Less than three months after being first shown off, Thunderful’s SteamWorld Heist 2 launches is a pretty quiet month. Should players head out for the Great Sea?

SteamWorld Heist 2 Review

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SteamWorld Heist 2 kicks off with players having a skeleton crew and their ship impounded by the Navy – talk about humble beginnings.

However, your crew is deathly loyal, and they help you get your submarine back. While that puts a huge mark on your back from said Navy, you were also planning to steal from them anyway.

You travel the ocean helping out other Steambots by clearing out levels and getting more fresh water. As you progress, you get additional crew members, better ship parts, and even more fame and glory. The ultimate goal? Rally the troops, push back the darkness, and keep the water free from oppression.

The story of this ragtag crew becoming something greater than themselves is certainly a good one, but the real story comes from Captain Leeway. Leeway lost his gun arm, his sub, and his confidence before the start of the game, and you have to help him earn it back.

Being the son of the great Krackenbane, he has a lot to live up to, and that pressure often overwhelms him. Despite this, his crew is adamant that he is the man to lead them. They believed in him, and as a result, I believed in him.

At that point, the rest of SteamWorld Heist 2’s story didn’t matter much to me; it was now all about getting my man his gun arm back and regaining his confidence.

To do this, you take on missions from various areas of the world. Most are quick affairs, with SteamWorld 2 having that “one more run” feeling in spades. Mission types vary, but since the game has “Heist” in the title, one is often stealing loot from someone or something.

On that note, players will have a set amount of turns to get said loot before it disappears. After securing the loot, players will have to fight back to the ship to escape. How one actually gets to the loot is up to you, because this game really lets you play the way you want to play.

For instance, there are no penalties for playing on easy or even quitting a level. Each character starts with a class, but you are highly encouraged to swap their class. In fact, not only is it encouraged, but on higher difficulties, it is mandatory. By switching to other classes, you can then learn the moves from that class.

Let’s say you are a Sniper, but you want to be able to move really far and shoot each time. By swapping into the Flanker class, you can Wheel and Deal, which lets you move twice and then shoot.

As for the combat itself, it’s pretty simple – at least, at first. Every class has their own weapon type and starts with one or two abilities.

For instance, Reapers can kill an enemy and then shoot again because they killed someone. Engineers can put down cover and eventually heal allies as well. Melee charges in, and bashes enemy bots to bits.

It’s a simple system, but depending on your skills, classes, and weapons, you can make some incredible things happen. There is nothing like missing with your sniper only to have the bullet bounce off an icicle, which falls onto an explosive barrel and kills three enemies. Happy accidents, as Bob Ross would say.

When you aren’t scraping bots, you are exploring the overworld in your sub. When you first get it, the sub is bare bones; in fact, it can’t even go underwater. As you progress, though, you get new weapons, engines, and boosts and can go underwater.

You can think of this sub as a separate character from the rest of your crew; it needs to be managed, upgraded and kept safe for you to succeed. The best part is that all you have to do is steer and aim; the guns fire on their own. That might sound annoying, but the contrast between combat and open-world exploration is a welcome one.

Besides, it’s nice just to spin the stick until enemy boats sink.

Between missions, you can also hang out at bars to buy items, recruit new allies, and sometimes even receive missions. The bar is also where you will call it a night to rest up your crew.

After you rest, any missions you complete will reward you with bounty coins that you can spend on items, more water, and other upgrades. Any coins not spent are converted to water, and you are reset to zero each day. It’s just another incentive to grind missions for more loot and EXP.

I didn’t run into any bugs or crashes, but there were a couple of annoyances. When aiming down and to the right, your skill bar will sometimes get in the way. The worst part is that a big box with the skill description pops up and takes up a large chunk of that bottom-right sector.

I don’t know if I missed the prompt to remove the box, but man, it was annoying. You can work around it, but you shouldn’t have to. I also had a pretty jarring difficulty spike at one point. I went back and grinded for a bit, and it was good again, but it hit me like a truck.

Fans of the SteamWorld series will be happy with Heist 2. If you like steam bots and robot pirates – and who doesn’t? – pick this one up.

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