The game was provided by SEGA for review. Thank you!
Ever since seeing Demon Slayer The Hinokami Chronicles 2 at Summer Game Fest in June, I was completely turned onto the series. I had always wanted to watch the anime, but I was convinced to get into it as soon as possible, thanks to my short experience there. I was so convinced that I wanted to experience the story from the beginning, so I played the first game before diving into this one to get the full game-side story before this one and see how the gameplay has improved. After playing it, I can confidently say that there have been many fantastic improvements over the last game, and it solves a lot of the issues I had before.
Most of the changes I loved come in the form of quality-of-life improvements, and general gameplay remained the same. Like the previous game, the story is on a linear path, consisting of 3D cutscenes, fights, boss battles, and 2D cutscenes that provide exposition and extra information for everything happening in the story.
The sequel picks up right after where the last one ended, taking place from the Entertainment District story arc and ending after the Hashira Training arc. Further following Tanjiro Kamari’s story, we get to see him face off against more demons and continually grow to master the Hinokami Kagura and get closer to defeating the demon lord: Muzan Kibutsuji.
The story mode is pretty linear, going from cutscene to combat to cutscene, but it’s very entertaining to see play out. As someone who hasn’t watched the anime, I was captivated by the way the story was told, and I love the extra exposition cutscenes that can be found to pad out some of the events I want a little more information about. I’m purposely being vague here so I don’t spoil the story for anyone who doesn’t know the story yet, but I was not disappointed.
One thing CyberConnect2 showed with the previous game was their successful balancing and translation of drama and humor, and that’s on full display again. If anything, I’d say this game has even more humorous moments that made me crack up, and it never felt out of place. Seeing Inosuke’s muscular mice bringing him his sword in the Entertainment District had me audibly laughing just seeing how ridiculous they are.
In between battles and cutscenes, there will be small areas where we can freely run around and explore. This was in the previous game as well, but Demon Slayer The Hinokami Chronicles 2 fixes a major problem that made these moments a chore. Now, we can run and jump around, allowing us to traverse faster and interact with the areas more. With the areas being littered with collectibles and side quests that consist of one-off battles or fetch-quests, I had a much better time going through and getting everything that these areas had to offer.
And those challenging boss battles return in full force, which I had a blast playing through. The bosses offer unique challenges thanks to their AoE attacks, and it was a blast to watch the quick time events unfold to see how our slayer was able to destroy the demon. Dashing away from these attacks is still obnoxious, like in the previous game, but it didn't change how much I enjoyed the fights.
Combat remains largely unchanged as well, and if you have played the Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm series, this will be very familiar. You run around a 3D arena, jumping, dodging, blocking, and attacking your enemy. We have our basic attack, which can be modified based on the direction we hold our joystick, heavy attack, and an assortment of skills to use. We can also bring another fighter with us to swap out or call upon to use their skills to help us.
It’s as flashy as ever, using the gorgeous cel-shaded art style that accentuates their anime/manga roots. The awesome combo system returns to give us a chance to combine skills and regular attacks to create these great combos without it feeling unfair, while the Surge system also returns to help us turn the tide by boosting our attack if the bar is filled enough.
Ultimate Arts are also here again, giving us some great cinematic attacks that deal massive damage. They are a joy to watch unfold, and with this game, we have Dual Ultimates to utilize. If we have specific support partners, and our Surge bar is filled high enough, we can trigger an ultimate, cinematic attack that has both of them work together to destroy our foe. It’s arguably more flashy to watch unfold, and with each Demon Slayer fighter having at least one other person they can dual ultimate with, it’s a welcome addition.
However, dodging is still a sore spot for me. Dashing to the side or backwards is how we can dodge attacks, but the distance it covers is still a little too short to dodge attacks. This mostly affects bosses with AoE attacks, but I still found it hurting me in regular fights. We can also block as an alternative, but I tend to prefer dodging and attacking.
One of the other issues I had with the previous game is its replayability. Outside of the story, there wasn't much to do. Luckily, that isn't a problem here. Outside of the story and collectibles, there are different game modes to enjoy. We have offline and online versus matches with over 48 characters to choose from, as well as The Path of a Demon Slayer and Training Paths. The former allows us to play through some of the battles from the previous game with a cutscene to explain it, while Training Paths is a new roguelike-esque mode.
The Path of a Demon Slayer is a nice touch, but playing through the story more intimately than in the last game was more enjoyable. Still, I appreciate an option for those who want to experience the story before. The Training Paths are a nice touch as well, allowing us to face off against multiple enemies as we get to the final fight. It is laid out like a grid where we choose where to go next, and if we beat the enemy and complete an optional objective, we will get a usable boost to augment our fighter. We can fight against each of the 9 Hashira, all with three different difficulties. We can also get some prizes from the grid, which includes new Slayer ID customization options and more.
On top of that, each character has their own Mastery level, which goes up the more you use them to unlock new titles, profile photos, and costumes. The Kimetsu Point Shop makes a return as well. We get points as we fight, and use them to unlock new characters, costumes, voices, quotes, stamps, and more Slayer ID customization options. Most of the characters and costumes can also be unlocked through the main story, but it's nice to have another option.
We also have Gears, which allow us to augment our fighters a bit more. You can get gear as you play the Story or buy it from the Kimetsu Point Shop, which provides different effects. Most of them need to meet some requirements to activate during battle. They can range from increasing your attack power to increasing how fast your skill gauge replenishes. We have three slots for gears and three different loadouts to fill out. It's a nice feature to have, and some gears don't do as much as I would like, but with the right gear, it can be very useful and enjoyable to play around with.
Overall, the variety is nice. As much as I enjoyed the story, which I did a lot, I enjoy the new modes and playing around with the Gear system. The Mastery levels are a nice touch as well, especially to get those extra costumes. I definitely felt compelled to come back and play more even after the story was completed.
This is definitely an improvement over the previous game, and I loved playing it. It also plays really well on the Steam Deck, and to my surprise, better than the last game.
As for playability on the Steam Deck, it's fantastic. As I mentioned above, Demon Slayer The Hinokami Chronicles 2 plays significantly better than the previous game, easily hitting 60 FPS consistently. There were some boss fights that caused it to go down during certain attacks, but it primarily stuck to 60 and stayed stable even in the areas where we can freely walk around. The battery drain ranged from 14W - 19W.
The game actually runs at 60 FPS on the Max settings, and there's very little visual or battery drain change when going to the lowest. Along with not having any settings to change the framerate, the Max settings at 60 FPS are going to be the best way to play. We can't cap the framerate through SteamOS since it will slow the entire game down to a crawl, but it plays wonderfully without needing to do so. There will just be almost no way to lower battery drain, but in the end, it's still playable.
There are some slight slowdowns at max settings in some of the group battles where you face 50+ demons, but these are far and few and I powered through it. Changing to the High quality preset.
The pop-up tutorials are with keyboard and mouse glyphs, but the actual legends in-game are correct gamepad icons. Also, pressing the "Steam" button and going back into the game minimizes the screen and makes it unplayable, so doing that will force you to close the game completely and reopen it.
The game allows us to customize the HUD, camera controls, subtitles, region, sensitivity, audio settings, and controller button type.
It doesn't support 16:10 resolutions, but it does have cloud saves and controller support. There are no HDR settings.
Demon Slayer The Hinokami Chronicles 2 is a fantastic improvement over the previous game. The story is exciting, the combat is flashy, the cel-shaded visuals are gorgeous, and the new game modes and features add a great amount of replayability. The dash is still a short distance, but the quality of life changes to free-roam areas make the story significantly more enjoyable.
To my surprise, it's also more playable on the Steam Deck than the previous game. It hits 60 FPS at max settings, and while it has some minor slowdowns in the story, it's not nearly enough to stop my enjoyment of the experience. This is a great step up from the previous game, and I highly recommend it.
このレビューはPC版に基づいています。
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Demon Slayer The Hinokami Chronicles 2 is a fantastic step up from its predecessor, fixing almost all the issues I had from before and runs better on the Steam Deck.
