Project Warlock II

[b]That was something.[/b] I had a blast enjoying the entirety of the [i]Project Warlock 2[/i] experience, but it was kind of... a mess. A huge and wonderful mess. [i]Project Warlock 1[/i] was a tightly packed, cohesive, and solid game. A renewed, but restrained take on the anemic and labyrinthine structure that was the core design of [i]Wolfenstein 3D[/i]. Besides the striking art direction that captured the same feel of classic sprite-based games—but brought in crispy animations with more frames than usual—and a handful of interesting additions like an RPG progression system with attributes, skills, and a fresh weapon upgrade system, it gave the air of a nostalgic game that modernized the original experience and created something new enough to stand out among its peers. More like a good bite-sized dungeon crawler with shooting and melee mechanics. It was a short, very polished, to-the-point and replayable game with a good variety of content. A great buy for anyone interested in the genre. [i]Project Warlock 2[/i] attempts to expand the principles presented in the first game in almost every way. More options, more weapons, bigger levels, verticality, more enemy types, more builds, more effects, more narrative. In short, more of the same—but bigger and better. Faster, more intense, louder. And frankly, I think they pulled it off—but at the cost of any cohesion and sense of balance. It’s like the developers, through many iterations, came to the conclusion that if the game doubled down enough on what it does best to the point where the player wouldn't care about the rest, they’d be successful. And, well… they were. PW2 is pure chaos. It’s so excessive that it tramples over any negative feelings that could arise from such a disjointed experience. Shooting in this game is glorious. Every single weapon is incredibly satisfying to fire. Crunchy and impactful sound design. Powerful. Enemies explode in a festival of particles. Resources flood the screen every second. Entire hordes feel like they’re charging at a massive atomic meat grinder on legs that shoots missiles. Upgrades and spells just make the party even more insane and unhinged. How about dual-wielding SIX-BARREL shotguns that you can fire all at once without needing to reload? Ammo evaporates in seconds, but enemies owe you HP for thirteen generations. Or how about a heavy machine gun that upgrades to fire even faster? And what if it also shoots flaming or poisonous bullets? Or a hand cannon with infinite ammo as long as you keep landing headshots? Or a nuke with a blast radius so wide you’ll probably die every time you use it? How about a death laser? It’s simply spectacular. And the game pairs that extreme firepower with unbelievable fights against so many enemies at once that sometimes you can’t even tell what’s on screen given the level of visual noise. You can’t even hear the damn music! Sometimes it makes you feel like the last [i]Imagine Dragons[/i] fan on Earth who just parachuted into the angriest Wall of Death in the world. None of it makes any sense. There’s barely any structure or planning. It’s just a mess. And it’s amazing. There doesn’t seem to be any encounter design in this game. You just walk and get constantly ambushed in an arena and forced to destroy everything in sight until there’s nothing left. Any attempt at giving enemies a meaningful role in a dynamic, elegant, and well-structured combat dance disintegrates the moment the game turns up the heat (which is basically all the time). You’re swimming in resources and never need to worry about anything. And the combo system rewards you more and more the higher your count gets. The combat has all the red flags to be immensely frustrating, but the game buffs you so much and gives you so many tools that you just win by attrition. There’s no challenge that can hold up to a god of death like you. The progression system is broken and wrecks any sense of balance the game might have had, and it feels thin and insignificant, with little perk variety and prerequisites that practically force you to invest in attributes that have no synergy with the rest of your “build". “Build”, because, aside from the weapons, it’s hard to feel any significant difference in your choices. It feels like they all lead to the same place, and that kind of defeats the purpose—especially when every chapter resets all your powers in the name of variety that, I imagine, could’ve been achieved in other ways that are now, sadly, unreachable for an already launched project. The game also does a poor job of returning you to where you left off between chapters, making each feel like a separate campaign rather than a continuous experience. I have no idea why I always need to reach mission 7 just to regain access to features I’d already been introduced to in the previous chapter. It’s like they forgot this was supposed to be a continuation of established concepts, not a reset from the beginning. It gets worse because you don’t even get to experiment. Every upgrade is permanent, even if you allocate a point by mistake. The incentive to explore builds is neutered right from the start, and it doesn’t make much sense since you’re always progressing toward another reset—without the previous weapons. I’m not replaying an entire chapter just to see what I missed. Level design also fails to support or enhance the rest of the experience, falling short of providing a consistent quality. And unfortunately, very few levels are noteworthy conceptually. In the first act, levels are large and more open, but they fail both at selling a sense of place (because the environment and geometry feel artificial) and at being compelling video game levels. Without clear structure, progression, or direction, they make you feel like you’re going nowhere, not advancing through the space or decoding the layout. I never actually got lost, but I never felt like I was exploring or making meaningful progress either. Levels just started and ended, and I moved on to the next without registering what I’d seen. The lack of meaningful enemy and resource placement, and of distinct segments, stripped a lot from these levels—making them feel homogeneous and interchangeable. The pacing is all over the place. The so-called “sprawling verticality” promised in the store description is practically nonexistent. Instead, you get several uninspired areas filled with geometry that serves no gameplay or atmospheric purpose. In the second and third episodes, things simplify quite a bit, becoming smaller and more to the point, focusing more on a continuous combat experience—which, in my opinion, is much better, but most of it is still pretty generic. Just more concise. Oddly enough, in the second, the combat slows down, becoming more restrained and ironically making the difficulty curve feel inverted. Then in the third, things go off the rails in the opposite direction—levels become even shorter and simpler, and combat becomes fifty times more relentless than in the first act. And then it ends. Leaving a very strange impression. Strangely satisfying. Combined with everything I described above, it feels like—unlike its predecessor—the game lacks any clear direction in what it wants to be and how to expand upon already established premises. There are a LOT that just don't fit together properly. To me, the developers tried to make a drastically different type of game while still trying to force it into the same mold of the original. And the result was this: An incoherent mess, insane enough to be entertaining. This is a bit of everything: a movement shooter, a horde shooter, a collectathon, a clone of several things, all of that and none of it at the same time—and it barely holds together. You might not even understand what you’re seeing or doing, but in the end, it’s great.

This game starts very high and ends very low, is also has some quite embarrassing technical and balancing issues that should have definitely been addressed before a 1.0 release. I've put this review as negative because I am VERY disappointed after counting PW1 as one of my favorite boomer shooters, though I think Chapter 1(E1) is worth getting the game at the 50% sale it is at the moment, if only to see the absolute beast of a shotgun they graced us with in that chapter. -- The Good -- [list] [*]Game looks great, character, enemy and weapon designs are all fantastic [*]Music is awesome (if you can hear it, more about that later) [*]Level design in E1 and most of E2 is great with fun secret hunting and monster distribution [/list] -- The Bad -- [list] [*]Level designs for some of E2 and all of E3 noticeably declines, E3 is half the length of the other 2 with much worse pacing [*]A lot of abilities and weapons are badly explained, the game expects you to look things up in the codex (more on that one later as well) [*]Ammo distribution for some weapons is very weird, for example one weapon in E2 you seemingly can't find any ammo inside the levels, only in between [*]Difficulty balancing is BAD, I played through this game on hard mode and besides the first few levels it's incredibly easy to become overpowered, oneshotting even large enemies [*]Quite frequently the largest enemies are practically incapable of hitting you, they constantly shoot walls or get stuck, making them an absolute pushover [*]Weapon balancing is even worse than general difficulty balancing, for example the life steal on your melee in E2 makes you pretty much immortal, you could just poke your way through that game, even on hard mode [*]The story might as well not exist, the few paragraphs you get didn't make much sense at all to me and how they're supposed to actually connect these three characters together in a meaningful way [*]The weapon overheat mechanic in E3 is very badly implemented and needs a complete rework to integrate properly, I could write whole paragraphs on why that mechanic doesn't work in its current state but I'll spare you [/list] -- The UGLY -- [list] [*]Audio sliders are completely broken, the audio balance seemingly randomly changes, the SFX are constantly overpowering the music, even with frequent readjusting the audio levels fluctuate frequently and music sometimes just stops playing altogether [*]The Codex sometimes just doesn't list an entry, the description for the spells of your character just didn't get added after collecting, I had to guess and try out what they do, you get 0 explanation for them outside the Codex [*]This one isn't very frequent but sometimes the engine breaks and you go down to single digit frames on an otherwise pretty stable running game, on the final boss of E2 my frames would drop to 3 every time I pulled out my pistol [/list] Final thoughts: The way this game plays it looks like the devs ran out of money or time or motivation and just wrapped it up and called it a day, this is not 1.0 ready and E3 is an absolute joke compared to E1 I would love to see this being improved and worked on, but you only get one launch and sadly it's not a great one, I can't see them doing major level reworks for E3 like it would need so I at least hope for them fixing the things that pull down E1 and E2.

Solid boomshoot and follow-up to the original Project Warlock. The first game's best aspects, namely the weapon tweaking and customization are still here, but the level design is more ambitious and is now closer to something like a Quake than a Wolf3D. The encounters still tend to just throw a bunch of guys at you without a ton of craft, but it's still a pretty fun time. That said, it's abundantly clear that the game's third episode was rushed out the door since it's like a quarter as long as the other two. Keep that in mind.

Project Warlock is one of my favorite boomer shooter games. I remember being fairly disappointed with its sequel's early access, but I couldn't tell you why now. What I've played now, however, is very enjoyable. Unlike the original, this game has actual verticality, so the levels feel much more unique, and not like pallette swapped Wolf3D environments. Project Warlock 2 feels more like Serious Sam than any game, even those that have "Serious Sam" in the name. It's a very arcadey experience: a power trip with tons of monsters, big guns, upgrades, stuff like that. Where it shines is, unlike Serious Sam games, the game isn't a dick. There's nothing like picking up a health point spawning a billion enemies. With relatively small levels, you always feel powerful, rarely overwhelmed, and never bored. The movement in particular is very reminiscent of Blood, it's got that joyous bounce to it. The levels are also pretty good! Nothing too memorable, but most are very solidly built. All three episodes feature different protagonists, enemies, and weapons, too. Episode 1 is more focused on medieval aesthetic with all-around arsenal. Episode 2 takes more after Blood with wild west setting and slower weapons that pack a punch. Episode 3 is sci-fi where every weapon is extremely strong and/or has an incredible AoE. I think Project Warlock 2 could be one of the better boomer shooters, but holy fuck, it might be the glitchiest game I've ever played. Get yourself a bingo of game bugs, and you'll hit it. I fell through floors, I walked through walls with no ability to walk back, I've softlocked myself multiple times, I've had enemies disappear from the arena with no way forward, I'm pretty sure I've had secrets not count... Despite that, I've mostly enjoyed my time with the game, since checkpoints are plentiful, so it was just amusing, but this game has been in early access for years! There's also a distinct feeling that it was still rushed, as Episode 3 levels are really, really short. Like, 3 minutes WITH secret hunting sometimes. I don't know if dev has just gotten bored or what, but it leaves a bad taste in your mouth right at the end. I still think there's value in playing this game. It's fun on its own! However, maybe wait until a few more patches are out. The core gameplay IS pretty damn great, it's a shame about all the other stuff. I'm still gonna leave a "recommended" despite this in hopes for future patches and because, ultimately, I liked my time with it, but do be warned.

I enjoy the gameplay, but the overall quality of the game is quite poor. It still needs a lot of polishing and refinement.

I bought this game when it came out of early access, thinking i'd get access to three fully fleshed campaigns and a relatively bug free experience. I was wrong. The devs rushed out this release and as such it is full of massive gamebreaking bugs and other bugs that will basically require you to restart the episode because of it. For episode 3 they went all in on the details and forgot to add any actual gameplay, most of the maps are tiny (Some can be finished in 30 seconds) and the character you play on that episode absolutely sucks until you start upgrading her weapons, at which point she basically one shots everything on the map. There was no balancing or testing done. Then theres 'realmshift mode' which allows you to play any of the episodes with any of the three characters. Its bugged beyond belief. From the 'rune quests' (ways to unlock element based damage for your weapons) not actually granting you the unlock, forcing you to....you guessed it, restart from level 1 to try to fix it... to your weapon/stat points suddenly vanishing when you return to the hub, It feels to me that the devs just wanted to wipe their hands clean of this project and start working on 'the lost levels' for project warlock 1. If you've already played episode 1 and 2, its not worth getting just for episode 3. If you haven't played episode 1 and 2, I would strongly suggest you wait on your purchase until the devs communicate better and make it clear that they are going to fix these game breaking bugs.

~~Buggy. Incredibly buggy. And a lot of monsters teleport behind you. Literally appearing when a map-trigger is crossed so they're directly behind you. Which is a thing so cheap that even Doom-1 knew not to do that to players and to instead use monster-closets. I may update my review if the bugs get fixed.~~ Edit: Apparently the bugs were all just lingering issues from early access. You have to make a new savegame at v1.0 to have it not super bug out the game. Overall it's okay, not amazing, but okay. The monster closets are still an issue.

John Romero would be proud. Sorry i had to come back to this review just to hype this game a bit more, it has 32 levels and its only getting better and better. The guns the universe rotates every 12 levels but damn You can tell how much i liked this game considering this game is around 8h long and im putting around 30h in it

It's great! Fast action, good soundtrack, a lot of blood, secrets, weapon upgrades and hero abilities. Plays really well, I like to place headshots, especially with the corresponding passive perk. Probably a little bit too many achievements, though. =D

Feels like episode 3 was a little bit rushed, but episode 1 is among the best boomer shooters I've played and episode 2 is... "fine." Definitely worth your money, but not exceptional.

I gave this game a long while before I was willing to take a dive at it. Primarily because the first game also took a good bit to iron out. People had some mixed opinions on this so I figured I'd wait. It was worth it for certain. While I wouldn't say this is perfect in its current state, it easily can be depending what gets added to the game. Let's get into it. If you played Project Warlock this is similar game in every sense. You collect guns, level up, upgrade your stats gear and continue on. You mow through hundreds of enemies, uncover secrets and most of of all just simply enjoy the very responsive, fast paced combat with wonderful feedback. I will say this off the bat. I cannot stress enough that the combat (weapons feedback etc) is uterly spectacular. It is why I have a fairly high play time on it (and it's predecessor) despite it being relatively short. There are some major differences from the original. A huge one is that levels are vertical now. You can jump!! This alone makes the entire experience immensely more enjoyable. Second you have three different campaigns with three different characters. Each of which have their own set of weapons and magic (though they all share the same passives when upgrading). Unlike in last game most categories here will be upgraded via a different item, while in last game there was only one upgrade token and you upgraded stats on level up. Each of the campaigns you control a different disciple of the Warlock, the guy who conquered hell in last game and become the next big bad sort of thing. You will control Palmer, Urd and Kirsten. Each with a different theme both in how they play as well as levels and time periods you will go through. Palmer has the medieval theme, focuses on most traditional guns, and out of the lot has probably the most overpowered gun setups due to frost enchant (not the spell) being simple bonkers. Seriously his lightning staff with frost will trivialize the game. It's fun as hell though. Urd follow a wild west theme, and her guns follow that motif, however oddly her broken setup tends to be melee due to one upgrade for her speed magic spell. Kirsten is the futuristic one with lasers, claws, and a nuke. Her arsenal is probably the most over the top. Overall each character gets 6 weapons, and each weapon has 3 forms (one base and two advanced which you pick one from). Each advanced form in turn has unlockable secondary fire (hint, try Palmer's mortar for his 6, use the alt fire while in akimbo, it's hilarious). While the variety is there, I do feel that having only 6 is lacking a bit, even if there are more combinations than the previous game had , technically. However I feel due to how balance is for some guns, you end up using one or two for each character. Palmer's fast firing weapons like Heavy Machine gun and Lightning staff with frost enchant will simply make most encounters not a problem. While Urd's buckshot revolver will shred anything in the game in a blink, and if you need survivability the before mentioned melee setup will do. While Kirsten's Shotgun (whichever form) and the railgun will carry you through the game. Another issue to compile on top of this is the length of each campaign. Third campaign is too short. While none of them are particularly long, Kirsten simply has too many levels that are way too short. She does have some really damn good fights, but overall I wish it was longer. You do get the realmshift mode that can let you play any campaign with any character but that is besides the point. What I feel this game needs most is simply more content. I don't need another campaign (though that would be most welcome too) but I would expand the current ones. Both in terms of levels and weapons/gear/spells. Spells in general should be expanded upon. They are way too simple. Add another weapon or two to each character, perhaps expand the melee mechanics a little and few levels, and this game could be a masterpiece. I would compare it to Hexen, while no where near that quality of level design and complexity, the gunplay here is superior (as it should be considering the times). In short I hope they keep plugging at this and add more to it. It really could stand apart as some of the best this subgenre has to offer, but even in its current state, it is most certainly worth the time and money.

[h2] Project Warlock II review [/h2] The game is highly enjoyable — i got it after playing the first Warlock, and this feels like a huge upgrade, with cool and nifty features to it. [h3] Advantages [/h3] + Cool guns and spells. You WILL feel like a power-fantasy hero, which is, for the most part, what boomer shooters are about. + Upgrade system. It's cool to have variety, but sometimes it's hard to choose between two FUN guns. + Combo system. You really DO want to have this meter up, and the game allows you to, by constantly spawning monsters, which you make a mess of. + Secrets. It is fun to explore. [h3] Flaws [/h3] It also has similiar flaws to the first game. Tolerable, for the most part: - Guns. A selection of weapons and spells are much, much better and stronger than the others. Palmer's cannon, and it's upgrades just suck, but the double-barrelled and the MG is real good. The akimbo spell with no reload makes wonders, and other two spells are just pale, compared to that. And explosives for all characters are just meh — they don't do much damage, and often damage you — it's just not worth it to learn to use them when you have stronger alternatives at hand. - Some upgrades are real downgrades (see the ranged kunai dagger, which feels and plays real good VS any upgrade you could get for it, which fetches you a melee weapon with no real advantage). - Quite a few levels overstay their welcome. It's fun and all, but i'd rather prefer more short levels, than less longer levels, like it was in first Warlock. Subjective. [b] But overall, [/b] Project Warlock II has fun game mechanics, polished gameplay loop and is a great boomer shooter overall. Enjoyable till the end, and then there's option of playing it again with different characters. Recommended.

The actual game here is great, but the optimization, like last time, is comedically and inexplicably rough. How does a game that looks like this make my Steam Deck's GPU hit 90 degrees in the main menu?! And nowhere else?! What's happening here?!

[b] Project Warlock II [/b] is a worthy successor to retro shooters like Doom and Quake. Enhanced graphics with 3D levels and 2D sprites, a punchy soundtrack, and visceral gameplay create a nostalgic vibe. Three heroes (Palmer, Urd, Kirsten) with unique arsenals and skills add variety. Levels are larger and more vertical, though this can drag out gameplay at times. Steam shows 82% positive reviews from 249 of the last month, praising the action but noting bugs and optimization issues. If you love old-school FPS, it’s it is a blast, but wait for patches to polish it up.

Project Warlock 2 is a fine sequel that probably didn't need to be made. The developers iterate on the first game well enough, and take some risks with different characters and more experimental weapon designs, but I can't say any of it justifies its existence. The first episode is great, full stop. It's clearly where the team focused most of their effort and that focus gave us tight gunplay, an engaging enemy roster, and levels that are well paced, smartly designed (lots of interconnectedness), and big without feeling like that pair of pants your buddy tried on after 3 months of Ozempic. If I'm in the right mood I might even argue that Episode 1 is worth the price of admission alone. The other 2 episodes both have huge level design problems on opposite ends of the spectrum. Episode 2 reminded me a lot of TNT: Evilution with its expansive levels that contained more real estate than they knew what to do with. There were frequent 1-2 minute chunks of walking from point A to point B with zero combat. It might not sound like much but it can feel like a lifetime in this genre. TNT has the reputation it does for this exact reason. I have to imagine the levels were created chronologically because the brevity of Episode 3 feels like a direct reaction to the prior set. I beat most of E3's levels in under 5 minutes and all of them in under 10. Tiny levels can work as momentum builders when used thoughtfully and sparingly, but 12 of them consecutively signals burnout, and I think that was clearly the case here. The first game got away with it by being built around an arcade style loop, but the sequel clearly had bigger ambitions and this episode feels at odds with that attitude. The revolver you get in E2 was also a source of frustration for me. Hitting a headshot doesn't cost ammo, and while that's a cool idea it made an already easy game even easier, so much so that the fights felt more like shooting galleries. I have good aim and this game has very generous head hitboxes so 1/3 of the entire experience was less an FPS and more a point&click adventure, to the point of boredom. I did like the active reload on the third character, and most of the spells were useful or at least fun (agility on the E2 girl). If you're just looking for a simple shooter to pass the time Project Warlock 2 could be worth a look, but it's not essential and you've probably got more pressing games in your backlog.

I wasn't a big fan of the first Project Warlock, it just didn't click with me, but the second? Absolutely love it! Well 75% of it. The art feels good, the combat is nearly buttery smooth, the different playstyles in each chapter felt nice. overall, lovely and solid. If I had to narrow which chapter was the best? It'd be Chapter 2. Love every bit about it. Parts of it felt like I was playing Blood, all it needed was some fire weapons and it'd be perfect for it! but I can settle for poison, which was pretty fun to use! The Worst? Chapter 3. Well, it's not I didn't hate it but there was a lot more things about it I didn't like. The weapons for one, the overheating system and timed reloads, sure does reward skill but I never really liked those mechanics.. Also how the guns look and feel... didn't strike as well as the others did. Same with the spells. A lot of Chapter 3 felt... too disconnected? I mean I can see it being pretty cool going from basically familiar settings on earth to then going to space might work for people but for me nah... That didn't ruin my enjoyment of it and I'm gunna run through it some more, I'm glad I picked this up!

Had a blast in E1, got a bit bored in E2 and was annoyed in E3. Level design, weapons, spells all go downhill fast in the last episode. Wtf is this story? Most NES games had better fire effects than this game. The poison cloud (blocking your view but not the enemy's) actually made me edit my save file to remove the perk. Who tf thought those void effects were a good idea? Huge enemies and small level geometry do not cooperate well. Enemies sometimes keep their aggro after reloading. Levels often enough start with enemies already attacking. Codex entries do not do a very good job of explaining. Difficulty balance is rather poor. Played on hardest difficulty after E1 because it was way too easy after upgrades. Hardest moment is not the final boss, but a single, small room in E3M7 (well not sure if 7). This also represented the only time i actually needed to use spells. This would have been a recommendation if it weren't for the last espisode - buy on sale for the first two.

having seen this game grow into what it is now has been incredible i honestly think its a massive upgrade from the first and i cant wait to see where they take the warlock from here very good

I had some fun but a lot things annoyed me in this game. Weapon upgrades can actually downgrade your weapon and you cant get your weapon points back. I upgraded the cannonball gun into the that shoots a bunch of small cannon balls. But it has such a wide area and no penetration that I couldn't even finish the multi kill rune quest on ghouls. You will find a lot of weapons do this and there just isn't enough weapon points to go around and try everything unless you want to restart all over again. Rune quest can only be done one at a time and if you forgot to start one then your out of luck. It feels like after chapter 1 secret became an afterthought. Chapter 2 was great until I hit the train lvl. Afterwards it just felt plain or maybe I was just too overpowered by then. Chapter 3 was annoying. The overheat reload system felt bad to use and can just be ignored by switching weapons. The enemies had annoying mechanics like leaving a nearly invisible slime trail that hurts you. The game encourages you often to run through blazing with the combo meter but now it punishes you for it. The beastiary codex actually has useful information in chapter 1. Like enemy weakness and armor. But Chapter 2 beastiary barely had useful information. Chapter 3 beastiary completely just gave up on being useful. I tried poison build on Urd. But apparently getting poison cloud stuff makes a very blinding fog that makes it impossible to see through while enemies don't have a problem seeing through. Im not sure what chaos enchantment even does in Chapter 3. Level visuals tend to go from find to bland. Like Chapter 3 visuals were very smooth/bland to look at to the point my memories just remembers nothing of note. Yull find alot of level visuals have this samey quality slapped everywhere and you just try to avoid looking at them. There were good moments in the game but overall was dragged down by the rest of the game.

if you enjoyed ultrakill but couldnt handle or disliked the difficulty of it, Project warlock 2 is a great alternative the art style is frankly fascinating, the secrets (in some cases) require searching but arent shoved up satan's a$$, mechanics are fun and the weapon variety is wide, in short it was very worth the 8 euros i got it for while on sale

I got this game at the start of early access, and after all of this time it is still a broken mess. After so many years of development, I don't understand how some of the weapons are fully broken. For example, the void staff in episode 3 is supposed to have a vortex effect that groups enemies. It does practically no damage, but does have the unique power of breaking every fight that requires you to kill all enemies in an arena. There are so many problems, that even if it wasn't a buggy mess I still wouldn't recommend it. There are so many good shooters out right now, don't waste time on this one like I did.

An incredible game with rough edges. It plays wonderfully, the guns and satisfying and varied, enemies are numerous and die in pleasing explosions of blood. Though the level design is inconsistent and there is a lot of bugs, the dev is constantly patching the game and listening to feedback which is commendable and makes me believe that in a short while it will become a much more polished game. It's still worth playing despite these issues. Highly recommended.

A fantastic Boom Shoot. The combat in this game is top notch, and honestly the launch sale price is a steal for a game of this quality. Awesome to see this one leave early access. Easily one of the better in the genre, easily.

The game was a bit too rough when it launched into early access, so I put it down while waiting for the full release. Now that it's here it's almost like an entirely different game, the level design is improved, the visuals are less messy, the progression is much more interesting, and the weapons feel fantastic. It doesn't have the same polish that the original Project Warlock had, but it's also a less simple game and offers a different kind of experience. Overall I'd definitely recommend it to Boomer Shooter fans, as well as any casual FPS fans looking for something fun.

Decent shooter, not without flaws. And to enjoy it you need to have a certain amount of tolerance towards pixelated sprites.

Gameplay, level design, even the small bits like having secret placement have the right blend of hard-to-find and obvious in hindsight are there in this game. The weapon selection and feel is one of the best among related games. But it's a shame that optimization is so bad that the game starts to drop below 30 fps once the player hits a big map like E1M4 even at lowest settings, which is definitely unexpected for a game with retro graphics like this. Sadly, I cannot recommend it at this point.

The first one was definitely better. This one is not bad, but it's the same as the new Doomy - too many arenas. Seriously most of the enemies I just avoided as much as possible because it started to annoy me. Finds are ok e.g. cameos with characters from movies or other games. The music was as if there was no music at all - none of it was memorable except for the music from the main menu, where there is a riff similar to a Megadeth track called ‘Trust’.

Holy sh*t I didn't expect it to be THAT good! Non-stop action, just kill everything! HELL YEAH!

As much as I've been enjoying the gameplay aspect of this, since it definitely scratches the Boomer Shooter retro itch, the performance issues unfortunately get to a point where it's actively hampering the experience. One of the missions just dropped in frames to an absurd degree the further I moved into it, and E1M11 was absolutely unplayable, since everything was moving at 1 frame per 5 seconds right at the start of the stage, even with the graphics at the lowest settings, and I couldn't even get the game to close properly since it was struggling so hard. It sucks because if you want to bounce around and shoot everything in sight, this game does a very good job of achieving that objective. However, it also definitely needs more polish and bug smashing for sure, so I'll sadly have to leave a negative until the issues get addressed, since as it is right now it is impossible to progress any further, and if I do find a way to get back it then I worry a different stage may possibly be worse. On a high end PC rig that can brute force past the issues it may not be noticeable, but on lower end setups there will definitely be problems.

1. The Bugs I've played this game when it got into Early Access after playing and loving Project Warlock and promptly refunded it after getting softlocked way too often. It is good to see that a lot of the bugs and glitches are gone yet it still needs polish, especially one of the spells in Episode 3 ( [spoiler] The Reaper Spell [/spoiler] ) which hardlocks you after using the spells key during it's "second" phase and requires a full game reset. The only other glitches I've encountered are very rarely endlessly falling through the bottom of the world in some maps and some performance issues tied to a particular gun. These issues only exist at the time of writing and may be patched out later. 2. The Gameplay Very fun! You got a lot more vertical freedom, A LOT more customization and build options and very fun and solid gunplay. Every character feels refreshingly different from the others with different styles of arsenal and combat abilities with each one having distinct strengths and weaknesses to adapt to and overcome. The game itself is divided into three episodes each with 12 Levels with varying stage lengths [spoiler] with Episode 3 being way too short in my opinion [/spoiler]. The RPG elements are well implemented, sadly once you get one particular skill or weapon upgrade your are locked into it for the rest of the Episode. No Taking-Backsies unless you savescum. 3. The Story Since both games are taking place within the same universe Project Warlock 2 tries to expand it's existing setting and story throughout the game with each characters backstory, mission and unique leveldesign philosophy. There are a lot of indivitual Lorescrolls and Bestiary entries you can find and collect, either by just finding them laying about in the open or within levelsecrets, which are in turn readable in the Codex/Bestiary. I did not pursue the route of relentless secrethunter, therefor I do not have the full knowledge about the lore and without that knowledge I have to say that the story overall feels okay but a bit lackluster. 4. Personal Verdict If you're only here for fun gunplay and having a good time slaughtering through hordes of enemies, give it a go. Is it a good sequel to the first game? I can neither definetly say yes or no, that lies in the eye of the beholder. For me it was and alright-ish experience with some really refreshing changes and additions and some lacking and sometimes bad moments as well.

Bloody fast and blood-crazed, demon raging gameplay! 7/10! Tons of ways to replay the game! Maps and certain areas can be frustrating but a little exploration helps! GO PLAY!!!

This game is great the gameplay is fluid and straight forward the only issue being that same levels are more demanding and performance drops

Not a super well balanced game, and honestly the less said about episode 3, the better. But gunplay feels great, most of the 54 (!) guns are fantastic and there's a lot of value in this package overall, especially when you brave through the aforementioned episode 3 and unlock the ability to use that chapter's guns in other chapters. Nailgun my beloved Pick it up if you want kind of an unbalanced power fantasy boomshoot. It'll fill that hole and then some.

This has to be the hardest review I have done. The game isn't bad, and I want to say yes pick it up. But this game is a downgrade to the first game in every way. The first game was just a blast to play, but this game is the exact opposite. The art style has to be the part that ruins it the most for me. Everything looks the same and blends in with the environments. The mobs all act and look the same making every level boring. I find myself just trying to race through the game just to be done with it.

Quite buggy, some game mechanics aren't well explained (start runequests at your home base, runes are a game changer) , had a fun time playing it though,

Como fanático de los [i]boomer shooters[/i] y del primer Project Warlock no puedo recomendar esta segunda entrega, por lo menos no en el estado que se encuentra al día de la fecha (24/06/2025). Voy a intentar ser breve: 1. El juego está crudísimo, con bugs que van desde los menúes hasta el gameplay mismo: * En reiteradas ocasiones el juego se quedó trabado en la pantalla anterior al menú principal, y un par de veces en pantallas de carga de niveles. * Mi personaje se cayó debajo del mapa en varias ocasiones, algo que parece suceder sobre todo al pisar superficies inclinadas. * Partes de la geometría que deberían poder pasarse por alto (como una grieta en el suelo) detienen la marcha del personaje como si se chocara contra una pared, mientras que otras hacen que nuestro personaje pegue un salto y salga volando. * En varias ocasiones el juego se quedó trabado después que los enemigos me hayan matado, haciendo imposible acceder al menú de pausa y debiendo forzar el cierre del juego desde el administrador de tareas de Windows. Estos son sólo algunos ejemplos, pero queda claro que lo sacaron del horno antes de tiempo. 2. A todo el juego le falta una tonelada de pulido: Los menúes son feos comparados con lo estilizados pero funcionales que eran los del primer juego; las armas varían enormemente, con algunas muy satisfactorias y otras completamente inútiles; usar explosivos es un juego de azar entre si el proyectil va a alcanzar al enemigo o se va a quedar trabado en la geometría (el disparo secundario de la [i]shotgun[/i] del tercer capítulo es el peor ejemplo de ésto, si se dispara estando bajo un techo medianamente bajo existe la posibilidad de que el proyectil explote directamente en nuestra cara). Todos los aspectos del juego se sienten pobremente realizados, faltos de detalle... El primer Project Warlock era [i]lo-fi[/i] a propósito, era su estética particular — esta segunda entrega se siente barata como un [i]budget title.[/i] 3. Con la [i]metaprogresión[/i] y el conocimiento del comportamiento de los enemigos bastaba para superar las partes más desafiantes del primer Project Warlock sin morir demasiadas veces — era un juego [i]relativamente fácil.[/i] Esta segunda entrega, en cambio, cuenta con una dificultad esquizofrénica donde pasamos de ser una máquina de matar imparable e inmortal, a ser [i]oneshoteados[/i] en una fracción de segundo por 30 enemigos que [i]spawnean[/i] de la nada. De no ser por esta [i]generación espontánea[/i] de enemigos, todos los encuentros son ridículamente fáciles y no presentan ningún desafío. El [i]boss[/i] final puede ser derrotado con un solo disparo de [i]railgun.[/i] Uno solo. Aclaro que completé el juego en [i]hard difficulty.[/i] 4. Gráficamente el juego es espantoso. Del hermoso [i]pixel art[/i] de los enemigos de la primera entrega se ha pasado a modelos tridimensionales convertidos en [i]sprites[/i] de ocho lados, lo que da como resultado que los enemigos se vean embarrados, toscos, faltos de detalle. Los ambientes también sufren del mismo efecto embarrado y esto constituye un problema no sólo estético sino también en el gameplay, ya que entre los ambientes, los enemigos y los proyectiles que vienen y van, se genera un ruido visual que resulta muy desorientador y confuso. Por lo menos la mitad de las veces que morí en el juego fueron porque me resultó imposible ver claramente qué estaba pasando en la pantalla. 5. El diseño de mapas del primer Project Warlock remitía a juegos aún anteriores a Doom como Wolfenstein 3D, Blake Stone y hasta Catacomb 3D — una propuesta innovadora y poco vista. Esta segunda entrega apuesta a mapas más complejos, con resultados dispares. La calidad decae enormemente hacia el final del juego, siendo el último mapa del tercer capítulo, derecho viejo, un insulto a la inteligencia. Puede que se solucionen algunos de estos problemas con parches que vayan saliendo, pero para mí Project Warlock 2 se alejó demasiado de todo aquello que hizo especial al primer juego, y eso no lo arregla ningún parche. Lamentablemente, no recomendado.

Boring compared to the first game but it's alright. Starts to grow on you after a few maps.

In many regards it is an improvement to the first, but also many points where it's worse. Level design was much better than the first and i never experienced cheap instant death due to falling into lava like the terrible last world of the first game. First issue is that upgrades don't tell enough nor give the ability to test them by allowing you to refund the upgrade if it just doesn't work for you, you have to save prior, test it and hope that gives enough info for if it will fit into your playstyle, added with he problem that some "upgrades" are downright downgrades and i think you should be able to do at least 3 quests at a time for those enchantments as easy quests could just be finished at the beginning and you still have a whole level left. The second is an issue i have with all boomer shooters and that is how they handle their secrets, typically the four bad ways to go about it are hug/use/shoot every wall cause we won't give tells for all of the secrets, a button that opens a secret, where? I don't know you find it, don't forget to look up for that button to shoot which will only be often enough for you to forget about it only to remember when you randomly see it after many levels, and literally out in the open. I would much prefer the fourth over the other three, but the best way would be casual observation i.e. if you just look around you'll find them, also everyone knows the hardest thing to convince a player to do in games is look up without active incentives. the worst thing about secrets is long levels make hunting secrets a pain. The other problem stem from the secrets system in this game is that upgrade points can be hidden in them and you have to hope that the level is one of the good ones or you aaren't at optimum stats cause you're not secret hunting. My issues with Episode 1 were that the cannon felt terrible and no upgrades could fix it and the levels stretch a bit longer than I'd like. Episode 2 the first map is a bit hard for a introduction to the character and not a fan of the permanent lower armor, has the worst weapons in my opinion and levels that are too long. Episode 3 has the worst upgrades, worst enemies and i hate that reload, I know you can just switch weapons, I just think the reload system sucks, though i liked that it had the shortest levels. I often forgot about the spells on episode 1 and 2, probably more important on harder difficulties. I don't feel like this is a 1.0 and it ends on a cliffhanger that feels like it should have another episode to end it.

A decent boomer shooter. Generally speaking, each character and their weapons and abilities were mostly fun to use. Levels were fun. Enemies were fantastic. The art style of this game is really neat. What little story there was, was well written. There were a lot of really cool nods to other franchises, games, movies etc. I had a pretty good time with this game. Some suggestions to the devs: - I would have liked to have seen more story written into the game. You get one bit of text at the start of a character's run, and one bit of text at the end. That's pretty much it. I didn't pick up this game because I thought it'd have an unforgettable, deep story, but a bit more would've been nice to sort of flesh it out a bit more. - Upgrade stations always killed the music in my game. A small, but noticeable annoyance. - The weapon upgrades aren't all good. I don't expect every upgrade to cater to my specific playstyle, but giving us the ability to undo weapon upgrades would go a long way. After upgrading some weapons, I ended up trying them, and never touching them again. - Palmer's rife (the name escapes me, but it's the one you can upgrade with a scope) needs some work. You get a scope that can you look into, but the crosshair in the scope isn't how you aim your shots...the iron sights are. If you try and use the scope crosshairs to aim your shots, you always miss. Does that seem wrong to anybody else? I suggest actually making the gun use the scope's crosshair properly. - Kirsten's void effects completely block vision. Absolutely more of a pain than it's worth. I'd suggest making it transparent.

Absolutely love it, highly recommend, it just feels like a D&D version of doom and I am here for it

Project Warlock ll is my pick for top boomer shooter released in 2025 so far. I enjoyed every aspect of this game (except for the bugs which I’ll get to later), the dev team nailed what it takes to be a fun boomer shooter. Tons of weapons to choose from, each with upgrade trees that lets you make them more powerful or change them entirely. You can further customize them with runes that allow extra damage points via RNG, such as poison effect or setting enemies on fire. As you collect stat points you can upgrade your character even further to match your playstyle. The game is divided into three episodes, each with its own unique playable character which was a cool experience. Every character has their own individual powers and set of weapons which keeps the game fresh. You can even go back and play other episodes with whatever character you like after you beat the game adding to the replay value. The levels are well designed and a huge step up from the first game. There is a jump button now and the levels are much larger and you’re not confined to one plane. The first game felt cramped but here it’s the opposite, some levels are absolutely massive. Hunting for secrets is an essential part of any boomer shooter and they did an excellent job with it here. Rarely are they obvious and some are extremely well hidden and you get a great sense of satisfaction once you 100% a level. Each level has a “secret cameo” too which are video game pop-culture references, these were fun to find. There is a quick save feature but I found the in-game save points were generous enough that when I died I didn’t feel like I lost too much progress on respawn which I appreciated. For me this was a game that I enjoyed so much that once I beat it I immediately started a new game on the highest hardcore difficulty, this time choosing entirely different weapon and spell upgrades which made it feel like a different game. Put simply, if you enjoyed the first game or are just a boomer shooter fan in general this is a must-play, I promise you’ll have a good time with it. Now onto the issues with the game, which have nothing to do with the game design but instead are problems with the game’s programming. There are still a lot of bugs in this game. None game breaking, but annoying nonetheless. I ran into issues where I clipped outside a boss arena on a few occasions, leaving me to have to restart the section a few times until it worked properly. I also kept clipping through the floor on an elevator in the second episode which then was warping me back to the start and I couldn’t progress until I figured out to start the elevator, jump off, and then wait until the elevator had reached the bottom and jump all the way down the elevator shaft which worked since there is no fall damage in the game. Many achievements are currently broken including ones that require a ton of time and effort to complete. For example I took the time to find every single secret in the game, except the achievement didn’t pop which was frustrating. You get a kickass lava gun in the third episode except there isn’t any ammo for it for four or five levels straight which felt like an oversight instead of intentional design. Some bugs were in the player’s favor so its not all bad, I had a bug where the SMGs could fire infinite bullets without reloading or using the alt fire which was fun. I expect all the bugs to be iron out in due time and honestly I can overlook them since I enjoyed the game so much. I still had an absolute blast with Project Warlock ll

This game was okay. Not as great as the first one unfortunately, mostly due to the level design feeling a bit weak. The game does keep interesting by having many 3 distinct chapters that are somewhat different in play-style.

A solid entry into the Classic Style FPS/Boomer Shooter genre, Project Warlock exceeds its predecessor in all aspects. Its faster, more frantic, and gives you way more versatility than the last game. Never once did I feel like this game was dragging on for too long or was overstaying its welcome. Each chapter has its own theme and character, arsenal, abilities, and it features some light RPG stat building as well to give you an extra boost as you progress through the chapter. Level design is great, the secrets and Easter eggs are well hidden and are tons of fun to find (and worth your while, too). Love that each chapter has its own set of enemies unique to it, you only see a few repeats. Boss fights are fun, providing a decent challenge to close out the level. I only had a few issues with bugs and some glitches. I fell off the map by walking through a wall once, and another time a shambler threw me into a fence and I got stuck in the level geometry and had to reload the save I made which was all the way back in the hub area. A little bit annoying. In short, I really enjoyed it! Beat it in like 25 hours and I might go back to replay some of the chapters with different characters. If you enjoy boomer shooters, you'll probably enjoy this game, too. Plus, in the age of limp and half cooked 80 dollar games, this 17 dollar one has quite a bit of meat on its bones to Rip and Tear through. I rate this "[Finds a secret cameo] Oh, that's gore... That's gore of my comfort character..."/10

I'm not too far in, but I've absolutely loved what I've played so far. The pixel art artstyle, the sound and feel of the guns, the kick ass music, the flowing level design, and even just how fun it is to simply CONTROL your character have made this game blast to play so far. Plus there is a metric TON of stuff to do in this game, with a bunch of secrets in every level, gun customization that somehow makes the already fantastic feeling guns even more fantastic, and enough achievements that will probably keep you playing for a good long while if you're a completionist. Solid recommendation from me, especially at only $17. Best entry into the boomer shooter renaissance in a good long while.

It's been a long time coming, finally this game is out of early access and I finally got around to finishing it. - Great Combat: Fast pace and fluid - Level Design: Pretty good but can be better, gotten lost in a few instances but not the worse thing - Enemy Variants: Plenty to keep the game feelings pretty good and changes how you have to approach certain encounters. - Length of the game: Does not overstay its welcome, I say its worth the time to play it and even more to 100% it. Overall: a solid 9/10 I look forward to future projects. Happy Slaying, Warlocks.

One of my first reviews and this game is worth the attention. Project Warlock 1 was so much fun that I had to beat it in a sitting. A 6 hour sit but well worth it! Project Warlock 2 improves on the first in every single way, but with the addition of verticality the team has added more than just a third dimension. The weapons are dynamic, and all the upgrades are meaningful and viable. The spells are interesting but I frankly get by more with the weapons. I've been playing on the highest difficulty, but with the addition of quick saves its been manageable. Something I love is the disabling of quick saving during sequences where the exits to an area are blocked, marking a large scripted arena-like event of a fight. I believe I'm halfway through the game and is certainly my game of the year, or my game of the first half of 2025. I can't wait to finish and see what the devs come up with for...Project Warlock 3!?!

What can I say about Project Warlock II. It's a flawed game. but I'm willing to let it go due to the sheer hours of joy this game brought me. The combat, enemy design, level variation and so forth are inspired, if somewhat ramshackle. The pixel-art aesthetic is fresh and inspired. Unfortunately, PW2 just doesn't quite know what it wants to be-- a fleshed out expansion to the original, or it's entirely own thing. Having changed so many times throughout development it honestly deserves its own documentary. Whether this was due to developer indecisiveness or the entitlement inherent to Early Access contributors is unclear. Remember the good old days when you bought a finished game? Quantity does not necessarily mean quality. Episodes 1 & 2 are solid enough (Urd is my waifu) but episode 3 feels completely rushed. Which is a shame, because it has the most compelling setup of the trio. Alas, all of the weapons are imbalanced OP nonsense-- which, while fun to use in a kindergartner kind of way, do not a level game experience make, and every map of E3 can be completed in a matter of a few minutes or less. This is an alpha build masquerading as a beta masquerading as a finished product. With all that said, I still recommend Project Warlock II. The combat, music, and level design gel nicely. The story blurbs that bookend each episode are fire. The upgrade system is cute, if rudimentary. A lot of blood, sweat and tears clearly went into this game. I enjoyed my 40+ hours, even if it is an imbalanced, unplaytested mess.

Basically a modern version of doom its very well made and the art direction is one of the best ive seen recommended! specially dujring a sale

Edit- Game is glitched on last boss. There are little spiders that come out and some are invisible. So while the boss is in thier cocoon healing you just sit there having to dodge these little jump waves till it times out and he comes back out with more health. Normally when there are only a few enemies left they have little things above them. Game started as a 10/10 for the first episode. I felt the other 2 episodes were lacking. Ill give it a 7/10 due to the last chapters. The 3rd chapter the weapons didnt feel useful and the ammo was pretty scarce for some of the more powerful weapons. Other than those complains I think its a pretty solid shooter.

A fun sequel with a few bugs and a bit of an identity crisis. This wants to be a sequel to the original game, which was a combination of Wolf3D, Doom and Hexen. As a result, a lot of it's enemy encounter / encounter design wants to prioritise close-knit gunfights with small, select amount of enemies. But it also wants to be Quake 2, with much larger levels and much higher enemy counts. As a result, the weapon / ability roster struggles to accommodate each play style in full. Overall, this is still a super fun game with satisfying visuals, audio and gunplay. Recommended pickup during a sale, hoping the developers iron out the bugs that are still in the game sometime soon.