My thoughts on Project Warlock 2 – From /r/BoomerShooters

Finally finished this game after noticing it got a huge optimization patch. My time with it was buttery smooth from start to finish, at least as far as performance is concerned.

A pretty great playing boomer shooter, and a huge improvement over the first game IMO.

Fast and frenetic gunplay, satisfying weapons, a huge variety of enemy types, fun spells and unique possible builds with every upgrade being a choice that locks you out of the other. Some of the level themes and background detail can get fairly interesting, there’s some decent verticality with jump pads and light platforming across the game. Weirdly enough, the game also has a pretty robust photo mode.

Not perfect by any means – most frustrating is the lack of a level select, you have to play each episode sequentially, with no way to revisit prior levels to hunt for secrets/upgrade material. Even after finishing the game, you still can’t pick a specific level you may have liked to replay it. I also don’t get why you can’t just pick any of the three stories from the get go, seeing as they don’t lead into one another. And the level design/soundtrack feels phoned in during the third episode – though the player character’s bonkers abilities during that episode almost makes up for it.

Game’s got some other quirks, too. While there’s a bestiary and plenty of lore to read, most of it is hidden behind the game’s myriad secrets. Unless you’re good at hunting, you won’t really have much of a clue as to what’s going on in the world. What’s there is fairly interesting, if questionably translated. Also, mild spoilers, but it doesn’t really feel like the game’s story is resolved by the end of it.

Despite its issues and the fact that it loses steam toward the end, I’d still recommend this game over the first one in a heartbeat. More Quake/Doom, less Wolf3D. It stacks up pretty well to its contemporaries, and is one of very few games were you can blast skeletons with a shotgun.