[Review] Warlocks 2: God Slayers - Nintendo Switch

[Review] Warlocks 2: God Slayers – Nintendo Switch

Warlocks 2: God Slayers

Nintendo Switch

Reviewed By: Tyler Higgs

Developed By: Fat Dog Games/Frozen District

Published By: QubicGames

Category: Action, RPG, Platformer, Hack & Slash

Release Date: June 7, 2019

The Action RPG genre is becoming more and more prominent on the Nintendo Switch with every passing month. There are so many fantastic titles to choose from in the genre that it can be difficult to pick only a few to play. To stand out in the genre you really have to diversify yourself from the competition. Warlocks 2 manages to do everything it does fairly well, but nothing truly stands out which holds it back from being a must have title.

Warlocks 2: God Slayers is a 2D Action RPG that utilizes a pixel art style visual design. You play as one of 5 characters each with their own skills and personality. Alone and angered your character sits in a cage, captured by some thugs. Out of nowhere a strange looking old man let’s you out of the cage as long as you promise to become a Warlock. You agree and bust out of the cage to wreak havoc on your enemies. Now your quest to become a Warlock begins; time to slay some gods.

The story here definitely isn’t anything spectacular, but it’s decent enough. There’s some humor and while it doesn’t always land well, for the most it manages to be entertaining. You probably won’t get wrapped up in the story, but it won’t deter you from playing either.

Warlocks 2 plays pretty similar to most other Action RPG’s. You move around a specific area and uncover parts of the map while completing missions and defeating enemies. Before you start you can choose between 4 different characters each with a bit of their own personality. While your character choice doesn’t have much of an effect on the story, it will affect your playstyle. The campaign runs from about 7-10 hours which is a pretty solid length for a playthrough. There’s 3 different planets you have to visit where you will face off against a variety of foes and in a variety of different levels. Maybe if you get far enough on each of the planets you’ll even fight…. a god!

Every character has their own skill tree to help diversify from one another. Skills are learned from leveling up and each one will take a skill point or two to unlock. Every character has a few different abilities, but you can only have 4 equipped at any give time. I chose to play as Cormag the drunken goat who’s coincidentally is the only character that primarily uses melee. There’s some twin stick style aiming mechanics that come along with Warlock 2’s gameplay, but that’s only if your character uses attacks that must be aimed. If you’re using melee attacks then, unfortunately the hitboxes are a bit wonky. I’ve had times where my attack has touched an enemy, only for it to not register and no damage to be taken. It’s a bit frustrating and can be a problem during some fights.

When you set out for your next mission the quests are usually fairly similar. You’ll have to set out to find some objectives on the map and destroy enemy towers that act as spawn points. These missions while entertaining can become a bit repetitive. There are also side missions that you can start for extra items and EXP.

There’s a variety of different items you can find in Warlocks 2. Many of the items you find are healing consumables that I can guarantee you will most likely need a lot of. Besides consumables there’s a fairly robust equipment system that allows you to really focus on which of your characters stats you’d like to improve. There’s equipment spots for shoulder gear, body armor, headgear, your weapon and even a few more. Equipment also have specific rarities with the equipment having better stats and sometimes passive abilities.

Where Warlocks 2 tries to make itself stand out is in its ability to play up to 4 players locally. Up to 4 players can play through the story as long as they have their own pair of Joy-Cons. The levels in the campaign feel like they were built for local co-op as they can be pretty daunting if you’re on your own. It’s definitely a nice addition to have local co-op and is for sure one of the game’s biggest pros.

You’re also given the ability to hatch an egg and receive a pet that you can take around levels to help you out in combat. I’m a sucker for games that let you have a companion.

The pixel art visual design that’s used here is relatively average. While the worlds and environments all differ and look quite colorful, item designs and character designs leave a bit to be desired. There’s times where everything looked and felt really nice and others where I was genuinely uninterested in the game’s worlds. These feelings probably also came from the level designs which were also sometimes great and other times kind of generic. The sound design is alright, but there’s nothing special about it.

Besides a few significant frame rate dips my time with Warlocks 2 was free of issues. I can’t say that the frame rate issues took me out of the game as they didn’t happen often, but they were a bit frustrating especially when i was in crowds of enemies.

Warlocks 2 does fine in the Action RPG genre and manages to blend its elements together along with some fairly responsive platforming. Unfortunately, Warlock 2 doesn’t do much else then settle for average which makes it hard for this one to stand out when there’s so many great titles in the genre. The option of 5 different characters is a great addition and local co-op definitely helps it stand out from the crowd a bit. This is definitely a decent title, but there are others in the genre that do the job better.