Neon Abyss 2 Review Summary

Multiplayer is a major highlight: The addition of online co-op multiplayer for up to four players is overwhelmingly praised as the game's most significant and enjoyable new feature. Players love the ability to play with friends, leading to more chaotic and fun experiences, especially during boss fights.

Strong and improved sequel: The game is consistently lauded as a strong and improved sequel, retaining the core appeal of the first game while enhancing graphics, art style, and overall visual performance. Players appreciate the expanded content, refined mechanics, and increased depth compared to its predecessor.

Engaging roguelike gameplay: Players find the game's roguelike gameplay to be highly enjoyable, addictive, and fun, offering a satisfying experience for both new and experienced players. The fast-paced combat, unique runs, and engaging progression contribute to its high replayability.

Rich and varied content: The game features a vast and rich array of new content, including a greatly upgraded weapon system with creative and unlockable guns, and an abundant item pool with clear descriptions and pop culture references. This variety enhances build diversity and overall gameplay.

Innovative Faith system: The new Faith system is a significant and well-received innovation, adding strategic depth and unique gameplay experiences, particularly the gambling-oriented faith. This system, along with new characters, weapons, and items, contributes to more varied and less formulaic builds.

Prevalent Bugs and Performance Issues: A significant number of players report numerous bugs, ranging from UI glitches and unresponsive interactions to game-breaking issues like being stuck or losing save files. Performance problems, including frequent stuttering and lag, are also prevalent, severely impacting gameplay, especially in multiplayer.

Unsatisfying Roguelike Experience: Many players feel the game lacks the core satisfaction and progression of a roguelike, especially when compared to its predecessor. It's perceived as an unpolished, unfinished product that doesn't offer enough new content or a compelling sense of character development.

Poor Multiplayer Design: The multiplayer mode is heavily criticized for its shared resource and item drop system, which often leads to conflict and an unfair distribution among players. This design choice, combined with general instability and bugs, makes the co-op experience frustrating and unenjoyable.

Weak Item Synergy and Impact: The item system is widely criticized for its lack of synergy, unclear descriptions, and minimal impact on gameplay. Many items are considered useless or provide negligible buffs, making builds feel unvaried and progression less exciting compared to other roguelikes.

Unsatisfying Weapon System: The weapon system is a major point of contention. Players find weapon upgrades slow, unrewarding, and lacking the impactful changes seen in the first game. Many weapons are deemed useless or uninspired, leading to a monotonous combat experience and poor balance.

New 4-player co-op mode: The game introduces a new co-op multiplayer mode for up to four players, allowing for shared exploration and activities like fishing and basketball. Room rewards are shared, and progress is tied to the host. However, reviving teammates costs health and they return with half health, and soul fragments from weapon decomposition can be taken by other players.

Revised weapon upgrade system: The weapon upgrade system has changed, now relying on soul fragments instead of treasures, and offers a choice between two exclusive items. Weapon stats are more conservative, and bonuses are often tied to in-game currency like bombs, coins, and keys, which can feel repetitive.

Deep pet system: The pet (Hajibao) system is extensive, allowing players to hatch, combine, and evolve pets into more powerful forms. Pets provide unique abilities, can block bullets, deal damage, and are crucial for many builds.

Retains core gameplay and visuals: The game retains the core visual style and fast-paced bullet-hell action of its predecessor, featuring vibrant neon colors and fluid movement. Level design is reasonable, and combat feels impactful with screen shake.

Varied weapon and item builds: The game features a wide variety of weapons, including new melee and hybrid types, allowing for diverse builds. While there are rich item combos, the overall synergy and build complexity can feel somewhat simplistic.

Persistent stuttering and frame drops: Many players report frequent stuttering and significant frame drops, impacting gameplay fluidity. While some improvements were noted post-launch, the issue persists for many, even on high-end systems.

Improved bug stability: While some players report a lack of major bugs in the current version, there's a mention of the demo having numerous bugs. This suggests an improvement in stability since the demo, but some minor issues might still exist.

Default 4K resolution: The game defaults to 4K resolution upon initial entry, which might be inconvenient for users with lower resolution displays or those who prefer different settings.

Difficulty selection bug: One player experienced an initial bug where the game was stuck at the difficulty selection screen, preventing progression.

Limited resolution options: A player questioned if 1280p was the only available resolution, suggesting a potential lack of clarity or limited resolution options.

Mixed purchase recommendations: There's mixed sentiment regarding immediate purchase. Many recommend waiting for further development, bug fixes, and content, especially if they are fans of the first game. Some, however, believe it's worth buying now.

Early Access needs optimization: Players acknowledge the game is in Early Access and express a strong desire for continuous optimization, bug fixes, and new content. They are hopeful for the game's future development and frequent updates.

Improve multiplayer item drops: A significant point of feedback is the need for individual item drops in multiplayer mode, rather than shared drops. Players feel this would greatly improve the co-op experience.

Rebalance weapons and items: Players suggest rebalancing weapons and items, specifically by adding attack speed items to make initial weapons more viable and increasing overall item synergy.

Enhance boss mechanics: Feedback indicates a desire for more challenging boss bullet-hell patterns and the addition of a momentary invincibility or bullet-clearing mechanic after defeating bosses.

Early Access, future updates expected: Players acknowledge the game is in Early Access and expect ongoing development. They anticipate bug fixes, performance improvements, and new content to be added regularly, with some planning to update their reviews as the game evolves.

Mobile version concerns: There's confusion and concern regarding the mobile version of Neon Abyss. Players note it's a separate, licensed product from a different developer, and some hope the PC developers avoid outsourcing mobile games due to issues like excessive content.

Series veteran feedback: Veteran players of the series, especially those who played the first game and its demo, note similarities and improvements. The demo of the second game was particularly engaging, making the first game less appealing.

Roguelike genre identification: The game is recognized as a roguelike shooting game with a cyber-mythology theme. Players compare it to other titles in the genre, indicating its core gameplay loop is understood.

Humor and easter eggs: Players appreciate the game's humor, noting it's full of memes, gags, funny item names, flavor text, mini-boss names, and numerous easter eggs.