Review by: James Fudge

If you use the same formula over and over again, how can you expect different or better results? That's a question Q Entertainment needs to ask itself as it considers making a third chapter in the Ninety-Nine Nights series. Ninety Nine Nights 2 (N3 II) not only fails to refine the formula created by KOEI's Dynasty Warriors series so many years ago, it also sells itself short by omitting features that might make the game worth playing like split screen co-op, online co-op that has something to do with the main campaign, and storytelling that fails to tie the whole thing together. Don't get me wrong; N3 II isn't the worst tactical action game ever made, but it doesn't go out of its way to do anything particularly exciting.

N3 II is your standard tactical action game (read: GRINDFEST) where one hero and the occasional NPC ally battle thousands of enemies, solve puzzles, and fight gigantic bosses using a toolkit that includes generic passive and specific active attacks, a standard set of attacks, a skill that allows you to manipulate the environment (like breaking pillars, shooting targets or moving blocks to get beyond certain obstacles) and a powerful attack that shakes the environment around you. The action is smooth and satisfying at first, but after multiple hours of using the same button presses to fight the same enemies to ad nauseam, the game starts to feel more like a slog and less like an epic adventure.

As you play Galen (the main character) or the four other characters in the game, you'll collect thousands of soul orbs from your victims that - if you survive a given map - can be used to upgrade your weapons, characters, and special active and passive attacks (called “accessories”). While this part of the game is interesting, it ultimately forces you to grind the same maps multiple times to collect enough of these orbs for much needed upgrades. You can also jump into a multiplayer game on Xbox Live to grind out orbs, but you won’t progress in the main campaign. Multiplayer is great for earning those orbs and finding the occasional rare weapon or accessory, but it also feels counter-productive because you are not accomplishing anything in the main storyline. The ultimate goal is the main campaign after all, and since there’s no real cooperative play in the game, you are having absolutely no impact there beyond character growth.

This is basically the depth and breadth of the gameplay in N3 II and it all feels like a puzzle that someone put together by shaving and reshaping the pieces that didn’t fit; multiplayer is a particularly awkward addition that doesn’t belong with the main campaign. If not for the character growth you get from it, multiplayer would be completely worthless. Sure, there’s a leader board that you can get your name on for dedicating some time into this particular mode, but it just seems pointless. There has to be a compelling reason beyond that to engage in a secondary activity where grinding thousands of enemies means more than just a fleeting moment of fame.