Review by: Brandon "Destroyer" Cackowski-Schnell

Humor is a difficult thing to pull off, especially in a video game where funny moments have to be created out of much less dialog than other mediums. In the right hands, it can be used effectively to defuse tension and comment on the inherent outlandishness found in so many games. In the wrong hands it can make an already tedious story and turn it into a downright slog. Unfortunately, too much of the single player story of Conduit 2 falls into the latter. While the multiplayer is as strong as ever, the single player falls completely flat right up until the incomprehensible ending that left me with little hope for or interest in a third game in the series.

The game picks up right where the second left off, with Secret Service agent Michael Ford jumping through the Conduit on the trail of bad guy John Adams. Ford has his trusty All Seeing Eye with him, complete with the consciousness of Prometheus, a dead alien, locked within. Upon arriving on an oil derrick off the coast of Florida, you’ll take on Trust agents and aliens in your quest to bounce around the globe finding other aliens so you can suck their souls into the ASE for some kind of alien slumber party. If you haven’t played the first game, don’t expect to know anything about what’s going on as the game makes no effort to illuminate who anyone is, or why you’re doing what you’re doing.

The game’s writers definitely wanted to take a less serious approach and apparently felt it would be a waste of voice actor John St John, voice of Duke Nukem and Michael Ford, to not have Agent Ford spouting off quips and one liners at every turn. Unfortunately most of them fall flat, including the cheeky, self referential lines about video game design, to the point where you don’t know if you’re supposed to be laughing alongside the game—or at it. Granted, if you’re not laughing at all, it’s a moot point.

The story also brings characters into the game for no reason, like Andromeda, a female warrior in stasis on some ship at the bottom of the ocean. You wake her up, Prometheus tells you not to tell her that he’s locked in the ASE, you think you’re going to hear about some sort of sordid backstory and she does nothing but act as your operator for the entire game. Worse still is the fact that she’s clad in armor from head to toe, except for her cleavage. Give me a break.

The game sports the same excellent control scheme as the first game with plenty of things to tweak and play with to get the optimal playing experience. WiiMotion Plus is supported this time around, used to smooth out the controls and it works as designed, however I did notion some hypersensitivity when using zoomed in weapons. If you prefer the twin stick approach, the Wii’s classic controller is also supported however I’ve always found that controller too loose for my liking.

The great multiplayer modes from the first game also make a return. Gone is all of the Friend Code silliness allowing you to easily build custom matches or jump right into a game. As you succeed in your multiplayer endeavors you’ll earn currency you can use to unlock weapons, armor and upgrades, all of which can be combined into various profiles, profiles that you can swap based on the game type or whatever other whim is driving you.