What is it?

A 3rd person, open world, japanime, high fantasy, superhero, action/adventure.

Whats good?

Superbly original mechanics and gameplay, awe inspiring exploration and vistas, addicting sidequests and scavenging, adorable heroine.

Whats bad?

Camera hiccups, combat can become tiresome and tedious, story leaves much to be desired, insta-fail stealth missions, a couple grindy trophies.

Released 2017	SIE Japan Studio	Sony Computer Entertainment
Last Trophy: 2017-02-04	Completion: 100%	Highest Trophy: Platinum

Full Review

Gravity Rush 2 is a huge game. I don’t usually track how long I play a game but somewhere around two thirds of the way through I really noticed it. The odd thing though was it wasn’t an annoyance being so big I was still enjoying the game immensely but just had to take a moment to recognize wow there is a lot of game here. Bear in mind I was completing every side quest as it became available and I spent a lot of time being sidetracked by scavenging for collectible gems littered around the world or by the random online treasure hunt events that never stop coming in. That being said I have platinumed games such as Far Cry Primal in a weekend and I am positive I have put more time into Gravity Rush 2 then I did to platinum Watch Dogs 2.

I didn’t find the story in Gravity Rush 2 very compelling however it does get a lot more tense and interesting in the last quarter of the game. Usually a weak story would be a big deal for me as my favorite games are story driven but in this case it really didn’t affect my overall enjoyment of the game. Basically you pick up playing as Kat aka the Gravity Queen sometime after the first game. Kat is an ultra cute, super happy to please, super girl. She’s easily one of my top video game crushes along with the revamped Lara Croft, Ciri from Witcher 3 and the dynamic duo of femme fatales from the Uncharted series, namely, Chloe Frazer and Elena Fisher.

The rest of the characters are pretty fucking annoying for the most part but considering you never have to watch cut scenes or hear them speak it’s easy to button mash through the comic book inspired story parts. When Gravity Rush 2 begins you are kind of a work slave on a mining crew stranded with your friend Syd and you have lost your magical cat Dusty and the gravity powers he gives you. If that sounds stupid to you don’t worry you’re not alone because it is. Nonetheless if you can get past the ridiculous set up you will eventually find your beloved magical cat and regain your gravity shifting powers and that’s when the game opens up. You end up at a new city your boss who was a complete bitch to you is being muscled by some pirate guy and his brother. After some shenanigans you become allies even though the pirate guy is a complete douche. Basically everyone you meet is an asshole who uses you and treats you like an idiot and unfortunately there is no karmic choice options to smack the shit out of them at any point. The story goes on about a corrupt city council, weird monsters that come out of gravity storms, rich townsfolk mistreating the poor townsfolk, a military gone mad and a living city that eats other cities. Sort of like Unicron in the Transformers movie. Oh and all of this is occurs in the first half of the game, before you get sucked through a gravity worm hole and end up back in the city from the original game. Anyway like I said the story is not my cup of tea at all however I was still able to enjoy the shit out of the game because the gameplay is just so much fun. I literally want to ransom someone at DC comics to pay Japan Studio to make a Superman game. Rocksteady did an amazing job with the Arkham series but the flying in Gravity Rush is amazing and gives me goosebumps when I think of what they could finesse out of a Superman inspired game.

Gravity Rush 2’s strength is showcased when you aren’t actually doing any of the missions. Just about any time you aren’t in a mission there will be several available objectives on the minimap. As someone who always has a whack of games waiting to be played, I like to get right down to business and map out the most efficient way to clear out side missions. More often than not though I’ll notice an hour or more has slipped by and I haven’t even started the next mission. Nope instead I’ve been free falling around town looking for hidden gems, snapping pictures, taking selfies or responding to online treasure hunts and event challenges. It’s actually really frustrating that it’s so easy to be distracted as I’d really like to knock a few more games off my list but I just can’t help myself. I have never been much into in-game photography or social features but Gravity Rush 2 sort of has me hooked on them and they did it in such a non intrusive way. So to Japan Studio, shame on you but at the same time great job you clever fucks!

I never played the PS4 Remaster of the original Gravity Rush but I did play the original on the Vita within the last year or so. I really did enjoy it and the game is easily one of, if not, the best Vita games I have ever played, however I had a few serious gripes with the controls. I could never really nail the gravity slide and for some reason I had a hell of a time aiming myself during combat to the point it really detracted from my overall enjoyment of the game. Of course the control issues could easily have been a Vita thing more so than a Gravity Rush thing. The other thing to consider about my take on the original Vita game is that I don’t really like handheld games especially for long gameplay sessions so it took quite a bit longer than usual to beat the original than it probably should have.

I gave up on pretty much any gravity sliding challenge in the original and rarely, if ever, used it at all. That’s not the case with Gravity Rush 2. Gravity sliding is far easier and it makes the ability a lot of fun to use. Because of this I got the gold rating for all challenges for which gravity sliding is absolutely essential. That being said gravity sliding can still be a bit wonky in tight corridors but that should be expected when taking into consideration the skill is actually tilting the gravity so you are sliding down a surface and not that you are sticking to a surface and sliding along it. For the most part the game isn’t played in constricting spaces so it’s generally a non issue but it can be pretty rage inducing the few times it happens.

Combat is also a lot more refined in Gravity Rush 2. Not only do the PS4 controls just instinctively work better for me but Japan Studio also expanded the arsenal of Kat’s abilities with different stances (although I don’t think they call them stances, shhh.) In addition to the classic stance you are given the options to switch at any time, even during combat, to either the heavy slow stance (Jupiter) or the light and fast stance (Lunar). These new stances both share the same abilities you have in regular stance but they are tweaked in a few interesting ways. For example the Lunar style gravity kicks are teleporter kicks which help to hit aerial targets you would usually miss with the original gravity kick, and in the Jupiter stance the gravity kick becomes a slower more powerful charged up attack that causes a devastating explosion upon impact. That explosion helps tremendously with groups of land based enemies and is also handy for taking out clusters of ore deposits if you can stomach the mining grind.

The stances have a few other differences when it comes to speed, jump height, and attack damage which are easy to figure out based on the stance idea but nothing too major. Although neither of the stances are game breaking they do offer some fine tuning during combat encounters which helps even out the bore of repetitive gravity kick chaining from the original title. The other thing to note about combat is just how over powered stasis field is. In and of itself the ability is fairly strong as you can literally pick up armed guards 4-6 at a time and toss them as projectiles at other guards but to make it even more overpowered, early on in my playthrough I found a talisman that automatically picked up items and put them in stasis while expanding how many items I could carry at one time. It completely trivialized a lot of fights and challenges but alas I won’t complain as I do enjoy getting trophies.

Talking about talismans they are a new addition to Gravity Rush 2 that allow for slight tweaks to your special abilities. You can choose attack modifiers, health modifiers, defense modifiers, specific skill enhancements and even some fun unique ones like the aforementioned auto stasis talisman and another that attracts any nearby NPC dog to follow Kat around like the pied piper. As for gem farming you can use those to upgrade your main abilities just as in the first one however I found this time around the sheer volume of gems required was ridiculous. At about two thirds through the game I was sitting at about 25,000 gems. There is a gold trophy for collecting 60,000 not to mention another trophy for upgrading all of her skills which takes over 80,000 gems. That end run grind to get the last trophy before the platuinum was a giant letdown and sort of ruined the greatness that came before it. Oh well all in all it was a great game, unique, fun a little cute and it coughed up a shiny new platinum trophy for me.

How does it rate...		Other games in that category...
3rd person game	A	The Last of Us, Metal Gear Solid 5, GTA 5, The Witcher 3
Open world game	A++	AC4: Black Flag, Batman:Arkham City, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Japanime game	A++	Gravity Rush, Persona 5, Nier: Automata
High fantasy game	A+	The Witcher 3, Shadow of Mordor, Journey, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Superhero game	A+	Batman:Arkham City, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Infamous Second Son
Action/adventure game	A	The Last of Us, Metal Gear Solid 5, GTA 5, The Witcher 3, Uncharted 2

If you are curious to see how I have ranked other PS4 games you can see the full list here: https://steemit.com/gaming/@johnquake/current-gen-game-rankings-ps4

Putting my money where my mouth is here is my personal Gravity Rush 2 trophy list: https://psnprofiles.com/trophies/5765-gravity-rush-2/Johnquake

* Note: These ratings are based on my personally rated games as of the time of this posting. Additions and Alterations made to after this date will not be reflected in the written review. For anyone wondering why I include a link to my trophy profile the answer is simple enough, it's an easy way to verify how much of the game I have actually played whereas with most reviews it's unclear if the reviewer had only spent a handful of hours on a game they praise or slam.

The best Gravity Rush 2 Trophy hunters resource:
http://www.playstationtrophies.org/game/gravity-rush-2/trophies/