Updated at: 31-05-2022 - By: Leo Hall

The shotgun is the only weapon that truly embodies the spirit of a first-person shooter. In the early stages of Rage 2, the protagonist, Walker, a wasteland ranger who can be either male or female, discovers a futuristic combat shotgun locked away in an Ark: a kind of technological fallout shelter built to protect humanity and its treasured technology from a catastrophic asteroid collision. There are a lot of issues with Rage 2, including a dull open world, a weak story, and terrible vehicle control, but that shotgun. As soon as you press the trigger, you’ll notice that it’s a high-quality first-person shooter.

As a semi-automatic weapon of mass destruction, it’s loud and unpleasant, much like Rage 2. Your shoulder practically vibrates when you unleash a hail of buckshot on an unsuspecting foe. What really sets this game apart is its unique secondary fire mode, which can be engaged by holding the right mouse button. The dispersion gets smaller and the effect gets more powerful. The blast sends enemies hurtling backwards against walls, over railings, and off of cliff faces.

When it comes to dealing with The Authority, an army of mechanical freaks that has taken over the planet, you’ll need the kind of firepower you’ll find here. Rage 2’s primary goal is to take out these thugs and their leader, General Cross, as well as other bandits, robbers, and thugs. On the other hand, I have no recollection of the plot whatsoever. After you’ve lost interest in the story, fighting will keep you playing long after you’ve given up on the story.

Only a small portion of what makes Rage 2 such a great first-person shooter are the violent, visceral weaponry like that fighting shotgun. With each new ark discovered, you gain access to what are essentially superpowers that you may use to your advantage in the open world as you progress through the game. Floating in mid-air while aiming your weapon or doing a gravity-defying double jump are two examples of these more subtle abilities. It’s a little more dramatic with others.

Rage 2 review: Easy to hate, easy to love - Polygon

The slam is my personal favorite of the bunch. In order to unleash a concussive blast when you land, activate it when you’re above a gathering of foes. A crimson slurry forms around anyone in the path of the hit, while everyone else is hurled into the air like an unruly rag doll. Using it at a higher altitude will have a greater impact on your body because the discharge will be more severe. You will frequently find yourself surrounded and overwhelmed by fast-moving foes in Rage 2, making Slam an useful crowd control method.

Hit the V key to activate Overdrive mode, which boosts your weapons’ power, restores life, and shortens the cooldown period of your abilities when a certain amount of damage has been dealt. Additionally, you can create protective energy shields and draw together large numbers of foes by unleashing a swirling vortex. There are upgrade trees for all of the game’s abilities as well as for weapons and vehicles. All combat situations may be dealt with in Rage 2 thanks to the game’s extensive customizing options.

Among the other abilities is Shatter, which lets you charge at an enemy with a burst of strength, breaking their armor to bits or blasting them in a cloud of claret if they are close enough. In the course of the game, you will gain a wealth of abilities, weapons, and upgrades, making fighting even more enjoyable. Doom reboot fans who yearned for more diversity will find it in Rage 2, a sequel developed by id Software and launched in 2016.

The default key bindings for your powers are abysmal, to say the least. To use them, press and hold the control key while pressing another key. When you’re in a frenzied, fast-paced gunfight when you’re also running and jumping and shooting, it seems like you’re grappling with your fingertips. My preferred method of rebinding powers was to use the number keys, and I found that much more intuitive. Using the mouse to navigate the menus in Rage 2 is a little uncomfortable because the UI is optimized for a gamepad.

Is there anything else we need to know regarding the team’s overall performance? Unfortunately, there is nothing else here that comes close to the level of combat. The world is a dull, uninspiring place, and it’s a constant disappointment. While the post-apocalyptic wasteland built by Avalanche for their 2015 take on Mad Max is stunning and haunting, this drab expanse of swampy forests, rocky valleys, and desert dunes is profoundly unappealing as well. The lack of visual interest in the game is exacerbated by the long drives between tasks.

Input parameters: Vsync, Motion Blur, Chromatic Aberration, Anisotropic Terrain Filtering, Geometric Details (Low-Ultra), Global Illumination, Depth of Field, SSAO, Anti-Aliasing, and Shadow Resolution (low-ultra)

Performance I was able to play Rage 2 at 1440p on full settings with a mostly stable 60 frames per second using a GTX 1080, 16GB of RAM, and an i5-6600K overclocked to 4.0GHz. I’d notice noticeable drops in busy areas of the map, but frame pacing was never an issue. To learn more about Jarred’s performance, check read his analysis.

Rage 2 – Mad Max has a lot to answer for

Aside from the fact that these gaming mechanisms are solid, there is no compelling reason to use them, so what’s the problem? As a result, the 12-hour story campaign omits large swaths of the landscape that you don’t need to explore in order to complete the plot. As far as side tasks go, you’ll find many, but they’re largely unoriginal variants on clearing out enemy camps, and they’re all plopped onto the map without much thought or care.

Although the story objectives are more diverse, it appears like the game is attempting to make it into a monotonous, linear shooter that looks and performs worryingly like a bad Xbox 360 title (i.e. something like Rage 1). When the first mission takes place in a sewer, you get an indication of the lack of inspiration at work, and the sparse use of boss battles and other interesting set pieces can’t make up for it.

While you can drive any car in the game, most of them are either uncontrollable or require a lot of upgrades to become playable. By the time you’ve done that, you’ll probably have lost interest. The convoy battles in Rage 2 aren’t as exciting as they were in Mad Max, and we soon found ourselves using fast travel whenever available.

As frustrating as Rage 2’s schizophrenic combination of good and bad is, we don’t understand how id Software couldn’t have pointed out that the open world and story missions are so lifeless. While the game is definitely aiming for a sort of 2000 AD type punk irreverence, it’s rarely as amusing as it thinks it is, especially compared to the thematically comparable Borderlands.

Open world and post-apocalyptic games have become oversaturated in gaming, and you’d think that Bethesda would be aware of this, yet Rage 2 has no self-awareness when it comes to its own lack of creativity.

Like Days Gone, Rage 2 is either fantastic or dreadful, with no in-betweens. It’s still fun in the end once you figure out how to get around and disregard some of the game’s flaws, but it’s frustrating to see so much hard effort go to waste on something so unmemorable.

Rage 2

Rage 2’s first-person combat is some of the greatest of the year, but as an open-world adventure it wastes everything on a pointless narrative campaign and dull task design.

Gunplay is excellent and there is a wide variety of interesting and powerful abilities, weapons, and upgrades to choose from.

Ranked: Rage 2 Characters

Drawbacks: The game makes terrible use of the open world, with dull tasks and a narrative that is far too brief. The vehicle combat is only passable, and the writing is mediocre, with jokes that fall flat.

Score: 6/10

There are three ways to play: PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC.

The cost is £54.99

Bethesda Softworks

Avalanche Studios and id Software are the developers.

It’s scheduled to be released on May 14, 2019.

In terms of both sights and ambiance, the northwestern jungle region known as The Wilds is by far the most intriguing. Rage 2’s universe is small compared to other Avalanche games, and that’s something I appreciate. It has a more selected vibe, rather than an unending expanse of nothingness. There’s not enough accuracy in the world-building, however, to make exploration particularly gratifying, and the open world functions more as a tool to get you from one objective to the next than as an integral element of the experience. I expected to be compelled to travel off-road and explore in an open world game, but I never had the inclination to deviate from my GPS route.

If you’re playing with a mouse and keyboard, the vehicle handling can be a real pain. There are two noisy, rattling machine guns attached to the front of the Phoenix, your primary mode of transportation. Other vehicles that you find (or steal) in the environment can also be driven back to settlements like villages and cities to be added to your collection if you have unlocked a specific upgrade. There’s just one problem: They’re all awful to drive. Sluggish, smeary, and insensitive handling means that you never feel in complete control while driving.

Switching to a gamepad makes driving a little more fun, but the cars’ excessively huge turning circles make it feel like you’re fighting to get them around a bend. Other than that odd, isolated downturn, Rage 2’s gameplay is absolutely fantastic, from the thrilling knee-slide you may transition into while sprinting to the most basic of actions like cracking an open a crate with your fists.

FAQS:

Was Rage 2 any good?

If your only goal in Rage 2 is to annihilate post-apocalyptic punks, it’s an excellent action game. Although the story and gameplay are terrible, the experience is nonetheless enjoyable.

Rage 2 - Eden Assault Extended Gameplay Trailer - QuakeCon 2018 - YouTube

Is Rage 2 a long game?

With the primary goals in mind, Rage 2 takes roughly 1012 hours to complete. It takes 3012 hours to complete the game if you’re a fan of the game and want to see every facet of it.

Why is Rage 2 so different?

The engine used to produce Rage 2 is intended to provide players with an immersive open world experience. When it comes to gameplay, there aren’t any discrete racing or shooting regions, nor are there any loading periods (except for fast travel). This does not imply that racing is more difficult, but rather that it should be more enjoyable and enjoyable.

Conclusion:

I quickly forget about Rage 2’s dull setting and story when I’m surrounded by foes, chaining powers, and unleashing those resounding cannons. At least until the gunfire dies down, the battle serves as a tremendous diversion from the game’s issues. There’s a lot to like about this game, but the disparity in quality between the combat and the rest of the experience is detrimental. In spite of these difficulties, Avalanche and id Software can be proud of Rage 2’s shotgun, which is among the best.