Customer Reviews

BloodRayne 2

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I liked the original "Blood Rayne" OK. I thought the graphics were actually sub-par for PS2 - slightly better on Xbox of course - and it was fairly short and easy. But how could you not have a fun time with a character who can suck blood for health, use the victim as a human shield, and fire over his shoulders all at the same time?

Then I heard "Blood Rayne 2" was coming out, and I figured I'd check it out and see if the developers had actually managed to improve on their concept. I was in for a nice surprise. This game ROCKS. Rayne has been completely retooled, with much better controls (I always found L1 for the blades pretty awkward) and a camera system that lets you 360 around her with ease. The slightly washed-out graphics of the original can't even compare with "2" - Rayne looks HOT, the levels are beautifully rendered, the enemies are well-designed if a bit repetitive, and the fatalities are SICK "Kill Bill" style extreme blood and gore, guaranteed to freak out your parents. It's easy to get the hang of the moves, and you can potentially get all the practice you'd ever want - the enemies just keep coming and coming. True, you can't jump quite as high as you could in the first, nor do you have your little spin at the end, it's just a conventional but sturdy double jump. Blood Rage is also far less dramatic, but still pretty lethal. Once you get the blood guns, the strategy of the game basically involves making the most of the way you slay your enemies, rationing their life force between yourself and your weapons and feeding your Blood Lust by executing fatalities. You can also get creative with the harpoon and rack up "Carnage" points by whipping enemies into spiky objects - these "environmental" kills eventually earn Rayne Health and Rage upgrades.

Another feature that I personally love is Rayne's ability to smash practically everything around her into smithereens, with accompanying loud sound effects. If you're like me, nothing's more fun than destroying the virtual china cabinets in the mansion levels - except possibly slicing the heads off the debutantes. And you HAVE to check out the various themed outfits - my favorite is probably "Schoolgirl Rayne," especially hilarious when she's sliding down the poles.

Overall this game is really so different from the original that it's barely even a sequel. Some of my friends didn't like the first but they love "2," and maybe vice-versa for some people. Seriously, since they'll probably never make an actual "Kill Bill" video game, this is about as close as you could get without legal action occurring. Whether you liked "Blood Rayne" or not, I highly recommend you check out "2" - I doubt you'll be disappointed.

In my review of the first BloodRayne I listed some things that I thought the first one lacked..like graphic consistency. There were other things I wished the first game had as well. Lik eI thought that it was a shame that your perspective was only behind Rayne..since her character model was the best..but I also thought that the action was too focused around guns..and not enough blade action was going on. Also I thought that in the first game, Rayne herself seemed very stiff with alot of her motions. In what I've seen for myself of this newer version all this has improved, and the control of Rayne herself had improved GREATLY. It's now fun just to run around, jump and slash objects, let alone play the game. So this game no longer feels like a vampiric version of Max Payne, but more of it's own game ok..so the borrowed a little from Prince of Persia..but I think it's awesome. I can't wait to see how this series continues to develop.

Have recently had the opportunity to try out a BloodRayne 2 playable demo. Here are some first impressions.

First, the bad news: gone are Rayne's 180 degree quick-turn, spiraling kick-jump and her ability to drag victims to her to feed on via the harpoon. And, while she is still able to jump greater distances than mere mortals, no longer are they the ludicrous, yet eminently satisfying, terrain-telescoping leaps of the first game. Whether Rayne re-acquires any of these abilities later in BloodRayne 2 remains to be seen.

Now, the good news: Much more precise control over Rayne's abilities, including a lock-on target mode and separate buttons for kicking and slashing; Rayne's harpoon can now be used to hurl enemies as well as pulling bits of scenery down on top of said enemies; Prince of Persia-style pole swinging and vaulting, including the ability to perch on top of poles; Tony Hawk-style rail grinding, during which, Rayne can extend her blades out to her sides to dispatch any adversaries unfortunate enough to be standing at the bottom of a rail; "Kill puzzles" to advance to the next stage, solvable by catapulting foes into, say, a giant fan or garbage truck with the harpoon; gruesome fatalities which, when executed while feeding, will cause Rayne to perform on her foes such lovely acts as decapitation or hoisting them aloft with her blades as they beg for mercy before being eviscerated; Blood-powered weaponry which can be refueled in tandem with regular feeding; Blood Rage, Aura Vision & Dilated Perception have all returned as well, though, thankfully, the annoying Extruded View is absent. The graphics and level detail are considerably more robust than those of the first game and Rayne herself moves and looks more lusciously than ever.

Yeah, great features, but how does it play? Well, I can happily report that , taken all together, it's a blast and I have practically worn out my demo disk of BR2 playing the same stages over and over, refining my techniques in anticipation of the game's final release. The controls are relatively easy to master, so you'll be able to crank out the carnage in no time flat. This is going to be a worthy sequel.

This is no HALO or GTA but its a great game. It has all the basic ingredients for male oriented entertainment: sex; violence; and liberal amounts of cursing.

This is the type of game you play when your under stress You pop it in and you take your frustrations out on fantasy enemies. Theres not much thought involved so its a good escape. With this short term escape you get savory pieces of instant gratification.

It has a good storyline that makes you want to get to the next step to see what happens next. So any repetitiveness is balanced by the storyline and well thought out cut scenes.

Finally, Rayne, is just an enjoyable character to watch fight and talk crap at the same time.

Bloodrayne 2 is the sexiest video game I've ever played. You are a barely clothed vampire who bounces all over the place when you walk!!

With that said, the game play is much improved over the first game. The graphics are sharper, the engine is smoother, and it's a much easier to play game. The story line hasn't grabbed me 100% yet, but give it time and I'm sure it will. I like this game, but it's definitely not for kids.

I bought the first one back in 2003 when I was stationed in England. I had never heard of it, but based on the images I saw on the back of the box, it seemed like it had a similar over-the-shoulder 3rd person perspective like Shadow Man, Tomb Raider, etc. I bought it and loved it. Bloodrayne 2 has everything the first one had and more.

It takes place about 65 year after the first one left off, with Rayne still searching for her father, the Vampire Overlord Kagan. The game opens up with an FMV of Rayne in a sexy black dress arriving at a party thrown by one of her many vampire siblings whom she wishes to destroy.

The graphics, audio, gameplay, controls...everything is greatly improved in this sequel. A couple of cool additions are the feed fatality moves. There are 12 of them in the game designed as an alternate to just feeding off an enemy until he dies. You can start feeding to get your health up and then kill him/her while feeding to get a boost in your rage meter.

Speaking of which, you can also increase the size of your health and rage meters by performing puzzle kills. Basically, this is when you can kick/slash/harpoon an enemy into a fireplace, out a window, or over a railing on a higher floor. When this happens, an icon encompassing both meters slides up. When it goes all the way to the right, the meters fill up, and the icon slides back to the left. This keeps happening until your meters reach maximum size (which is almost 2X the original size). this helps immensely in the later parts of the game where the enemies get significantly harder to defeat.

Overall, a wonderful playing experience with some sweet extras that are all available when you finish the game. Among these are different costumes for Rayne, a level select, and a trailer for the upcoming Bloodrayne movie.

If you liked the first game, you'll LOVE this one. If you've never played the first one, get it first then get this one. There are a couple of references to Brimstone Society in this one which will go over a person's head if they didn't play the first one. (For those of you who haven't played the first one, Brimstone Society is the organization that asked Rayne to join their ranks at the beginning of the original Bloodrayne after observing her fighting skills against a couple of vampires).

Other than that there are little or no references to the first one, but I would playing both...and the 3rd installment that will inevitably come out based on how well Bloodrayne 2 has been received.

What can be said. Awesome graphics - great game play. This is a mature title with a mass market appeal. Strong woman in the lead role (...) who has an attitude and the ability to slice and dice the bad guys. The "pick up a weapon" feature has been ditched for a very cool blood sucking system for weapons (she is half vampire after all) and there isn't any "find this key, find this key" thing going on - it is all done through death and destruction of bad guys. This one is worth buying and the replay value exists (try playing her as rayne dressed in a japanese school girl outfit - GREAT stuff!).

If you liked Bloodrayne, you will definitely enjoy Bloodrayne 2. The improved controls makes it easier on your hands and performing combo moves and fighting many enemies at once is much more ergonomic. The graphics are delivered with the XBox's maximum potential. This game is definitely great monster-bashing fun but had little replay value. However, completing the game unlocks Rayne's other outfits which may add some more hours of replay fun but there's no guarantee. This game is definitely fun and picking up a cheap used copy can be worth your money!

This game is great! I was really surprised at how much I enjoyed playing the first. Aside from the fact that the first got a little repetitive at times it was still fun. Well the second is even more fun and it felt a lot less repetitive, especially towards the end. Naturally we'll expect to see some similarities to the first installment, but I think they've made some quality improvements this time around. The most noticeable is probably in the graphics department. Rayne is looking hotter than ever! The in game cinematic sequences are also extremely strong in this regard; I'd rather watch a movie of those than the crap Uwe Boll puts out.

If you thought Rayne was up against some precarious forces with Jurgen Wulf... well she's up against even more dangerous enemies this time around! This game is a large scale production by comparison. There's something very bad going on in the world and a lot of powerful vampire's are uniting. They're going to try and remake the world in their image and it's up to Rayne to stop them! She's lost contact with the Brimstone society and just has Severin to help guide her through all the dangers of this adventure. I don't want to reveal anymore of the story, because it's very well written. Don't expect to see that Nazi element appearing from the first again, that's not in here at all. I actually like this story a lot more over all. It's much more cinematic and has some really good twists and turns.

One thing they changed that I didn't like very much was her weapon system. No, not the blades, her guns. Don't get me wrong... the Dragons are awesome weapon concepts and I love how you upgrade them overtime as you get more experience. However, one thing that was cool in the first game was that you could pick up new weapons and you could search the environment for more ammunition. The environment in this installment is even more interactive, but I feel like they've removed the element that makes me want to explore. There are no items for Rayne to pick up, so why should I explore every inch of the environment? Sure it's really cool to break stuff, but after a few hours that gets a bit boring and you just feel like moving on because you're not getting anything out of it. That's really the only one small fault I have with the game.

As I mentioned before the graphic quality of the game is far superior to the original. I think they've even changed Rayne's costume slightly because she looks a lot more alluring in this edition. Not to mention the enemies she's fighting are a lot more varied. Sure in certain sequences you get similarly rendered enemies, but they change as you go through the levels. That didn't happen as much with the first game. The overall script is a lot stronger as well. It felt like they took the time to sit down and write a more well thought out concept. Even the small quips Rayne says when she's fighting people are a lot cooler and varied. Rayne also has a LOT more combos! This is by far the greatest added feature ever. It's so much more than just hit "X" a bunch of times like in the first game. This one relies on special combinations which result in her executing a cool impressive maneuver! I loved this feature. Another fun aspect is that a lot of the puzzles are solved by throwing enemies into electrical units, woodchippers, etc. in order to solve a puzzle to go onto the next section. This was absolutely hilarious. Remember... the harpoon is usually what you have to use to throw an enemy into a whirling fan blade most efficiently. You'd think this would get redundant after the fifth puzzle... but for some reason it actually doesn't. Throwing enemy bodies into fans in different ways is actually kind of fun to figure out. Though, I must admit that I had to put on God Mode from time to time while I sat around and figured out how to solve some of these puzzles. Such as when fighting final level bosses, there's usually something special you have to do to beat them... you can't just hack them to death like most other enemies.

If you enjoyed playing the first game then you'll surely find this one even more fun. If you got tired of the assassination mission to just kill the same Nazi over and over, then you'll be pleased to hear this game doesn't have that same failing. I actually highly recommend this game; it's a lot of fun. Some of the acrobatic scenarios are incredibly frustrating, but you feel like an idiot after you figure them out most of the time! You can expect to see the same amount of extreme violence purveyed throughout this game as in the first. This one is probably a lot more intense on that level, so if that's your interest in playing this, you will not be disappointed. Whatever your reason for delving into the world of Bloodrayne, it's a lot of fun once you're there!

BloodRayne 2 made a lot of improvements the first

The combat system is made for one-on-one an doesn't work so well when lot of enemies are ganging up on you...and that happen a lot

School Girl cheat best ever!
I wanted more [...] cheats