Vigil Games

The basis of the Darksiders story is about causation and the effects upon which humanity and religion are based. Darksiders 2 presents a character study of Death, his regret, and how he carries himself through the conflicts within the Darksiders series.  The best way to illustrate his arch is through the teachings of Baruch Spinoza. He believed that the mental state of remorse or regret is shown as a “pernicious intoxicant” which, by proxy, hinders the growth of one’s emotions and influences that same type of cause within their action. This ideology and the story are a double entendre in their meanings since they boast each other up. This ideology is used to basically connect the effect of the overall story. But to understand whether they deliver this effectively, we must analyze the combat and visuals to see the mastery of the story telling Vigil games put across.

The combat continues the same style of the God of War structure, with a couple of defining mechanics in comparison to its predecessor. A cool idea they brought to fruition is the introduction of Death’s scythes, which present him as a more agile and faster counterpart to the more traditional powerhouse of War. The other big improvement is the implementation of the loot system, which includes stats, customization, and overall gameplay variety. My only problem is the organizational mechanics that lead to many a mind goblin during my playthrough. The game is set in an open world with your basic Witcher-esque structure.  This expands upon more variable dungeons, which include well-crafted bosses at the end of each dungeon.  However, to transfer such improvement, they have to provide a smooth execution for these elements to land effectively. GameFAQs admin ThePock, feels Darksiders 2 is more DMC-like than most expect.

“Darksiders 2 feels a lot like DMC, just without jump canceling and weird techniques,” ThePock said.

The asset work within this game is near perfect, with the use of their rougher textures to convey environmental storytelling. On the PS3 version, it caps at thirty frames per second, and the PS5 remaster at a crisp sixty frames. Overall, it runs well with no slowdowns, even with the intricate and effective art style. User of r/PatientGamers FolsomD, explains the problem of the Deathinitive edition.

“Deathinitive seems to have some weird fps issues on SOME hardware.” They continue by stating the context of said gear, “ I remember a friend saying he got 60 solid and never under on an R9 380 though.”

The art style continues with the Warhammer-inspired character design, with the change being mainly within the colour palettes. They implemented muted tones and greys to make the main colours (greens and purples) pop out really beautifully. Even with the red heavy areas, they create a nice contrast with blacks and heavy shadows to create a vibrant environment. It is near perfect visually. 

Overall, this game is bittersweet since in 2013, THQ filed for bankruptcy, causing Vigil Games to go out of business as well. But at its original state, this game is masterfully crafted and just overall one of the best hack and slash titles out there.