Code Vein II Review - Anime on the Streets, Souls in the Sheets
I never got to experience the world of the original Code Vein. Coming into the newly developed sequel, I was unsure if that lack of prior knowledge of lore and terminology would hold me back and prevent me from getting into and enjoying the game. Fortunately, while Code Vein II has an abundance of terminology to grapple with, it is not a direct sequel, retaining only some of the narrative aspects and gameplay elements of the original. It places you in what could be a parallel world, one where human society fell due to an event known as the Resurgence, an unnatural release of energies that transformed living and non-living creatures into the Horrors that have overrun the world. After the last flare-up of the Resurgence, four Revanants sacrificed themselves, entering cocoons and using their life force to seal it and prevent the destruction of what was left of the world.
What follows is a slightly confusing ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff that involves you travelling through time to find the ‘keys’ that will release the heroes from their cocoons and kill them before they essentially blow up the world. If you really feel like doing each of these individuals a solid, you can alter the past tragedies that drove them to their sacrifice, not so they don’t sacrifice themselves for the greater good, but rather so they are at peace with their choices when they do.
Of course, these choices will affect the ending you get once you save the world, and yet it made me question the morality of the actions I was taking. Yes, the world needs to be saved, but as I journeyed through the different time periods and learned more about the Revanants, I started to question their moral standing in this post-apocalyptic world. Revenants in Code Vein II are, essentially, vampires. With the collapse of human civilisation, the Revenants came forth from the shadows and became the dominant species. Ostensibly, they help to protect the remnants of humanity while trying to prevent the end of the world, yet, on the other side of the coin, they are seen to refer to a human child as a “blood bag”, giving the impression that the humans are only being kept around as a food source. Given that the protagonist is a human who was resurrected and given half a Revanent heart, you wonder why they don’t react to this information. Maybe I am looking too deeply into this myself, but it just felt jarring and out of place in the context of the overall narrative.
What pleasantly surprised me was the balance within the gameplay and different character builds. Interacting with other revanents will provide you with their Blood Code for use. These could be loosely defined as classes, as they have different strengths and weaknesses, but nothing prevents you from using a Blood Code high in dexterity and magic power while swinging around a two-handed greatsword. Code Vein II even plans for this with its burden system. Unlike other games, if you do not meet the strength requirement, you will still be able to utilise a strength-based weapon, but you will be afflicted with a burden that places a positive and negative effect on your character. In this instance, your close-range attacks will be more powerful, but should you miss, the attack will consume more stamina than normal.
On top of all that, you will almost always have a Revanent partner along for the ride with you. While during story beats the choice of partner will be locked, you can choose how you want them to affect your game. The other option for those who want to go everything alone is to assimilate the Revanent, receiving buffs dependent on your Blood Code level. The default is to have your partner out in the world with you, engaging in combat with enemies alongside you, and often proving a nice distraction when you need to get some healing in during a boss fight. It was a gameplay mechanic I was very happy to take advantage of, especially as their drain attacks provided me with the energy I needed to power my chosen ability attacks.
Unfortunately, by the time I was trying to release the third hero, I had found that I was decimating the majority of the enemies I encountered. Even when encountering boss fights, where once I needed multiple attempts before I could beat them, now I was able to defeat them with little challenge. At the time, I suspected I had taken on the different heroes in an incorrect order, undertaking the more difficult section first, but once on the island holding the final hero, I found the challenge was still missing. Whether this is an issue caused by my completion of all the historical side quests for the heroes, because I am a softie and want them to be as happy as possible before sacrificing themselves, or just an issue where the enemies stopped scaling correctly, I do not know. It did make me feel like a badass, so small bonus.
This wasn’t the only issue I encountered while playing, though. While nothing is game-breaking, some design choices caused unnecessary frustration when playing. Why am I forced to wander the different hub areas when I want to speak to an NPC, because there is no interior map, unlike every dungeon in the world? Why, after slaying the corrupted forms of the Revanant heroes and making a big show of absorbing their hearts, do I need to purchase their bequeathed weapons from the store? And how was I supposed to know that was possible, leading me to play three quarters of the game with the two base options?
These were questions I was asking myself as I made my way through Code Vein II, but the biggest frustration of all came from the design choice to make a completely single-player narrative experience unable to be paused. In a multiplayer experience, it is expected, but when I am playing by myself, I should be able to pause the game and take care of my kids or let my dog out to the toilet. This may just be a personal issue, and others may have no problem with it at all, but for me, it did cause some frustration.
Despite a slightly confusing story, an abundance of systems you may or may not use, and the lack of the all-important pause function, Code Vein II is still a solid entry in the Soulslike. While the combat can feel challenging, utilising your Revanent partner can give you that little bit of extra breathing room during challenging fights, helping to make the game more accessible to gamers like myself who exist outside of the ‘git-gud’ Soulslike gaming community. Despite the flaws, there is more than enough for fans of the genre to spend a lot of time with and derive plenty of enjoyment.
Code Vein II was reviewed on PS5 with code kindly supplied by the publisher.
