Watch Dogs 2 teaches us an important life lesson: it’s all about relativity.
So, Ubisoft comes a second time around trying to show that they are “hip and down” with the hacker culture. And for a while, it really seemed like they nailed it on the head. The footage and gameplay shown at a lot of press events and conferences displayed that Ubisoft finally understood how to merge hacktivism game elements with an open world. But what’s the number one rule when it comes to gameplay footage shown at these sorts of events?
Don’t fall for the hype.
The first thing you notice when you jump into the world of San Francisco is how much more jocund it is than it’s predecessor. As with the first Watch Dogs, the theme was based on hacktivism being used to further one’s own gain (Aiden’s obsession with revenge). In turn, the aesthetic was this dark and gritty world that is consumed by the need to connect online, only to have that need be turned against them by individuals and corporations.
Watch Dogs 2’s aesthetic and theme is simply disgruntled hacktivism. And that is still, somehow, better than what its predecessor was going trying to portray.
The world of Watch Dogs 2 is more lively and brighter, it does away with this need to be so self-righteously serious and trades it in for this tongue-in-cheek humor about a bunch of aggrieved 20-something-year-olds who want to fight the system. And it sort of works. Each part of San Francisco feels uniquely different from the other, and even the people in it feel alive as they react to your actions, and exist within their own construct. More often than not, you’ll see random people around get into fights, frolick and behave as though they truly existed in this simulated world, and that is a leap beyond the first Watch Dogs.
You take the role of Marcus Holloway, and it follows his exploits after he is thrust into a hacker group called DedSec. Their sole aim being to take down big brother. And how do they do that, by doing public shows of hacktivism and anarchy in order to gain more followers on their mobile app. Yes, you read that right. At some point, the game plays off as satire.
I’ll be honest, after a certain point I was just going from place to place depending on the mission objective and I actually paid very little attention to what they story had to offer because it was sort of straightforward. Well, it’s one of those stories that appears to offer little but then after a few twists and turns it turns out there is a massive conspiracy, and the government is coming after you and yadi yadi ya. You get my drift. Added to a run-of-the-mill story are some odd side characters that are hit or miss depending on your idea of what counts as good archetypes. Initially, I felt a bit cringe because these characters seemed like a 50-year-old game designer’s idea of what a young hacker would look like and how they would act. But given time, some of them grow on you especially the character of Wrench.
But the real selling point for Watch Dogs will always be in its gameplay.
So, how does this fare against its contentious predecessor? It feels like five steps forward and two steps backwards.
The gameplay has improved by a longshot, especially in terms of interactivity with the world. It actually feels like the world was created around the concept of hacking as opposed to hacking being an afterthought. The opportunities for hacking are far greater this time around, and that also means that your creativity can run amuck. In the predecessor, you would end up using the same combination of hacks: hack this transformer, then hack this one other thing that brings the guards closer to the transformer, and then KA-BOOM. Watch Dogs 2 lets players advance through missions all at their own pace and wit. There is enough room to try odd combinations of everything, from complete stealth to guns-blazing to somewhere in-between.
Yet, the game is at its best when played with complete stealth.
Remember, the part where I said it feels as though hacking wasn’t an afterthought in this game. Well, the same can’t be said about the combat system. Shooting this game feels immensely clumsy and the cover system is just as bad. The weapons themselves don’t feel as though they pack any power behind them, and at times feel as though I’m using paintball guns. The hand-to-hand combat is pretty good and the finishing animations themselves are a morbid delight to watch. But those hand-to-hand scenarios are not frequent, and thus, you are usually left with gun combat (if you chose to no follow a stealthy approach) and that is one of the things that could drive you away from this game.
And this brings me to my biggest qualm with Watch Dogs 2, it seems to have an identity crisis.
As mentioned earlier, the game is about a bunch of angry young adults who fight back the system through hacktivism. So, how does mowing down a bunch of minimum wage security guards at an offsite server room fit into all of this? How does Marcus, a delightful angsty personality with no visible traits of psychopathy, manage to effortlessly massacre the police officers hunting him down?
The game’s weapon combat feels so out of touch with the theme, character motivations, and story it has on display.
This is one of those moments in gaming in which we see a developer stuff a game with generic mechanics and system because they are afraid that if they don’t do that, it could drive away consumers. In my personal opinion, this game is at its best when played with non-lethal stealth and pure hacking. That is when the aesthetic and design feels fleshed out, and the hacking opportunities are ample so as to not let the gamer get bored. It requires genuine wit and cunning, and that is when the game provides a real challenge. If you feel otherwise, and you much rather be dropping bodies, then get ready for a world of ludonarrative dissonance.
The game also suffers from the standard issue Ubisoft brand of bland enemy AI. The only time they ever posed a challenge was when using stealth, otherwise, your arsenal was more than helpful to take any of them out. The game is also littered with a lot of filler side missions that feel immensely repetitive. This isn’t to say, there aren’t some unique side activities out there that mimic the stories of real-world scenarios, but after a while, they enter a cumbersome pattern. One delightful highlight is that the driving mechanics have improved.
In the first installment, the cars felt like bricks with wheels made of bricks. In Watch Dogs 2, the cars still feel like bricks but this time they have actual wheels. Basically, they drive a bit better but not all that better.
Oh, and this time parkour actually feels like parkour and not melodramatic running-away-from-stuff.
For all its faults, Watch Dogs 2 isn’t a bad game but it isn’t remarkable either. It’s one of those games that exists. It’s good when you play it a certain way but its cracks show every now and then.
I reiterate again: Watch Dogs 2 teaches us about relativity. The game is an improvement over its predecessor. But the value of the predecessor depends on which side of the fence you were in regards to it. You could be the gamer that thought Watch Dogs was amazing regardless of what was showcased at events or you could be the gamer that thought Ubisoft hit an all-time low with this subpar, falsely advertised game. If you are the former, then Watch Dogs 2 will be something you want to put on your Christmas list. If you’re the latter, then you can probably wait for a sale, specifically one of those sales in which it’s bundled with another game because you will lose interest pretty fast.
The multiplayer could not be reviewed due to the reviewer’s lack of access to PSN plus.
This game was reviewed using a PS4 copy given to us by Ubisoft MENA.
