Abstract
- We go hands-on with the upcoming Excessive On Life 2 at gamesco 2025.
- Ralph Ineson joins the solid of Excessive On Life 2 alongside the returning actors Betsy Sodaro, J.B. Smoove, and Richard Form.
- Excessive On Life 2 launches for Xbox Collection X|S on February 13, 2026, and might be obtainable on day one with Recreation Move Final.
How do you observe one of the crucial hilarious first-person shooters ever created? Seems: give us a skateboard and inform us to get nuts. Throughout a current hands-on alternative with an early construct of Excessive On Life 2, I may immediately acknowledge many returning hallmarks from the unique, most notably the return of the speaking weaponry, Gatlians, but in addition the flexibility to make use of Knifey’s grapple to drag me onto ledges, and tons of sharply written dialog that mix this wild universe collectively. But it surely was skateboarding that actually caught my consideration.
Selecting up a while after the tip of Excessive On Life, the hands-on preview kicked off with me skydiving into the world of ConCon (Conference Conference), which is a planet stuffed with floating platforms housing (you guessed it) conventions. A bounty has led us right here, focusing on senator Muppy Doo, a politician who’s in league with the evil executives at Rhea Prescribed drugs who’re intent on turning humankind into… prescription capsules.
My mission? Make my manner by a number of conventions to seek out him. First up is ParkingCon, a group of crashed vehicles piled on high of one another with dozens of aliens combating over the few remaining parking areas – one area was even being “held” by a plastic chair – and we have to free one as much as give returning character Gene’s flying Winnebago an opportunity to park by any means needed (e.g. taking pictures aliens). At first, I got here to this with the method of a typical first-person shooter, specializing in enemy teams one by one, attempting to clear these parking areas, and biking between my two obtainable Gatlians: Sweezy (laser pistol) and Gus (shotgun). Then I hopped on the skateboard and every little thing modified.
Excessive On Life Professional Skater Version
The skateboard successfully replaces your dash button, nevertheless it’s the pace and agility that comes with it that makes it such a sport changer. The extra I moved across the stage on the board, the extra objects I discovered to grind on by urgent the LB button, like handrails and concrete dividers. I even discovered some sections that resembled quarter pipes and seen that sure vehicles had been positioned simply proper to provide the impression they had been ramps to leap off. That’s when it dawned on me that this complete stage was principally a skatepark! That is going to be nice.
The pace of battle actually picked up the extra I grew to become snug discovering areas to grind, whereas slicing down enemies left and proper with Sweezy and Gus. I may even “throw” my skateboard at enemies for a one-hit kill and located it vastly useful that the identical button tied to grinding was additionally Knifey’s head-latching capacity, which might neatly pull me to rails or grindable objects if I used to be going to be developing quick. It means you may get into an actual stream, even in a sport the place you wouldn’t anticipate it.
If you happen to recall from the primary sport, traversal with Knifey’s grapple was a giant element, unlocking quite a lot of environmental and platform puzzles. Now with the inclusion of the skateboard, the platforming facets are all amplified and it wasn’t lengthy till the demo began showcasing what else I may do.
Persevering with to the following floating zone concerned grinding on floating buses, bouncing on big inflatable balloons, after which wall using to soundly cross a chasm of clouds, the place I reached PoliCon (a politics conference). The skatepark motif continued right here as nicely, with loads of handrails and different objects to grind swiftly throughout this new zone, shifting by to my subsequent goal. And that’s when our private assistant Swimsuit-O stepped in.
So, What Else Can You Do?
For our demo, Swimsuit-O was ever vigilant in popping up on the backside of the display screen and ensuring we stayed on schedule for our 30-minute preview – deliberately fast-forwarding us by highlights of the demo, and “unintentionally” main us to the conclusion of a boss battle with one of many sport’s new characters, Sheath, voiced by the wonderful Ralph Ineson. What adopted was a hilarious (and bloody) dissection of his alien bounty hunter character – whose head is then remodeled into a brand new Gatlian. Yep, a boss voiced by a well-known actor is additionally a gun on this sport.
Sheath complimented Sweezy and Gus properly with the texture of a battle rifle – Halo followers may discover the acquainted “punch” right here — and his alt-attack is an Impaling Spike that can be utilized to string collectively subsequent targets and to create Spike ziplines, which I later use to cross over to the following conference, MurderCon (it’s precisely what you may assume it’s). I really like that these Metroidvania-like parts are nonetheless current from the earlier sport, opening areas previously unreachable after getting acquired the particular device to do the job.
Shoot, Shoot, Shoot!
As soon as we’ve stepped by the gates into MurderCon, the demo’s narrative shifted barely to concentrate on Knifey who, as returning gamers could recall, likes to get bloody. He was predictably overjoyed to attend a conference that’s all about considered one of his favourite topic issues. Earlier than I knew it, we had been neck deep in a battle royale, surrounded by a laser tag area aesthetic with numerous neon strewn about. And, sure, tons of enemies to shoot at. The speedy traversal parts took a backseat right here, because the demo showcased extra of a standard multiplayer-like shooter structure, permitting us to lean extra into our Gatlians and their skills.
Sheath feels nice with that good battle rifle punch, and utilizing his Impaling Spike to tie teams of enemies collectively was extremely enjoyable. Sweezy remains to be a stable laser pistol with an alt-attack that creates a slowdown bubble that surrounds a bunch of enemies. And Gus’ shotgun and disc shot skills are nice at clearing crowds of enemies. All this combating culminated in a boss battle with a big, ogre-like character named Brutus, who had a large pyramid-like helmet fused to his head. It wasn’t lengthy after that me and my Gatlians made quick work of him and had been topped winners of MurderCon.
Lastly, I used to be whisked ahead as soon as once more by Swimsuit-O to face off with Muppy Doo. At first, the encounter was your customary fare of dodging incoming assaults and unleashing some damage with my Gatlians. But it surely was the following section of the battle that I wasn’t fairly prepared for – and was in contrast to something I’ve performed. The ultimate boss battle occurred… within the menu display screen.
See, Muppy Doo has a shrinking capacity and was capable of get so small that he snuck into my swimsuit’s mainframe and tied up Swimsuit-O. After releasing Swimsuit-O by “clicking” on him, he grew to become my mouse cursor as I clicked by my menu display screen, attempting to uncover the mini Muppy Doo who was trashing my sub programs.
Muppy would pop his head out from behind an icon, or begin destroying menu objects, and we’d punch him, forcing him to duck into one other sub-menu. After a little bit of this click-tag, it grew to become worse for my character, forcing a full system reboot and deleting my save sport… which rebooted into a completely completely different sport – Bible Adventures. No, actually. Finally, issues continued to escalate to the purpose the place the one resolution was to have Knifey stab me to dying – which he was greater than prepared to oblige. And thus, we wrapped up our time with Excessive On Life 2.
A couple of video games underneath their belt now, I like that Squanch Video games is admittedly beginning to settle right into a mindset of, “Wouldn’t it’s humorous if…” and discover methods to undergo with it, whereas making it unbelievable enjoyable (and extremely humorous) within the course of. Discovering that stability shouldn’t be a straightforward factor to do – type of like attempting to trip a skateboard whereas blasting aliens within the face. Of which we’re very excited to strive extra of as soon as Excessive On Life 2 launches for Xbox Collection X|S on February 13, 2026, obtainable on day one with Recreation Move Final.
Excessive On Life 2
Squanch Video games, Inc.
You’ve finished it. You’ve taken down an intergalactic cartel, introduced humanity again from the brink of extinction, and hunted harmful bounties to the far corners of the galaxy. Bounty looking has introduced you fortune, fame and love; however when a mysterious determine out of your previous reappears and places a value in your sister’s head, your comfortable life will get thrown into chaos.
Do you’ve gotten what it takes to threat all of it and produce down an intergalactic conspiracy that after once more threatens your favourite species (people)?
Excessive On Life RETURNS as you and the one that you love rag-tag group of alien misfits shoot, stab, and skate your manner by attractive, harmful worlds all throughout the galaxy to explode the EVIL pharmaceutical conglomerate hell-bent on placing value tags on HUMAN LIFE!
