What Did I Do To Deserve This, Oh Lord? 2 (formerly Badman)

[Dogg Thang]

I picked this up the other day from PSN. The sequel to Holy Invasion Of Privacy, Badman - now with a fairly pointless name change.

For those of you not familiar with the first game, the idea is that you play the bad guy and heroes invade your dungeon. By digging through your underworld, you unleash creatures who feed on other creatures and create your own ecosystem designed to defeat your heroes. The play method is very simple - one button to dig and that's about it - but the actual mechanics of what exactly lead to what are slightly baffling. Even having beaten the first game, I never really quite figured out exactly what I was doing.

And yet I felt compelled to try again and again to try out different dig patterns.

For those who played the demo of this sequel, you know what has changed. There are now different locations and you move from one to the other after surviving a few attacks. And your creatures can now mutate. In the Training Section, there are also far more details and hints given as to what is going on and how it works.

And yet it's still pretty baffling to me.

With the new locations, well, all that changes is the look on the outside world. Your underworld looks identical (the game even jokes about this and recommends you put a plastic filter over your screen if you're expecting it to look different). What you do get are different creatures, though (mostly) the differences are mostly cosmetic and, even then, pretty minor.

The mutation mechanic is something I haven't really got to grips with. It just sort of happens or doesn't happen. I'll give it more time at some point.

And so it's very much more of the same. It's hard to say yet if any of these new things add anything to the game. Now that it's split into locations, it loses that permadeath feel of the first game (you restart from the location you were on) and that strikes me as a negative, not a positive. Actually it's not so much more of the same in terms of how we're used to that with games - it mostly is the same.

But one area this game really shines is the humour. I have cracked up laughing several times (and was surprised that they got away with opening the game with TITZ BITCH and more). One reference to a dead star was brilliant. It is very, very funny. So that's good.

I expect giving it a bit more time will reveal more in terms of the mutation system, although this game being what it is, part of me thinks it will just be a case of muddling through and seeing what does what. Still, having more detailed explanations in the Training section helps.

[abigsmurf]

Semi interested in this as the first one was pretty addictive (if a bit short lived)

There were the issues I had with the first:

Lack of control over mana. It only gathered where heroes were killed or spells were cast and tended to bunch up over a small area nowhere near where they'd be useful.

Unlucky pathing by the heroes. If a healer and a magical swordsman didn't go seperate paths, you were screwed, they'd pretty much wipe out the whole dungeon together.

Relying on powerful heroes getting 'trapped' between two or more monsters. This was the only way to kill some heroes and you had very little control over it happening.

[Darwock]

I disagree with some of that, there was no such thing as unlucky pathing because the AI followed a precise path each time. It was your job to figure it out and exploit it. Also I don't think I ever relied on a pincer movement to kill heroes, my favourite tactic was to catch them in a torrent of slimemosses.

The first game was very difficult and a lot of people failed to grasp the complexity, mistaking it for random chance. I heard this one redresses the balance a little?

[Dogg Thang]

Well the behaviours seem to be pretty much the same. In terms of it being easier to figure out, the training mode had diagrams to go with the explanations but, generally, the game is as baffling as ever. I haven't done all the training though. Not even close. So it could go into much more detail, I don't know.

One thing it does is give messages when the heroes do something, like when they plant a torch or drop something else. Some heroes can save their game in this one so keeping an eye on what they're up to becomes important.

[abigsmurf]

I disagree with some of that, there was no such thing as unlucky pathing because the AI followed a precise path each time. It was your job to figure it out and exploit it. Also I don't think I ever relied on a pincer movement to kill heroes, my favourite tactic was to catch them in a torrent of slimemosses.

The first game was very difficult and a lot of people failed to grasp the complexity, mistaking it for random chance. I heard this one redresses the balance a little?

I relied on pincers for heroes getting constant heals, a pincer is the only way to out-damage them in those occasions, in most of the stages the healer probably wouldn't run out of MP.

I guess it comes down to tactics. I preferred Slime/flowers + grey demons + lizard men.

The rules for pathing and spreading resources were as good as random for the sheer complexity behind them. Reminds me of Pac Man. All but one of the ghosts on that follow very fixed rules for their movement but for all but the best players, their movement is hard to predict.

I did get better over time and eventually complete it though.

[Dogg Thang]

Just playing through training now and, as it turns out, it does explain the hero paths.

[Dogg Thang]

I'm getting absolutely nowhere with Area 5. Anyone done this one? Any tips?

[Darwock]

I've not got it yet, too much hassle getting a US points card. Is it expected on the UK PSN?