Lost Planet 2 review: A fun mess

Lost Planet 2 feels very similar to the original. This is mostly a bad thing, but returning players can find some relief in it. Many can fault LP2 for it's problems such as disconnecting controls scheme, frustrating difficulty, and imprecision, but a few will find the scale, set pieces, and co-op to be as largely enjoyable as the biggest bosses you'll slay.

First, let's be clear: LP2 has some wonky controls. Button presses and layout feels very detached from the actual actions which may have found more traditional mapping on different games. Healing yourself, for example, is the start button. The melee button feels like it's reacting half a second slower, and your character routinely stumbles on landing from high places, making a precise jump impossible. Aiming also feels floaty and imprecise. You may not care with an automatic weapon like the machine gun, but forget about lobbing grenades. It's more like picking a direction and hoping the explosion is big enough. Don't even get me started on the sniper rifle.

Combat can feel brutally unfair too. The campaign was made for four gamers to tackle, but if you play alone, the challenge isn't scaled back. One time me and my team had to keep several drills running while pushing back enemy forces from deactivating them. Next time I tried, it was with a single friend and everything remained the same except for our numbers, so the enemies overwhelmed us much more easily. Enemies also have an abundance of ways to knock you down, stun you, or otherwise incapacitate you temporarily, and it'll prove to be annoying as you try making a break for cover.

There are many technical issues about the game that makes this game seem like a failure.

So why am I having so much fun?

In a word: scale. From even the very start your thrown into the clumsy controls of a mech, known as a VS (or vital suit). In the first half hour you'll face down an alien known as an akrid the size of a house. In the first hour you'll fight a huge akrid the lives in an entire damn. All while piloting mechs, climbing walls with a grappling hook, and making huge explosions with an array of explosive weapons.

An example of this love-hate relationship is chapter 3-3. At the end, you're tasked with killing an akrid who's size is beyond anything you've ever encountered. Riding atop a train carrying a railgun, the most efficient way to defeat the akrid is also the most complex. You have tons of things to do from carrying ammunition to the cannon deck, activating the cooling system, charging the railgun's electromagnets, and the rotating mechanism just to get the cannon in position and firing it. It's extremely complex, even for a full four player co-op campaign and at times is very frustrating just to stay on top of things.

But nothing quite beats that feeling of jumping in the gunner's seat to fire off a fully charged railgun, watching a brilliant explosion as it rips through the akrid's glowing weak point, slowly revealing giant impact craters in it's body. It all comes down to a do-or-die set piece as the monster tries to swallow the train whole from behind and your team struggles to get the cannon turned around with it's last bit of ammo.

Read through that all? Despite it's shortcomings, these improbably huge scenarios are incredible experiences, even with strangers, as you all work together to accomplish something normally impossible alone. There are more action sequences that are just as enjoyable, so really this game is all about the feeling than the thinking.