Gravity Rush 2 PS4 Review

Gravity Rush 2 (A.K.A Gravity Daze 2 in Japan) is a action-adventure game for PS4, which was developed by SIE Japan Studios and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It is a sequel to original 2012's Gravity Rush for PS Vita and remastered version for PS4 in year 2015.

It's been for like 6 years ago since I've played the first original game which is definitely being one of my favourite, but most technically impressive game on the PS Vita's hardware. It has decent storyline, memorable protagonist, epic action packed gameplay filled with missions and exploration, and gorgeous visuals that made the game so amazing, but its a shame that the original game didn't deserve much attention to western audiences due to PS Vita's poor hardware sales which led the game only sold few copies in worldwide, while the PS4 remastered version was sold lot less compared with the PS Vita version. Despite the poor sales, it gained cult following regarding the fanbase and few playstation owners did managed to enjoy their experience meaning that the Gravity Rush is a fantastic game that not many of people have played or heard of game before. I decided to give a try with the sequel for my PS4 which is a game that never got made for the PS Vita as it is a depressing news for PS Vita owners who enjoys the original game are not able to play the sequel on their handheld system unless they need to buy the PS4 hardware to play this game.

My thoughts on this game is really amazed me that the game is a bigger improvements over the first original meaning that the Gravity Rush 2 has pushed forward for its more in-depth storylines, some new cast of characters, bigger open-world exploration, newer fighting abilities, and more single-player missions with 20 to 40 hours long which is two times larger than the predecessor. The development teams has managed to add more content of the game to give a brand new experience for the fans of the series will able to be satisfied with this quality PS4 game. Regarding with the improvements, the game plays outstanding with great combat gameplay, impressive flying mechanics, entertaining single-player campaign with epic story missions and cool side-missions, and easy to explore worlds. I really loved the game's cel-shaded visuals, charming soundtrack and appealing presentation that adds the magnificent overall of the game.

So without go further do, lets start the review.



Presentation

This game takes place after the event of the first game and a prequel anime called Gravity Rush: The Animation Overture.
Its starts off with Kat and her partner Raven and Syd began to investigate the incident involves in the floating district of Neu Hiraleon, while they been encountered by mysterious androids before they being sucked into a gravitational vortex and transported to a different world.
When Kat and Syd arrive in the Banga Village to meet with the woman named Lisa as the leader of the Banga Village and being befriend with the girl named Cecie as they work in Mine places to collect Gravity Ore to sell to unscrupulous trader named Vogo Sun. After rescuing Cecie from the mysterious creature named Navi, Kat has finally regains her gravity power and reuniting with her cat named Dusty as she continues to working with Lisa's job, while she finally starting her quest at the city of Jirga Para Lhao.

I find the story in the game is starting off really good where Kat and Syd has dressing up as mine workers before they been encountered by the storm which led them into escape before being rescued by Lisa. As continues to follow the story further, there are a great storylines in each story mission such as battling with Vogo's step-brother named Fi through competition matches, protecting the poor people from military forces, why Raven becoming Night-Gale, and going back into Hekseville again which started to become more interesting as the story filled with light and dark moments that fits the emotions of the storyplot.

I find Kat is surprisingly entertaining in regards of her cool special powers abilities and great personalities that kept her interesting, while I also liked Raven for her edginess and kick-ass appearances. There are some side-characters in the game such as Cecie which is heartkinded girl as being a great friend with Kat and Syd is being a decent police-officer, while I do find Lisa is being too harsh with Cecie at the start which takes awhile for her to get used too, and Vogo is just seems to be very dodgy person when its comes to his trading business. There one of the most annoying character in the game that I can't stand is Kali Angel, who replaced Kat as a City's Hero of Hekseville. It seems that you cannot really trust Kali's ignorant facial expressions during the story dialogue and you can really tell how much shes talking like a down right bitch as she is nothing but equivalent to most of the bratty kids from cartoon shows. One of the villain that actually pretty good is Dr. Brahman, a scientist who designed a city-wide, robotic, Nevi defense system and becoming mayor of the city as being a mad scientist who plans to use the crystal-induced powers of his kidnapped daughters to destroy the peaceful city. As a villain, he acts like he pretending to be a Mr nice guy in whole story, but he has a wicked darkside of his event which made him look terrifying than most of the video game evil scientists.

What I've liked about the presentation was that it has mixed between the actual cutscenes and comic-book style sildeshow with text dialogue which kinda feels like watching most of the awesome superhero movies due to great art style and colourful environment details in the game. I also liked the open-world scenery that takes place in different locations, so you have sites places like Lei Elgona is where poor village people lives in broken houses, Lei Havina is filled with rich assholes has quailty fountain areas and big huge mansion, Lei Colmosna has variety of bazaars and shopping areas, Auldnoir is just quiet peaceful old town, Pleajeune is kinda has "Las Vegas" vibes to it with bar shop and ferris wheel,  Vendecentre is larger downtown area of Hekseville which is similar to french city, and Endestria filled with factory work places. Each of the sites are really fun to explore around which gives a stunning atmospheres to look at and how amazing the places look in the game.


Overall, it has great story, entertaining characters and stunning presentations.


Gameplay               

This game features 27 story missions, 50 side missions and 20 challenge missions for single-player quests.

You take control of Kat has her ability to control her gravity power and your aim is to complete all the objectives that been added on mission list. You are able to explore the whole area to search for missions to choose from, collecting gems to power up your abilities and discovering new things such as warphole which allows you to fast travel through the sites, so you can also check out the map screen to help you navigate the certain things that you want to visit.

On combat gameplay, Kat has basic attacks which is used for close-combat system, while increasing the power bar which allows her to perform special attacks giving instant kills to enemies, and you can also pick many of objects by using stasis field which allows you to throw objects at the enemies which is handy for the combat system that you can quickly able to attack the foes. She has ability to use gravity power for flying in the air, walk on walls and slides, so her flying mechanics allows her to fly around the city which is quickest way to travel around faster than using on-foot movements and I do find walking on the walls is kinda cool which changes the different camera angles of areas. I also liked the gravity slides which allows her to sliding through the levels, but I do find the sliding controls is little bit wonky which takes sometime to get used too, but playable at the same time. You can also perform gravity kick at the enemies while activating the gravity power in the air, so it can be locked on with blue-circle symbols which helps you able to aim at the foes easier, but having the issue with using the gravity kick is that it can be went off-tracked when failing to use flying attack on the enemies at the wrong target is kinda bit annoying, but practice makes perfect when getting used with the gameplay controls. The game also introduces the two new abilities that allow you to change fighting style such as Lunar style which is useful for Kat's speed and her ability to jump higher, while Jupiter style are used for heavy destructible allowing her to perform powerful attacks which adds the variety of fighting style gameplay. Going on power-up menu which gives you options to upgrade your fighting mechanics such as basic attacks, gravity attack, special attack, gravity slide, stasis field, and evasion which improves your certain of skills such as more combo attacks, adding capacity of stasis field's objects, reducing your gravity restoring time, and theres many more to unlock your abilities which really made Kat becoming powerful fighter. Completing many of the missions including story, side and challenge which gives you kinds of rewards such as obtaining more gems from challenge missions and increasing capacity of your health bar from both story and side missions depending what missions you are playing on. You can collect talisman from the Mine ore area which is additional special items that allow you to add different effects to Kat's arsenal of weapons and powers which is very useful for combat gameplay, and you can also head to fortune places where you can craft your own talisman by combining resources together to make it more up to date.

I'm completely satisfied with the combat gameplay as being a solid overall with brand new fighting styles, ability to add and crafting talisman, and upgrading the fighting skills which makes the gameplay quite acceptable for the playability. I really enjoyed playing most of the story mission which involves protecting people in town from the bad guys, fighting with epic bosses, and completing challenge tasks from the dark gravestone. Some of the side-mission has funny segments such as delivering stinky-box to Lei Havina, doing crime investigation in Vendecentre, working with film directors to become film star, and preventing drunk old man from entering bar shop, while challenge mission involves silly mini game like attracting the fans with your disguised costume, delivering newspapers, sliding race, and bringing customers to food shop which is really fun to play that keeps me playing more and more. The things that I don't like about the game is the stealth mission where you have to reach the destination without getting caught by enemy nearby, but the issue is that you could get easily caught by the enemy at the far distance which makes it even frustrating to play, so it took me awhile to complete the stealth mission. The game also features motion controls scheme just like the first original game, but I do find it completely useless when playing on PS4 controller which can disrupts your gameplay controls when playing on mission, so I didn't have problem with using the motion controls when playing the first original game on the PS Vita, but still it wasn't easy to play with the PS4 controller for motion controls scheme which makes it feels quite wonky.
You can also turn off the motion control through the control option menu which might help prevent the motion control being used in the game.

So far I really liked the game and its still playable for most part.

Overall, it has massive exploration, solid combat gameplay, and great story and side missions.           


Graphics

I was very surprised that the open-world design is much larger than the first game with great draw-distance and huge amount of environment which made the whole game looked quite bigger for PS4 titles. Most of the environments has well detailed city buildings, mansions, houses and palaces is looking spectacular in open-world areas, and it has colourful cel-shaded effects and bold looking animation that gives a anime style look on the game which makes it look beautiful to see how amazing the game looked. The character animation is looking fantastic in the game due to great use of facial animation and their appearance that adds the personality of the character development which makes them even look interesting. 
Its a big improvement over the first original which proves the sequel is doing a much better looking than was before.

Overall, it has huge open-world design, spectacular environments, and amazing animation style.


Music and Sounds

I got to admit the game has the best soundtrack of the modern gaming. The original musics has shares with catchy jazz and orchestrated style genres which really fits the game's personality such as action sequences, story cutscenes and in-game area. There are some of the music track are kinda reminds me of most of the movies from the past such as Forbidden Zone sounded similar from the Harry Potter films, Lei Elgona has Ennio Morricone vibe, and Old Town of Auldnoir is kinda sounds just like from Studio Ghibli's films, so these are the reasons why the original soundtrack in the game is Just sounds fantastic. It was composed by Kohei Tanaka was known for his musical scores for anime television series, OVAs, films, video games and tokusatsu series including Gunbuster, Sakura Wars and One Piece.

The sound effects are just sounds epic for whole game due to use of realistic background and environmental sounds effects from the open-world area, and atmospheric noises that fits really well in the game. The voice acting for most of the characters in the game didn't really speak with the actual language, so instead it was spoken in mixed between Japanese and French fictional language which makes it sounds bit more ancient, so it didn't really bothered me at all because that what the game is supposed to be sounds like.

Overall, it has fantastic original soundtrack and epic sound effects. 


Special Features

This game features unlockables Kat's costumes (including free DLCs costume pack) and room appearences, new DLC episodes such as Raven's Choice where you can play as Raven, collecting gems and talisman, and side-missions and challenge missions.

Overall, its a descent selection of all special features.




Advantages

Stunning presentations with great story and characters

Solid combat gameplay with newer fighting abilities

Numerous of missions to play

Huge open-world levels with bigger explorations

Gorgeous visuals

Fantastic original soundtrack
         
             

Disadvantages

Gravity kick went off-tracked

Wonky motion controls

Weak stealth missions



Final Verdict


Presentation 9/10 - Great story, entertaining characters and stunning presentations.

Gameplay 9/10 - Massive exploration, solid combat gameplay, and great story and side missions.

Graphics 9/10 - Huge open-world design, spectacular environments, and amazing animation style.

Music and Sounds 9/10 - Fantastic original soundtrack and epic sound effects.

Special Features 8/10 - Descent selection of all special features


Overall 9/10 - As much I've liked the first game, this sequel is technically superior to the original game which deserves much credit for being two times larger and better than was before. I had fun playing over 20 to 40 hours of this epic action-adventure which gives me a motivation to enjoy my overall experience due to numerous of missions to play, newer fighting mechanics, more in-depth storylines, and bigger open-world environment what really makes this game an enjoyable.

Gravity Rush 2 is one of the best, but most underappreciated playstation exclusives that not many people have played it, so if you're the fan of this genres or the series in particular then this is must play game for all serious video game collectors out there becuase it's beautifully made cult following titles that everyone should able to enjoy these type of game.


1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Skip it

Rent it

Buy it

If you like my recent blog, please hit like and comment below for further questions.  

This is Zeeshan Mirza's Blog and I'll see you next time, happy blogging everyone.             

Shenmue 1 and 2 HD Collection PS4 Review

History of Shenmue series:

In case you been wondering what I'm talking about the game that involves finding sailors, collecting toy figures, going convenience stores, working at harbours for forklift job, learning martial arts techniques, dealing with thugs, finding clues, one special girl in dreams, playing Lucky Hit gambing, discovering the truth behind mysterious mirrors, so it is Shenmue as being one of my all-time favourite video game series that defines gaming genres. It was created by Yu Suzuki, a same creator was known for his SEGA's arcade classics such as Space Harrier, After Burner, Outrun, Hang-On, and Virtua Fighter.
 
I've been a long time fan of the series when I first remember the first game came out for the SEGA Dreamcast in early 2000's. I just came over to my cousin house, who has the copy of the game, to play our first open-world experience to discover the mysterious storylines, memorable characters, cinematic presentations, interactive gameplay filled with battle system, QTE events and open-world exploration, and realistic looking graphics that really made the game so much special for Dreamcast titles. The game was well received that the game is been credited for pioneering several game technologies as original open-world city game before the idea was popularized by games such as SEGA's Yakuza series, while QTE Events was also popularized for later games such as Quantic Dream's Heavy Rain. It is considered to be most expensive video game ever developed, but also being listed as the greatest game of all time. I was so happy that I really enjoyed my experience of the first game that bought a smile on my face and then I had a chance to play Shenmue 2 on Dreamcast which was released two years later after the first original game and then got later ported to Xbox Original. It is also well received by critics and fans as I really liked the sequel for bigger open-world exploration, epic QTE actions, newer characters, and great storylines, but it's kinda shame that the sequel got end up with commercial failures due to game's poor sales which led the developers team into development hell when working on another sequel. It took too long for the fans of the series are kept begging SEGA for the another sequel to be happen until Team Yu has finally revealed the Shenmue 3 in year 2015 as making a huge return of the beloved franchises. After the kickstarter crowdfunding success which has raised over $6 million as sixth highest-funded campaign in Kickstarter history, the upcoming game was going to be released in year summer 2019. After the Shenmue 3 announcement, SEGA has finally brings the HD Collection of two of the masterpiece titles for modern PCs and consoles such as PS4, XBONE and PC in this year. I finally got the copy of these legendary HD collection for my PS4 and had a chance to beat the two of the game in 10 days, so let's move on to my video game review.


Shenmue 1 and 2 HD Collection PS4 Review:


Shenmue 1 and 2 HD Collection is a video game compilations of classic Dreamcast titles, and it is a open-world adventure games for PS4, XBONE, and PC was published by SEGA. The first title was originally developed by SEGA AM2 for SEGA Dreamcast in year 1999-2000, while the sequel was released in year 2001 for SEGA Dreamcast and then got later ported to Xbox Original in year 2002-03. These games has finally ported later for PCs and consoles in this year, which was been done by d3t Ltd for HD remasters.

I was so glad that SEGA has finally brings the two of the legendary titles to modern day PCs and consoles, so these HD ports include new graphics and control options, improved user interfaces, and has options to choose Japanese and English voices. So far, It's still plays like the original classics and I had a chance to play the whole two games in every 4 hours a day. I've notice the differences between the original version and HD ports was the game been displayed on 16:9 widescreen, so you have the options to choose between the original graphics from the Dreamcast version, while HD version has hi-res mode and bloom effects which improves the use of textures and colours to make it look suitable for HDTV. Having the updated controls and user-interface which adds the suitable playabilty for both modern PCs and consoles players. It worked really fine for whole two games which I am happy that I didn't experienced the problems of the single-player gameplay besides there are some minor bugs on cutscenes and audios which can be found on the first game regarding the Day 1 patch updates, but I hopefully it can be fixed later for another patch update. So far, it plays well and I really enjoyed the HD collection of these two games as my second time playing since the original Dreamcast version.

So without go further do, lets start the review.



Presentation

In the events of first Shenmue that takes place in Yokosuka, Japan, it starts off with 18 year old teen martial artist named Ryo Hazuki came running back to his family's home until he finally discovers his father Iwao Hazuki battles to fight with mysterious man named Lan Di, who is the leader of Chi You Men and threatens Iwao for Dragon mirror. After Lan Di has knocking down Ryo and Iwao, he also confronting Iwao for murdering man named Sunming Zhao and instantly kills Iwao with his finishing blow. The day after the event of Iwao's death lying on Ryo's arm, he swore to avenge his father death as his quest to investigating the mysterious mirrors, while finding a same man that killed Iwao in whereabouts. The second game focuses on the continuation of the story, as focuses on Ryo Hazuki has finally arrived to Hong Kong to find the person named Lishao Tao to find out the whereabouts of Yuanda Zhu, a martial arts expert who sent Ryo's father a letter warning him of Lan Di's intentions.

The story in the game has just caught my attention that how interesting the storyline of both game is to know why the cold-blooded killer demanding for the mirror and kills Iwao instantly which adds the mysterious of story plot as Ryo has to start investigating with people in the street knows about the incident and what they witnessed which gives a clue to find out where the killer whereabouts in Japan. Its a really depressing to see Ryo had promised to seek revenge which won't be easier for him unless he can get support and advice from someone who knew his father. It is good to know what the mirror is all about, which brings more in-depth mystery to make the story elements sounds more interesting. 

Despite the well written story that made the game quite special, I find Ryo Hazuki is one of the most memorable video game characters of SEGA's franchises regarding his cool personality, being talented fighter, and his appearances that made him so great in the game. Most of the supporting characters are also quite amazing in the game, so in the first game it has Master Chen, Fukuhara, Nazomi, Goro and Tom that gives a helpful advice to Ryo, while Guizhang are also a helpful partner that helps Ryo to fight with gangs in Harbour. In second game it has female biker named Joy and little street kid named Wong, while street gang leader Ren is another supportive partner helps Ryo to investigate Chi You Men's gangs while seaching for Zhu's whereabouts. Ryo can always get advice from the female teacher of Man Mo Temple named Xiuying Hong that teaches him with Chinese Kung Fu. There's one of the special girl dresses up in orange named Shenhua that appeared in Ryo's dreams in the first game and you can able get to know about her in second game once you had able to progress through the story.

The game also featured the villains in both games such as Lan Di as the lead villain of the game, while the first game has Mad Angel's gangs and that crazy golem guy named Chai, while the second game has weird woman named Yuan and the big fat guy named Don Yiu which I was really surprised how awesome the cast of the villains that featured in the game. 

The game's presentation is full of amazing to see how atmospheric both of the games was which filled with beauty and magical of China and Japan cultures. The first game that takes place in Japan has great street houses filled with neighbours, convenient store that has items to buy, the streets has vending machines to drink and toy capsules machine to collect figures, antique shops where you can buy moves scrolls, the bus stops that you can use it for travelling, arcade places that you can able to play your favourite SEGA's arcade classics, and the harbour that you can able to work there as forklift job. In second game that takes place in both Hong Kong and China, it has larger areas where you can visit to the tea shops, antiques shops, Kung Fu stores, Guest Houses for sleepover, gambling area where you can able to win and earn money, and temples to learn Chinese Martial Arts. The game's atmospheres has the use of date, time and weather system in the game which allows the weather to be changed differently such as rain, snow and sunlight, while the date and time can also effect with day and night time for opening and closing stores, and bedtime which made the whole game quite realistic at the times in early 2000's and I also liked the use of the cinematic design for both cutscene and in-game conversation dialogues that fits well for the game's presentation, but it does have minor problem in first game with cutscene bug where it got stucked on wrong places, but it can be fixed by quitting the game first, load the same save data again, and then repeat the same process to prevent the same cutscene bug that got stucked last time, so I'm pretty sure it can be fixed later for another update patches which is no problem.


Overall, it has outstanding story, memorable characters, atmospheric presentation and in-game's systems.



Gameplay

In both game, you take control of Ryo Hazuki has his goal to complete his quest by following the task which can be written on his notebook for important clues, so you are told to investigate with local people to find out the incident that was linked to Chi You Men's gangs related. Sometime it's takes awhile to get used too depending on which people can able to give you a information for newer clues or some other may not able to know what you're asking a question, so once you get the information from people then the newer clues can be added to your notebook so you can able to go specific places that the clues been written on the notebook such as sneaking into Warehouse to find important person and visiting gang's homes to interrogating gang member for information that been linked to Chi You Men's whereabouts. The clues are also involved with puzzle solving such as finding important items that can be found at different rooms, so you can able to find newer items by interacting the objects such as drawers, closets, boxes, cabinets and shelves to retain the items that you are searching for such as key to open doors, collecting cassette types to gain information, and opening secret paths with special items.

Besides the investigation gameplay segments, the game also involved with fighting gangs which can be played on different sequences such as QTE events where the command buttons can be appeared on the screen as the player has to quickly press the correct command button to avoid accidental during the fight sequence, but also has epic escaping, chasing and balancing sequence where you have to survive through without botching up the QTE gameplay, so if the button been pressed incorrectly which leads into epic fail sequences in the game. The basic QTE is pretty straightforward which you can only press the single button, but in the second game which introduces advanced QTE which shows the directional button and 4-buttons on the screen, but you need to quickly press the correct button in right timing as what it been shown on the QTE display which makes it quite hard, but really adds the game's challenge, so be careful when playing the game with QTE sequences. The game also has 3D fighting system similar to SEGA's Virtua Fighter, so you will have basic punch, kick and throwing button to attack your opponents, while you can able to dodge them by pressing the sidestep button. You can also perform different fighting moves which you can able to check it out on the list of fighting moves on the menus which helps you to learn the moves. You can also add your new moves from the shops that sells fighting scroll or obtain it from the someone that teaches you the Martial Arts which improves Ryo's fighting style in the game.

These game has open-world gameplay where you can able to explore the whole city area as you can also spent time to do whatever you want such as going to convenient store to buy items which also involves winning prizes, playing SEGA's classics from arcade places, winning money prizes from lucky hit, arm wrestle and street fight club, earning money from job places such as forklift job in Japan and lifting boxes with team workers in Hong Kong, collecting figures from toy capsules machine which you can able to sell those to pawnshop store in Hong Kong, and there's many places to visit that made the game quite unique for Dreamcast titles.

So far, the whole game are actually worked well for HD ports as the developer team are trying to make these game staying original as possible. I had no problem with the gameplay especially with updated controls which makes the character's movements and camera system easier to control on my PS4 controller. Controlling the characters is worked fine for most of the part such as walking, running and interacting stuff, while I find QTE event are quite simple for most action sequences. The fighting mechanics is just like the SEGA's Virtua Fighter with unique fighting style and simple fighting controls are worked well for battle gameplay. I had fun exploring around the areas with brand new discoveries, meeting with people, going to places to visit and have fun on open-world levels. I do like the puzzle aspects and searching for clues in the games which really motivates me to progress through the game's story.

Overall, it has outstanding open-world exploration, excellent battle gameplay, epic QTE events and puzzle aspects.



Graphics

To me, it didn't change the whole game a lot, but still remains a same original look of the game. For HD ports, I'm glad that the game runs on 16:9 widescreen to make the game look wider and I did notice that both of games has improved the use of shaper hi-res textures, bloom effects and colours environment that made the game look suitable for HD standards, so I'm happy that the development team trying to make the game look cleaner and fresh for modern PCs and consoles.

Despite the improvements, I really loved the scenery environments of trees, flowers, waterfall, city building, sea water and houses which adds the past nostalgia of the game. The weather system is quite well done with realistic looking rain, snow and sunlight, and I finding the use of day and night time system which has great use of contrast on skybox from blue to black. The character's design seems to be ageing well for today standards regarding the use of facial animation and body language which adds the personality of the game.

As I said earlier, it doesn't mean the game is all been re-made because its just a straight up HD ports of both games, but having with great resolution size, acceptable colour schemes and sharper details on the game is to make it look suitable for HDTV as trying to make the game look neater with less pixelated, so you have the options to change the graphics between the classics and HD for your suitable preferences which was featured in options menu along with selectable screen size between 4:3 and 16:9. 

Overall, it has stunning environments, great weather system, day and night contrast, and ageing character's design.



Music and Sounds

I got to admit that Shenmue has the greatest video game soundtrack ever made. Most of Japanese composer did a fabulous job for whole game which really fits well on game's presentation to express so many emotions in both games, so it has both Chinese and Japanese feelings of orchestrated soundtrack, while some of them has jazzy and catchy tunes in some different parts of scenes. The sound effects is quite atmospheric for most parts such as the sounds of waterfall, jingle sounds on convenience store, the sounds of vehicle in streets, and crowd noises that really fits well for whole open-world area. I also liked the chime sounds of QTE events which really helps me to navigate the right button on the screen.
You have the selectable options to choose between English and Japanese voices for in-game cutscenes and conversation dialogues, so I do find English voice acting considered cheesy in comparsion with Japanese voice which sounded more acceptable overall, but I had to give credit to Corey Marshall did a decent job for voicing Ryo Hazuki which sounds lot better than most of voice cast in English dub.
Then again, there are some minor audio bugs on first game as well which has few missing sound effect and bit muffled voices during cutscenes, but I'm pretty sure it can be fixed again with another patch update which is no problem.


Overall, it has fantastic soundtrack, atmospheric sound effects, and chessey English voice acting.



Special Features

In Shenmue 1, you are able to unlock 70 men battle and having ability to transfer save data over to second game allowing to retains the move scrolls, toy capsules and etc. While Shenmue 2 which lets you unlock your favourite SEGA's arcade classics, mini-games and etc. on Shenmue collection menu. On the game cases, you'll have reversible game cover which lets you switch over the cover of the game and it also including the double-sided poster of Shenmue 1 and 2 HD collection inside the game cases. Both of the games contains trophy achievements which also adds the player's experiences levels.


Overall, it has unlockables content, ability to transfer save data, reversible game cover and double-sided poster.   

                              

Advantages

Outstanding story

Memorable characters

Atmospheric presentation

Excellent gameplay

Aged graphics

Fantastic soundtrack


Disadvantages

Some minor bug on cutscenes and audio from first game



Final Verdict

Presentation 9/10 - outstanding story, memorable characters, atmospheric presentation and in-game's systems.

Gameplay 9/10 - outstanding open-world exploration, excellent battle gameplay, epic QTE events and puzzle aspects.

Graphics 8.5/10 - stunning environments, great weather system, day and night contrast, and ageing character's design.

Music and Sounds 9/10 - fantastic soundtrack, atmospheric sound effects, and chessey English voice acting.

Special Features 9/10 - unlockables content, ability to transfer save data, reversible game cover and double-sided poster.


Overall 9/10 - Shenmue 1 and 2 are still my all-time favourite Dreamcast games, but these HD collection are still deserves to be masterpiece for the fans of the series can able to get their hands on with these most ironic classic titles for PC, PS4 and XBONE, while it can be difficult for the newcomers of the franchise, but I'm pretty sure they might able to give these game a second chance since these game hasn't sold well on the Dreamcast release along with Xbox Original in year 2000's. I'm so happy that SEGA has finally give these game a re-releases to revive the series again and I'm hopefully to look forward to see a another Shenmue game for summer 2019. If you're into with slower-paced open-world adventures then go buy these legendary collection because it deserves more love and passions.

I wanted to thanks all of Shenmue fans community for supporting the wonderful franchise to keep the series alive and I also wanted to thanks SEGA for bringing these classics back to modern day gaming, and very special thanks to Yu Suzuki for bringing the franchise back in business.

Shenmue 1 and 2 HD Collection is still amazing video game compilations and it is a worth for your collection, so have a good luck finding sailors around.   




1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Skip it

Rent it

Buy it

If you like my recent blog, please hit like and comment below for further questions.  

This is Zeeshan Mirza's Blog and I'll see you next time, happy blogging everyone.