The man who is widely regarded as the father of the survival horror genre, Shinji Mikami, delivered The Evil Within three years ago, the title whose goal was to return the genre back to its roots. Although all the individual elements in The Evil Within were in place, the final result somehow seemed a bit stale. It was precisely why Mikami decided to take the back seat and give the wheel to one of his lesser known colleagues. The Evil Within 2 takes us back to the role of Sebastian Castellanos, a former detective who has been drowning in guilt for years because of his daughter’s murder and has been unsuccessfully searching for a secret organization that caused his despair. However, the invisible corporation Mobius finally emerges from the shadows, and reveals that Castellano’s daughter is still alive. It offers him an opportunity to save her from their Matrix-like system called Stem – an experimental device that can somehow manipulate human consciousness. The whole thing is falling apart and there is not much time left.

As for the gameplay itself, those who played the precursor will find themselves on a fairly familiar terrain. From a key crossbow to the green jelly you collect to build up your attributes, it is still pretty much a very familiar game. However, The Evil Within 2 uses the opportunity to correct some of the nonsense that made the previous game tiresome. There is no more unnecessary “letterboxing”, it is set as an extra option that needs to be unlocked first, and as far as it is concerned, it can freely remain there. Additionally, the game now throws us less into the closed arenas where you were supposed to withstand the waves of enemies, and that is why the gameplay is no longer so troublesome, but fun. Irritating traps are still there, but far less than in the past game. You also no longer need to set corpses on fire; you can just stomp on them.

While The Evil Within might have imitated Resident Evil 4 a bit too much, the sequel seems more like Resident Evil 2 because of the urban environment it is set in. The ordinary enemies are mostly classic zombies, not the Spanish Inquisition chasing you with torches. Zombies are mostly busy nibbling on things, so you have many opportunities to get creative playing with them. A knife in the back often comes out as good choice, but it is equally useful to completely go around them. Beer bottles that you can still find around can be thrown as a distraction, but they are also useful for fending off these stinky creatures. With sparse amounts of ammunition and a clumsy aiming model, the whole thing remains an intense experience.

Because of all that, stealth has a much more active role, especially in the open and abandoned neighborhoods of small towns that you may want to explore. This open world is probably the only thing that can be regarded as a novelty to some extent. In the open format, some side tasks are involved, which open the possibility for us to play more at our own pace.

You can even dig through some of the houses, including trains and buses, and what can be found inside can sometimes be surprising. Those parts of the map are big enough to wander around for hours, but not so big that going back would be a problem. Although all the sites are connected to the terminals with which you “jump” from one neighborhood to another, there is no flexible “fast travel”.

In addition to the classic zombies, there are also a few psychopaths that have the role of bosses in this lonely little town that you must confront. You will also encounter some of the bigger players. Although you may encounter such “important” figures several times, they play a simple filler role. While Sebastian is trying to find his daughter, those characters only reveal the fact that the princess is in another castle. That is why the whole structure of The Evil Within 2 is a collage of everything, including not only parts of the first game, but the horror genre in general.

Playing The Evil Within 2 remains an interesting venture, at least until you notice the fact that you have somehow seen it all in other game titles. The biggest failure of the game is that it plays safe and does not risk much. Stealth gameplay, though technically very good, is played in exactly the same way as in billions of other titles in which you spend time lurking in the bushes. However, the evil atmosphere and the creepy sound design still make it worthy of playing, walking and sneaking around, no matter how big a cliché that is.

You will occasionally encounter riddles that, unfortunately, are very scarce and are at the toddler level. If you know how to count to ten, you will solve them in five seconds. But even though The Evil Within 2 does not reveal the microscopically layered complexity, in a good ratio it makes the simple concepts fun, intense, and generally creepy if we don’t overthink it.

Depending on how deeply you are willing to explore, the first move could take you anywhere between 10am and 8pm. Therefore, The Evil Within 2 represents a decent bite of intestines, and if I wanted more, even with all of its oversights, then I know for sure that a good part of the game was well done.