Dementium II is the sequel to the Survival Horror FPS game
Dementium: The Ward, by Renegade Kid. Like its predecessor, Dementium II is a Survival Horror FPS, and what it does, it does exceedingly well.
In
Dementium: The Ward, you assume the role of William Redmoor, a patient trapped within his own nightmares. A Doctor had trapped you there in what he referred to as "phase 1." The game was short, but eventful and entertaining.
Dementium II picks up where the first one left off, with William waking up after his brain surgery, being told he was out for about 5 days, but now had to be moved as the Doctors needed his bed. You are escorted to a cell in clearly what looks like a jail, and after a brief touch-screen tutorial (how to examine, how to look, how to move) you are immediately thrown into a psychotic other world full of monstrosities and chains. Needless to say,
Dementium II holds nothing back. Unfortunately the storytelling elements are kind of slow and a little clunky, mostly focusing on your willingness to explore and find notes scattered around the hospital, but if you're willing to do the leg work it's well worth it.
Graphically,
Dementium II is beautiful as far as DS games are concerned. High quality texture and model work mesh as well as they did in the first, creating believable and chilling environments. In theme,
Dementium II takes after Silent Hill. William is careened around a maddening psychotic prison one moment, full of monsters and blood, and the next he is being assaulted by prison guards. The point of separation is how quickly the monsters begin to invade even the normal prison, creating a very gripping and suspenseful experience.
Dementium II's gameplay mechanics are clean, precise, and streamlined. Boasting a variety of weapons, from shanks to sledgehammers to revolvers,
Dementium II manages to inject fun and well tuned combat into the Survival Horror genre, one pitfall many of the best games cannot seem to overcome.
Aiming is accomplished by manipulating the touch screen with the stylus, attacking with the triggers, and crouching/jumping also handled by convenient buttons on the touch screen. Weapons are easliy swapped with the inventory button, allowing for a quick med or gun reload if necessary, allowing
Dementium II to shift the difficulty to the boss fight or enemies, instead of making the interface your greatest foe.
The map is extremely easy to read and use, updating itself for you with locked and open doors, and one massive improvement over the previous game is that when backtracking enemies do not respawn, which encourages exploration and makes the game a lot less tedious. That is not to say the game is not challenging, but it eases the new player into the game with a smooth learning curve.
Music is adequately creepy and mournful, featuring some of the main track from the previous game, however the real audio quality comes from the use of sound effects.
Dementium II doesn't rely on black and no-combat-with-flashlight to create horror the same way its predecessor did, it uses sound and environments to keep you on your toes and biting your fingernails. Creepy scarab beetles and screaming inmates, chains rattling and combat's hectic discord are all executed masterfully.
Presentation - 8
> somewhat tedious storytelling practices as well as being a kinda short game take some points off in my book.
Graphics - 9
> the game is just as great to look at as the first one, and their other game 'Moon', Renegade Kid clearly knows what they are doing.
Gameplay - 9.5
> it's not a 'scare the shit out of you' horror game, but it's creepy and maddening and all around fun to play and experience. Sometimes the storytelling gets in the way, but more often than not it's a gripping experience and certainly action packed.
Audio - 8
> the music is creepy as hell and the sound effects managed to make me jump on multiple occasions, but some of the audio is somewhat low quality (as in compression), unlike a lot of other DS games.
Overall - 8.6 / 10
> a very impressive game, and it's absolutely the sort of Survival Horror game that the industry needs. Not quite as impressive as Renegade Kid's "Moon" but it's still definitely worth a play for anyone who enjoys Horror games.
Prepare for phase 2
Discord
Light Style