Titanfall 2
FROM $89.95 | PC, PS4, XO | WWW.TITANFALL.COM Wall-runs up and over the competition.
Titanfall 2’ s brilliance comes as a surprise, and I say that as somebody who loved the original despite its flaws. In that first attempt, Respawn created a set of traversal, gunplay and mech combat systems served well by their multiplayer framework.
Titanfall 2 is a very different game. There’s a lot packed into the 6–7 hours it will take you to finish the campaign, with each section finding its own way to surprise you.
You’ll engage in a running firefight through a massive factory that is throwing prefab colony buildings together around you as you go. You’ll perform a beach landing alongside a phalanx of allied titans. You’ll engage in mech duels against a cast of mercenary titan pilots pulled straight from an 1980s action movie.
If there’s anything holding Titanfall 2 back, it’s that not all its chapters are created equal. It has some good ideas, some great ideas and one brilliant idea. However, even during its less-inspired moments, the worst this game gets is ‘very good shooter with very big robots’.
Titanfall 2 is built on rock-solid foundations. There are loads of weapons to try, from SMG staples to powerful shotgun pistols to gravity grenades and remote satchel charges. These feel and sound phenomenal. This is coupled with the series’ brilliant traversal system of double jumps, wall-runs, slides and powerful melee strikes. Shooting is a form of punctuation in Titanfall — it’s through movement that you really express yourself, to the point that resorting to boring old running on the ground can feel like failure. You’ve also got a shortduration cloaking device, gated by a cooldown, that lets you reposition in dangerous situations without needing to stop and hide.
The story is aboveaverage AAA action fare, punching above its weight in terms of spectacle and managing to fit in a few decent jokes amid the battle-talk. The central dynamic between protagonist Jack Cooper and the titan he is unexpectedly bonded with, BT, is perfectly enjoyable. It might not stick with you long after the credits roll, but the strength of the campaign as a whole is enough to make me want to spend more time in this game’s world.
If Titanfall 2’ s campaign surprises with quality, its multiplayer surprises with the amount that has changed. All the same ideas return, from freerunning pilots to titan calldowns to NPC minions and limiteduse power spikes, but each has been rethought. It’s extremely fast-paced and highly lethal, with grappling hooks, speed boosts and phase-shift abilities raising the skill ceiling of movement. An old-school degree of finesse is possible here, and when you watch from the perspective of a good player, you’ll realise just how much skill it’s possible to express by carefully chaining abilities together.
This is a game that takes some of the most familiar vocabulary in this hobby — run, jump, shoot, spaceship, robot, alien dog — and finds ways to surprise you with each of them.
When it comes down to it, that’s what Titanfall 2 deserves to be remembered for. Chris Thursten