Little Nightmares 2 is the prequel to the equally as fun to play Little Nightmares where in this game you play as Mono with six as your companion helping you through the ominous world you live in.
I wouldn’t be talking about Little Nightmares if I didn’t mention the effective atmosphere created by the game, take the first chapter for example. A foggy forest that takes advantage of blue tones making you feel cold and lost, seeing things in the distant background ropes shaped like nooses, and a vast number of trees. So many other chapters of the game follow this eerie theme with slight details which are so powerful.
Cute and creepy characters
Firstly, let’s look at the two main characters starting with Six, if you have played the first game you would know her as the girl in the yellow coat you play as who every now and then eats something off the ground viciously with these objects getting bigger and bigger.
Well in this game it’s almost her origin story as we see how she gets her yellow raincoat, and she follows around the character you play as known as Mono. Don’t worry Six still does some very odd thing’s as I walked in on her breaking the fingers on a mannequin’s arm.
Mono has an equally cute design as they start out in a trench coat and a paper bag on their head, unlike Six they don’t go around eating people, but they still have their own ominous mechanic which is repeated throughout the game. My favourite thing between the two characters was how they worked together and who doesn’t want to make them hold hands as they hide from scary monsters.
Speaking of monsters, the main enemies you face in this game are just as detailed and unnerving as the first game, from start to finish each ‘boss’ you face has different mechanics and a different way you deal with them in the end.
However, my least favourite enemy which isn’t even a boss is by far the mannequins, their mechanics are similar to weeping angels in Doctor Who or the Nurses from Silent Hill where if you don’t shine your torch at them they will spring to life and chase you. This is probably one of my worst fears so you can guess I certainly wasn’t enjoying my time in that chapter.
Apart from this I can confidently say that I enjoyed watching how each boss reacted and I definitely got to see the death animations I received from being captured by them, I personally don’t think Mono is a snack, but it seems the enemies think otherwise.
Pleasant puzzles and passionate story
One aspect of little Nightmares I really enjoy are the small puzzles, I never found myself scratching my head wondering how long it would take me to solve them which for me personally is something I enjoy.
Little Nightmares 2 finds the pleasant medium between being a puzzle game but not making the puzzles so difficult that you never want to pick the game up again. I found myself enjoying completing the puzzles, one which really stuck out to me was to do with placing chess pieces in a particular order.
Finally, the story to this game is phenomenal, which is something you’d never expect if you haven’t played a Little Nightmares game before. The characters don’t speak however if you look deeply into the actions of the characters or the environments you are playing in you see that there is a deeper meaning to everything which is occurring.
You may even need to play the game again to understand which is something I am hoping to do in order to unlock the secret ending through collecting all the collectables if you still don’t quite understand the story after that I suggest watching lore dive videos of the game on YouTube as they can be really helpful.
Slight setbacks and short stories
Although I didn’t get stuck on the puzzles there were elements of the game I was stuck at. One of these were defeating enemies using a hammer, if you’ve seen the trailers you have witnessed poor little Mono dragging along a weapon of some sort in these aspects of the game it is a case of if you don’t hit the enemies the first time with it they will grab you and its game over.
I also had to redo one segment of a chapter about 4 times as I kept struggling but I think this is sometimes just down to skill and perseverance as I managed through them and continued to enjoy the game.
A slight pick at the game is I feel like the story was quite short this is another complaint I also had for the first game. There is around 6 or 7 chapters which if you are dedicated to the game and play non-stop you can complete in possibly 6 to 7 hours.
I was just enjoying the game so much I didn’t want it to end and although I felt like it was short it made up for it in bosses, environments, and aesthetics.
The verdict...
Little Nightmares 2 has happily fed my small addiction for a puzzle-platformer, and I can confidently say that I enjoyed my time playing it, I look forward to completing it again so that I may be able to get the collectables in order to unlock the ‘true ending’ which I have avoided spoiling for myself up to this point.
I am going to give Little Nightmares 2 a score of 8 out of 10, I extremely enjoyed the first game, and this is definitely an amazing follow-up of it by Tarsier Studios, I look forward to continuing to explore my nightmares inside this universe.
Little Nightmares 2
Rated: 16
Price: £29.99 (At Game)
Platform: PS4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, PS5, Xbox Series X and Series S, Google Stadia and PC.