High On Life 2 Review - Comedy At A Cost

If you've never played High On Life before and are open to the idea of a comedy game, you're potentially missing out. In the '90s, these types of irreverent and risky projects flowed like water, but now they're fewer and far between. Enter High On Life 2.

A sequel to the 2022 shooter, Squanch Games is back, and they have some new tricks up their sleeves. Just don't expect all the rough edges from the original to be fully sanded over.

High On Life 2 Is Still Irreverent Fun

The Comedy Angle Still Works

High on Life 2 kicks off five years after the events of the original game, continuing your story as a star bounty hunter who saved humanity. On the way to one of your many celebrity events in the sequel, you learn that your sister, Lizzie, is one of the top bounties in the galaxy. From there, you'll become embroiled in a galactic conspiracy and plenty of meta-silliness. Oh, and your guns talk. Often.

If you haven't played the original, the High On Life series is exceedingly meta, to the point where it has myriad real-life references and gags, including fully-featured B-movies playing in the game. It never quite gets to the point where it's too much (Deadpool can often go there), as Squanch Games' signature brand of humor tends not to linger too much on any single joke.

This time around, the story is a bit more, we'll say...urgent. Instead of slowly working through bounties and uncovering what the game is really about, like in the original, you're pretty much in the thick of things right away. It's a distinctly different feel, and one I didn't really mind as it helps the sequel stand apart from the original.

Initially, I wondered how the team would top the original's over-the-top approach, but (without spoiling anything specific) they found many ways to sprinkle in weirdness throughout, including at least one unconventional boss fight. Not all of the jokes hit this time around (the gun banter is too on-the-nose sometimes), but you will be entertained throughout, especially once the narrative starts to wrap.

This Series' Rough Edges Remain

Including Some Crashing On PC

Gameplay-wise, on paper, High On Life 2 also does a great job of setting itself apart from its predecessor. The key ingredient is the addition of a skateboard, which you'll acquire very early in the game, and turns your dash into a first-person Tony Hawk mechanic. You can grind on rails while shooting, which plays into just about every encounter in the game, and offers more environmental variety and verticality to the arenas.

It's a refreshing change of pace, and I ended up exploring more of the game world because the skateboard works so well. The ability to grapple from the first game returns, as do a few other movement systems, intertwined with the game's many light puzzle sequences.

Enemies are also a bit more varied this time, with bounty hunter baddies donning suits that can split apart after death, creating more threats. The bosses, however, remain a sore point. The bullet-spongey feel of the original bosses returns, coupled with some awkward (and in a few cases, glitchy) transitions between phases. Even in the sequel, bosses generally feature a small moveset that is easy to counter and stay ahead of after learning their patterns in less than 30 seconds. I also had a few hitbox issues with some bosses, which are much more noticeable than when shredding through meatshields.

Speaking of glitches, I had a few notable bugs during my playthrough of High On Life 2. On around five occasions, I had to restart checkpoints to "fix" some elements of the environment. Whether it was a small puzzle sequence that needed to trigger something specific or a wave of enemies that didn't spawn, it was jarring to see it happen multiple times.

To the game's credit, the auto-save system is fairly frequent, so the most progress I lost in these cases amounted to a few minutes. But the real issue is that, since this is a jokey game, not knowing when the joke ends and the glitches begin can be an issue. I can see a lot of players simply forging ahead during a bug and wasting some time, expecting it to pay off. I did it several times, and after spending a few minutes roaming around, I reloaded the checkpoint and everything worked correctly.

In two instances, my game also crashed on PC when utilizing one of the game's power-ups. Some of these issues are known to Squanch Games and will be addressed in an upcoming patch, so keep that in mind.

I Hope We Get Another High On Life Game

Despite Its Blemishes, It's Great Having It Around

For all its faults, I'm still over the moon that Squanch Games is putting these games out. Trover Saves the Universe was kind of a proof of concept for a game like this, and the original High On Life caught a lot of people off guard, leading to this very sequel.

If the team can refine things a bit with the next iteration, they could have another hit. For now, High On Life 2 stands as a conditional recommendation.