture. The smoggy, whale-oil-powered streets of Dunwall instilled a powerful sense of place, but the fading, dilapidated capital city of Serkonis feels steeped in real history. With no rat plague to clear them, the streets here are relatively busy, teeming with fishermen, gangs, religious fanatics and surly, royally appointed law enforcers. There is, however, an epidemic of bloodflies – parasites that nest in bodies – and many buildings have been sealed to slow their proliferation. These condemned apartments double up as buzzing, itchinducing corridors through which you can move unseen.
But pest-ridden homes are just one way to avoid detection in the vertiginously constructed Karnaca. Sewers, basements, pipelines, suspended railways, precarious cliff faces and even power lines provide a web of potential routes through every area, and during our second playthrough we’re still finding rooms, passageways and rooftops that eluded us the first time round. The dense richness of the environments, mixed with the dizzying potential for creative assassinations teed up by Corvo and Emily’s powers, upgrades and expanded Bone Charm system (see ‘Calcium efficiency’), means you’ll want to play the game through at least twice to experience its full breadth. And that’s even before you square up to the optional No Powers mode, which will test even the most proficient assassins.
The campaign itself is relatively compact – it took us around 15 hours to reach the credits during our initial run as Emily – and the sometimes crowded story that’s been squeezed into its ten chapters will be better understood by those who tackled Dishonored’s The Knife Of Dunwall and The Brigmore Witches DLC. But the campaign is also stuffed with ideas, and its continual reinvention is almost disorienting, such is the frequency of each new arrival. Arkane sets up unique rules and mechanics for each foray into the city, every combination requiring a different style of play.
And even though many of the surprises have been spoilt, toying with each sandbox’s unique rules is as fascinating as it is joyful. If you’re an impetuous type, some of the challenges you’ll face along the way may seem like difficulty spikes, but a combination of thorough exploration and careful investigation will always arm you with information that tips the odds in your favour. Doing so will also lead to the discovery of some imaginative side-quests and, of course, more involved – and poetically cruel – ways to eliminate your marks without ending their lives.
Despite a handful of minor issues, then, and occasionally patchy framerates in particularly busy areas, Dishonored 2 is consistently remarkable. And not just for its boundless invention and beguiling world – that the game manages to feel so disarmingly original even in the wake of its groundbreaking predecessor and excessive pre-launch exposure is its greatest surprise. And with the forthcoming New Game+ and custom difficulty settings, Dishonored 2’ s exceptional execution threatens to keep players in its chokehold for a long time to come.