Misses the spark of the original
The Fall was a cleverly designed adventure game about an AI facing the conundrum of violating protocols in order to save its human occupant. The Fall Part 2: Unbound is a direct sequel and takes place directly after the ending of The Fall. If you haven’t played The Fall yet, do not play this game. The only way to talk more about this game is to explicitly spoil the ending of part one, you have been warned!
The Fall Part 2: Unbound follows up with our protagonist AI, ARID in the process of being disassembled after learning that it never had a human residing in its suit. ARID in a last ditch attempt of staying sentient, decides to hack into the network and control other robots to save its own life.
Unlike in The Fall Part 1, ARID navigates the interwebs in a metroid-like fashion. In this futuristic internet, ARID battles viruses and hacks into logs to learn more about the world. Unfortunately nothing works in this part of the game. The combat is boring and tedious. The enemies are all black blobs with tentacles. There is nothing interesting to do but dodge enemy attacks and shoot back. It’s fairly easy to get lost especially when there is no map and there is a lack of environmental variety.
The puzzle solving aspect kicks in when ARID hacks into the robots. Each robot has their own distinctive personality and offers a unique approach to puzzle solving. This is the strongest part of the game and it was a joy to see how ARID communicates with each robot. I found ARID’s conversations with “The One” especially hilarious. Unfortunately I found the puzzles a bit too hard with a lot of pixel hunting and trial and error. The game tends to hide vital clues on the ceiling. The game wants you to solve the puzzles in a specific way but doesn’t give enough hints to tell the player that they are on the right track. I ultimately had to resort to several walkthroughs after getting stuck twice exhausting every single option I had. I don’t remember ever getting this lost in the original game.
The story in The Fall Part 2 doesn’t pack the same punch as the original. Most plot lines remain unresolved and the focus is dedicated more on the robots that ARID hacks than ARID itself. There is also a lack of creative AI introspection compared to the first game and the writing tends to lean on the typical Sci-Fi cliche of an AI gone rampant. Fortunately, the ending of the game showcases what could be a promising final third part.
I was satisfied with my time with this game but was bitterly disappointed that The Fall Part 2 is nowhere near as good as the original The Fall.