Ghostrunner 2 Preview by @PixelHunted "harder, better, faster, stronger than the original" 🥷 @GhostrunnerGame #IndieGames #GameDev

I missed Ghostrunner on its original release, but when a polished next-gen edition landed on PlayStation 5 in 2021 I fell deeply dippy in love with its lightning-quick, lethal and acrobatic combat. Since then there’s been nothing else that’s captured the same sense of dynamic combat, where death you or your opponent’s death is a cyber katana swipe away.

Now, courtesy of a demo courtesy of developers One More Level, that same adrenaline rush is back. What’s immediately apparent is that everything great about Ghostrunner is present in the sequel. This is an evolution rather than a ground-up reworking, to the point where my initial suspicions were that little had fundamentally changed.

At least in this demo you are still bouncing around a neon dystopia, enemies are the same brand of cyborg meanie, and your movement and combat options seem identical. We can respect “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, but first impressions are that this could be a mission pack or expansive DLC for the first game rather than a sequel.

But the more you pick apart the new systems the more you appreciate what’s been added. Most obvious is that blocking has been revamped. In Ghostrunner you couldn’t block, but could deflect bullets by tapping attack a split second before you were hit. On one hand this let me live out my Gray Fox PSOne fantasies, but on the other, the risk of screwing up the timing and dying meant it was almost always better to dodge rather than deflect.

Ghostrunner 2 introduces ‘Active Blocking’, in which you can simply hold down the left bumper to raise your sword and repel attacks. Use of this is governed by a rapidly depleting stamina bar so you can’t simply tank multiple attacks, though it gives you more flexibility if you screw up and need a moment to reassess your situation. 

Parries have also been tweaked, allowing you to pull some gruesome and stylish finishing moves that reverse an enemy’s attack. Ghostrunner is an unforgiving game when it comes to timing, so I was expecting this to be tricky to get down. In practice there’s a surprisingly forgiving window for execution, so much so that single melee enemies now don’t prove much of a threat. They leap towards you, you parry and *wham* they get a neon blade through their electronic brain.

Just as in the original I’m sure the combat will gradually evolve over the course of the game as your suite of powers expands and I’m eager to see how the developers can push the limits of what players can process beyond the first game. 

The one-hit-kills and sheer speed inevitably mean there’s a steep difficulty wall for new players to climb, though I’m sure the assist options from Ghostrunner that made that game more approachable will also be included in the sequel (though, perhaps ominously, said options are nowhere to be seen in the demo).

But there’s one awesome new addition that propelled my hype levels into the stratosphere. At the end of the demo, you unveil a sleek and sexy hi-octane cybercycle that lets you live out your Kaneda/Tetsuo fantasies. The bike sequence in the demo is a timed obstacle course in which you boost, leap, and spiral your way through the scenery - with the closest comparator the Batmobile races in Arkham Knight (though this is much more fun). The bike is responsive, fast as hell, and feels like a smart extension of on-foot environment traversal.

The only annoying wrinkle is that it appears that the combat and bike portions of the game are entirely separate. For example, you can’t ride the bike into a battle arena and pull off sick wheelies as you dismember cyber-fiends. At least in the demo, you’re stuck on the bike until the game decides to let you off, there’s no ‘dismount’ button or exploration beyond the linear path you speed down.

The developers promise a semi-open world to explore, which I assume is where the bike will come into its own. Here’s hoping for races and increasingly devilish tracks to navigate - though I’m hoping for at least one bike-based boss fight that’s a glittering clash of blades as we ride on the walls of a tunnel at 200mph.

The cherry on top is that performance on PC is as sleek and streamlined as Ghostrunner. I hit 1080p60 easily (in fact a little more, though I set a frame cap of 60 for consistency) and any recent graphics card should be able to reach 4K60 and beyond. The fast-paced yet short missions also made the first Ghostrunner a great game on Steam Deck, so it’s reassuring that the developers promise this sequel will be verified at launch.

Right now Ghostrunner 2 is harder, better, faster, stronger than the original. 

After this demo I’m confident it’s going to stick the landing. 

Roll on Oct. 26.