The Surge 2

Deck13 have risen far from their bland and uninspiring Lords of the Fallen outing and have crafted a good mechanical and industrial soulslike in the first The Surge. With the second one, they've elevated dancing, stamina based combat, meaty and gory dismemberments and a small, compact world full of twisting paths and shortcuts to an artform.
The Surge 2 puts you in the role of an anonymous Jane/Joe Doe, flying into Jericho City on a plane that gets knocked out of the skies by some kind of disaster. After a few flashbacks of a young girl that was seemingly on the plane with you, you wake up in a prison hospital and need to punch, chop, sever and mutilate your way out through some escaped prisoners, security bots and a heated fight with the prison warden.
The story quickly dissolves into typical sci-fi meanderings of AI, mergers of man and machine, some kind of cyberdisease called Defrag, grizzled military jacks, nano machines absorbing everything and turning the world into Grey Goo and all the other tropes you can imagine. Tried and trusted. There are a few interesting characters and some side quests thrown into the mix, but they all seem to be on the comedic side and are not really taken seriously.
The true stars here are Jericho City itself, with it's districts, twisting and looping alleys, passages and shortcuts, the game's flowing, breakdance style, chunky combat and the satisfying character progression of collecting weapons and armour pieces and mix and matching them until you're satisfied with the bonuses. Or fashion, like any true Souls player knows.
Combat is very dancelike, swings and stabs pushing you forward or sideways as you execute them, swankily melding into finishers and limb chopping. But beware of button mashing. One button press does not always mean one swing and overeagerness will quickly drain you of stamina and leave you exposed. And you will die fast, as enemies pack a real punch, and will flatten you with just a few swings.
Dodging doesn't really give you any iframes and you need to pay attention to the direction of enemy swings. Directional parrying is also a great addition to the game, allowing you to quick parry enemies, temporarily stunning them and allowing you to execute huge hits. When you master this, it sometimes feels slightly overpowered. Battery power, usable for healing, finishing moves and several boost injections, is gained by attacking enemies.
There's a large amount of different armours and weapons you can cleave and scrap from various gangs, military and robots wandering Jericho City. Targeting individual body parts and then breaking the armour allows you to do a finishing move when the enemies' health bar drops low enough, divesting them of the targeted part with an assortment of deathblow animations. When you do it for the first time, you get a schematic for the part, each subsequent dismemberment gets you upgrade parts depending on the level of the enemy.
Armours come in three classes, operator, sentinel and goliath (light, medium and heavy) and give half and full set bonuses usually corresponding to the type of armour. In combination with a plethora of weapon types, from one handed metal scrap blades to giant military axes spewing electricity, you can create builds that focus on specific game mechanics. You could be a heavily armoured tank that relies on blocking and parrying to deliver monstrous blows with a giant piece of machinery or a nimble, fleet footed warrior that uses quick stab attacks with a spear and has reduced stamina costs for dodging.
The drone got a hefty upgrade from the first game and is really useful this time, coming with a few different weapons and abilities. You'll acquire it very quickly and there are armours and implants that synchronize very well with it and it can become a viable build.
You can freely combine and experiment with different builds and your basic stats can be reset for a very meager tech scrap cost, the game's currency for upgrading. You can further boost your build mechanics with implants, adding even more stat and ability boosting bonuses. Each armour part and implant uses power that increases with your main level. The better the armour part or implant, the more power it uses. A minor gripe, certain combinations become a bit unbalanced and very powerful and can easily make the game a breeze or a leisurely stroll to the end.
The bosses are kind of hit and miss. Some are very easy even with inferior equipment, while some are annoyingly tough, multi phased, with weirdly directed attacks and iffy animations to judge them properly. Even with that, levelling, properly equipping yourself and learning those janky patterns can turn them into milder irritations.
Medbays are positioned fairly and finding the shortcuts will sometimes surprise you with how well they loop around and make your trips to the boss fights or the place where you got your head smacked in, losing the scrap, short and relatively hassle free. Online play consists of painting graffiti with your drone, leaving messages or a mini game of hiding your banner and the less players find it, the larger your tech scrap reward is when time runs out. It's a bit useless and gimmicky. You can easily farm more scrap than the mini game gives out.
The arhitecture of the City, lots of tight corridors and a few bosses that move fast do cause some camera problems. In the boss fights, you can usually outdistance it until the camera settles down, but tight corridors are another pair of gloves, often causing you to take hits because you're staring at a piece of a brick wall or steel instead of the enemy. And there were some visual bugs and glitches, but nothing major or game breaking.
The Kraken DLC, accessed rather late in the game, continues with the man vs. machine story, puts you on a decommissioned aircraft carrier, VBS Krakow, and pits you against robotic pirates in a strange 90's sitcom neighbourhood built on the carrier. It's a bit short, with some tough enemies and a combat arena when you finish, but is otherwise just more of The Surge 2. And that's a good thing. All other DLC's, even the paid ones, are purely cosmetic, bring nothing to the gameplay and are easily avoided.
The Surge 2 improves on the first game in every way. From the bedlam that is Jericho City to the really crunchy, satisfying combat, Deck13 have fused very solid gameplay parts to some slightly brittle tehnical and story ones, but have made a sturdy, enjoyable compound that stands as a solid and competent soulslike.
Take a peek inside the Cabinet of Curiosities if you like to walk off the beaten path and only sometimes return to the main roads. You might find something worth exploring. And if you do, thank you for the visit.
Follow the Average Achievement Hunter Curator for reviews and useful information on Steam achievements: Most of the achievements are straightforward, there are a couple of side quests you need to pay attention to, a few collectible missables and the game has 2 ending achievemenents. If you miss anything, there's NG+.

Rating: 8.5/10
Genre: Third Person RPG/ Sci-fi
THE GOOD:
+ Unlike the first Surge game with its tight corridor level design, Surge 2 takes a more open concept approach. The level design in the first half of the game is rewarding. The main hub city has back streets, alley ways, roof tops, stairways all to explore. The city is filled with shortcuts to unlock and the more you discover the more you realize just how well designed the main city is. Other areas are equally impressive offering plenty of rewards and shortcuts.
+ A variety of different armor sets, weapons and implants to customize any build you prefer. You can save up to 3 different loud outs and switch between them
+ Combat remains mostly the same. The goal is to chop off different body parts so you can craft and upgrade your own armor. Different weapon types each have their own feel and weight to them so experimenting with one that you feel comfortable with is always encouraged. Managing your health, stamina and energy is the key to successful combat. Unlike other ‘souls’ like games, blocking isn’t really necessary as you can easily dodge most attacks. Leveling your character and finding the right build, you can easily ‘brute force’ your way through enemy encounters without too much worry about dying.
+ Difficulty balance has been greatly improved over its predecessor. While the first game had a very steep difficulty curve, Surge 2 makes things more accessible. More open level design means more space to engage and maneuver around enemies with a lot less surprises. In addition, you are giving an implant right from the very start that converts energy to health so dying becomes less frequent. The game is still challenging but a whole lot less frustrating.
THE AVERAGE:
- The second half of the game is where certain levels feel more confusing than rewarding.
- The story is merely a backdrop to move you from point A to point B. The characters are not interesting and most of the back story is told through audio logs scattered around each level.
- Plenty of side quests and many of them reward you with good items but almost all of them have you collect an item and bring it back to the NPC. Some side quests can even be failed. You could just as easily remove most side quests from the game and nothing of value would be lost. Only one side quest involving a certain ‘iron mouse’ is decent.
- The dlc – The Kraken is decent; it provides a solid 1-2 hours of extra content but compared to the rest of the game and even the previous DLC from the first game this seems like lesser quality. You can only access the DLC near the end of the game and it feels out of place.
THE BAD:
- Due to the story, the game isn’t always clear where you are suppose to go next, a clearer indication of your next objective and where your suppose to go would have been helpful.
- fast travel is introduced late in the game and by that point you would have likely done everything the game has to offer so it seems like a waste.
CONCLUSION:
Surge 2 overall is another excellent game in the series and one of my favorite ‘souls’ like games on the market. I like Surge 1 and 2 equally for different reasons.

For those who have stuttering or frame rate problems:
Go to task manager (Windows 10) -> Select TheSurge2.exe -> Go to details -> Set Afinity (uncheck the last two cores; press okay; and then re-enable them). Done. You will have no stuttering or frame drops issues anymore (I wasn't really able to play before, since it had major stutters when experiencing frame drops from 150 to 90 fps). What you can also do is to lock your frames at 60/75/xx frames. I also reduced "Lense Flare" effects to 30%..I mean, do we really need J.J. Abrams in a game? ;)
Well now to the game:
I liked "The Surge" a lot but "The Surge 2" is so much better. I think this has become one of my all time favorite games so far.
+ Combat (one of the best I've ever experienced, makes soooo much fun)
+ Crafting (engages you to find all schematics and weapons)
+ Loot (yeah, there is a lot out there to find)
+ Story (Continues the story of the first game; It is not the main focus of the game though)
+ Bosses (They look really good, some of them are amazing)
+ World (Design of the world is fantastic)
+ NG+ is engaging, makes you want to play more and reach higher levels to create better builds!
Some drawbacks:
- Entering a different area requires loading
- There are still some bugs when it comes to side-quests (like the Garden Planting Quest)
- Camera is quite good, but sometimes (if you are locked on a target) you cannot see everything around you
Final Conclusion:
This game might not be for everyone, because it takes some time to get into the story and to learn the fighting mechanics properly, but if you invest the time, you will not be disappointed! It really has one of the best fighting mechanics out there. I just love it!

The Surge 2 is one of the best "Souls-Like" games ever made. (No spoilers below).
It's a shame that the mediocrity of the first Surge has almost certainly caused many would-be fans to simply ignore it on premise.
The Surge 2 is not a perfect game. The performance on PC leaves much to be desired, the voice acting is not great, the story is mediocre, and there is a persistent aura of a AA developer "near-polish" where things are often slightly more buggy or sub-par than you would otherwise expect them to be (but can you really blame a AA developer for putting out a AA-looking game?).
But in almost everything else, The Surge 2 shines. The combat is ridiculously satisfying, build customization potential is off the charts, and the risk-reward element that is the key to many of the mechanics in any souls-like game is perfected here.
I can't think of any other game like this where, if you see any piece of equipment you like, you have to literally target the specific enemy body part and damage it enough to cut it off in order to collect the schematics and materials for that armor piece. Throw in directional parrying, charge attacks, your drone attacks, and the hundreds of combinations of rig implants, and you've got a combat system that is arguably deeper and more varied than any other souls-like.
The rig power level system allows for amazing potential for customization. Leveling your rig increases its power level, which allows you to equip more implants and stronger armor pieces. This makes tweaking and perfecting your desired build extremely fun, as you weigh the costs and benefits of what items you want to equip. Thankfully the character menu has three loadout slots that you can switch between at any time, so you don't have to be married to a single build.
The battery system in the game, which serves almost as a "mana" bar, is genius. Similar to the enemy armor system, it gives the player more risk-reward decisions to make during combat. Attacking enemies charges your batteries, while using consumables or executing enemies consumes a battery. However, certain implants and armor sets benefit from keeping your batteries charge, while others--that have effects triggered upon filling a battery--benefit from emptying them as quickly as possible.
The death system is great as well. As with any souls-like, your drop your currency/xp (called "Tech Scrap" in this game) upon death, and you must recover it or lose it forever. However, respawning after death begins a timer. When that timer expires, the tech scrap is lost, but you can extend the timer by killing enemies along the way. But wait! Even though there is a timer, you might not want to pick it up right away. Your nearby dropped tech scrap will slowly heal you over time if left untouched, which may be key to you defeating that boss or group of enemies that killed you the first time.
This game is just so fun to play, and I wish it got the attention it deserved.

This game is currently in the Humble Bundle for July 2021. If you are interested in the game and it's before August 3rd, 2021, consider picking up the game as part of the current monthly bundle.
This is a Dark Souls title with a science fiction slant and some new twists to the formula. While the original title in this series was rough if I’m being generous, this feels like a great new addition with a more fluid battle system and a great loot system. ‘
A big piece of the Surge 2 is players can cut parts of enemies off them in a brutal fashion and then collect them for their inventory or research. Players can target different parts of the enemy's body, both armored and unarmored for different effects, and there’s a very solid directional blocking mechanism that adds a lot to the title.
But make no mistake, this is still a souls game so expect a challenging experience and a decent difficulty.
Pick this up if you enjoy Dark Souls or Bloodborne-style games, but if you’re tired of them or have never really gotten into them, The Surge 2 is probably not for you. It’s very clear what genre this game belongs to and they deliver on it.
If you enjoyed this review or want to know what I think of other games in the bundle, check out the full review on or subscribe to my youtube channel:

Unpopular opinion incoming: I liked ''The Surge'' better than it's sequel, it was way more memorable in my opinion. I also liked Dark Souls 2 which is also considered blasphemy so there's that. Still it's a good game I could easily recommend.

Was a big fan of the first game so I was really looking to play this one. I would agree that it's definitely better in most aspects and it exceeded my expectations! Had a blast playing this one and hoping to see what the Surge 3 will bring!
The Good
+ Stunning visuals (the city setting looks really lived in and a lot better compared to the confined building setting of the first game)
+ Lots of weapon variety to choose from (Tried all of them and I think the fast weapons are a bit too good)
+ Armors have partial set bonuses now so there is a lot of customizability
+ Engaging block mechanic (has directional block so it adds an additional tactical layer to the game)
+ Bosses were fun and challenging
+ Animation for chopping limbs are still satisfying 30 hours into the game
+ There's characters from the first game that makes appearances
The Bad
- The story was a bit meh and uninteresting (I wished they just focused on the aftermath of the nanite spread rather than the adventures of a missing girl)
- Some maps were restart traps - there are areas in the game where your character will get stuck and you would need to restart
Overall, this one is still a must try for me and an easy recommendation!