The highly anticipated Hello Neighbor 2 was finally released December 6. After releasing a plethora of games prior and allowing players access to alphas and betas, many were excited to finally play the sequel. When I got the email for this review, though, I was actually terrified. I had watched a multitude of Hello Neighbor gameplays when the first game came out, and I knew it was scary. So I didn’t know if I even had the courage to play the game. However, I put my big boy pants on and pressed play. Before I continue this review, I will say that this game is significantly easier than its predecessors.
In Hello Neighbor 2, you are facing a lot more “neighbors” than just Theodore Peterson, which to be honest confused me at first. Considering the first cutscene of the game involves him, I thought that’s who I’d be starting with. But no. In fact, for the first 20 minutes of the game I was completely lost. There’s so many more interactable houses, and the world is a lot larger than that of the first game. Then after exploring, I realized that there was someone standing outside their house, so I assumed I should go there. Then my game really began, as well as my frustration.
The AI needs a lot of improvement to put it lightly. Trying to solve puzzles and explore the house is a frustrating task with the AI. I understand that is the point of the game, but at some points, the enemy would literally just guard the place that I needed to go even if I set off a distraction in an entirely different room. For example, I needed to put the last button in the cash register of the bakery. Gerda, the baker, was stuck in the path of checking the pastries for 10 minutes. It wasn’t until AFTER I let her kill me, she finally moved. On the other hand, there would be times where the AI would glitch and just stay in one place the entire time. Like when I was completing the last puzzle in the museum before rescuing the kid, Theodore would not move. I stepped on creaky floorboards, broken glass, and just straight up started running around, but he stayed in the same room the entire time. I consider this lucky for me because there are less jumpscares and running away from him, but it does ruin the game experience when the only enemy in the game doesn’t work. What’s funny is after that part, the neighbor turns into the literal Flash. Oh, and he sets up traps. So, while the AI was mildly difficult/annoying to play against for 99% of the game, it was tolerable. This part, at least for me, was not tolerable. Traps, inhumane speed, inability to open doors/go to other parts of the house was a huge difficulty jump. Especially considering that when you die, you lose the items you need.
Speaking of dying though, a pro of this title compared to older ones is that the items return to their original place after death. I genuinely think I’d go crazy if they didn’t, since I was already scared to explore and play the game as is. Another pro is the story. I actually went back and watched all the cutscenes since I was too busy being happy I beat another part of the game. Putting the story from the prior games along with this one was really fun. It was also kind of sad though. Not going to spoil the second game, but in my humble opinion, even though what Theodore is doing is messed up, I can get where he’s coming from. I wish the developers focused a little bit more on the story and fleshing it out with dialogue or just longer cutscenes. I feel like the story would make up for a lot of the other less satisfactory parts of the game. Another part of the game I heard people were complaining about was the story and the fact that it ends on a cliffhanger. Ending on cliffhangers is fine, but again, the game already has minimal story to it, so I feel as though that part should’ve been fleshed out a little more in order to make the cliffhanger permissible to the larger audience.
All this to say, the foundation of this game is good. It has a lot of potential, but there are also a lot of problems gameplay wise that make it difficult to pick up. Additionally, the game is actually super quick to finish, with most players finishing it in 4 hours or less (I finished it in 5) and speedrunners in significantly less (under 2 minutes for the record). So, the price of $40 makes it hard to pick up, especially since there isn’t a lot of replayability to the game. I look forward to seeing updates or improvements to the game since I do like the franchise and wish for it to grow.
Hello Neighbor 2 is available for PC via Steam
Related: Reviews by Maryanne Fadonougbo
"I've enjoyed gaming since I was little, playing games like Pokémon, Rayman, and Naruto every day. Besides that though, I've always had a love for writing. Now I am combining the two for the best of both worlds! My ultimate goal is to do narrative design for video games."
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