Attack on Titan 2: Final Battle Review

Attack on Titan is easily one of the most interesting yet weirdly fashioned title in recent years. Going from Spiderman-esque web slinging to Sword Art Online’s Kirito and his fast dual wielding slashing prowess. And if looking at genital-free naked giants doesn’t turn you off then you’re in for a huge treat. Attack on Titan is a series about humanity’s last bastion against the Titans that are knocking at their walls in hope to devour them whole or eaten flesh by flesh, limb by limb but you get the point right?… its man versus giants. But AOT2 Final Battle is a continuation of that story, an upgrade pack that can be bought separately or bought as a bundle for newcomers wishing to get into the titan-slaying action that is AOT.

So for the sake of this review, we’ll mostly talk about the Final Battle upgrade but follow the link (https://invisioncommunity.co.uk/a-o-t-2-attack-on-titan-2-review/) to know more about the base game.

Now with that out of the way, Attack on Titan 2 Final Battle is like I said, a continuation of the story which added in the content from the third season of the anime. But unlike the base game’s story told from the point of view of your custom character, Final Battle introduces a timeline-based storytelling in Character Episode Mode told with the eyes of the original cast of characters. So if you’ve already seen its source material, there’s really nothing much to surprise you until the last few bits. However when talking about timeline-based and branching story arches, I’m reminded of the glorious mess that is Dead or Alive 6 with things like chronological order being the last thing I want to worry about. However unlike the large branches of DOA6’s character episodes, Final Battle only has a few and is well-lined up to make sure you know which should be done first before the other. Although should you choose to follow a straight path just like how I always like to play my games before fiddling with the side quests and what not, it becomes a cluttered mess all the same with most of the bits being left out until you’ve played the game from another perspective. And this is my main gripe with this kind of storytelling, you have the freedom to do what you want to do first but at the cost of missing out on the full story until much later.

Aside from its story content, the upgrade also introduces the Territory Recovery Mode which strips away the story elements and tackles the oddities of being your own commander and slowly building your own regiment and reclaiming the land from the roaming titans. It adds in more of that Dynasty Warriors feel being developed by Omega Force after all, where you can freely explore and discover but with more verticality and less of that button-mashy combos. There’s much to enjoy in this mode as you progress without the constraints of contradicting the story progression as you play with characters that are supposedly dead or just straight out the so-called enemy of humanity.

Similarly, now that the story has progressed further towards its third season, we now get introduced to new gameplay elements like ranged weaponry commonly outfitted by the enemies you’ll face in the first part of the Character Episode Mode. This lets you play with guns, whether slow firing cannons or bullet-crazy gattling guns that rips enemies to shreds and is a nice way to get out of the usual and repetitive flashy slashing action. Another gameplay element that gets added is the Thunder Spears that can be activated by pressing both L3 and R3 together that gives you the firepower to blast titans to kingdom come. This is an iconic weapon from the manga and anime specifically designed to pierce even the toughest of hides of the Armored Titan. Having these new elements adds more flavor to the usually repetitive but undoubtedly fun combat whether you’re playing the new modes or the older ones.

Overall, Attack on Titan 2 Final Battle is outright fun but an extensively repetitive experience. Newcomers can enjoy it for its full story from the first to the third season but nothing says manga and anime better than actual manga and anime. However fans of the series can appreciate it’s true to life representation from its source material while still having fun at just zipping in and out and slashing left and right without reservations thanks to (in my opinion) the game’s best feature, Territory Recovery which simply gives you that freedom. And the crazy weapon designs help a lot to seal the deal for me too. Because nothing says, fiery sword of destruction like an actual sword stripped from the fiery depths of hell itself.