Introduction
Maximus 2 is a beat-em-up game published and developed by FourFats. It is set to come out January 5, 2023 on Nintendo Switch eShop for $4.99. The game had been previously released on Android and iOS. FourFats is comprised of four people who are based out of Hong Kong. I would like to thank FourFats for the review code for this game.
Overview
FourFats developed and published Maximus 2. They are a group of four people from Hong Kong and London. They were heavily influenced by Japanese and American culture. Maximus 2 shows this cultural influence in the characters and settings. If you look closely at some of the enemies and backgrounds you can see nods to different fandoms. I saw nods to Five Nights at Freddies, Lord of the Rings, and Friday the 13th. I am sure there are more that I missed.
Gameplay
Maximus 2 places you as one of eight characters. You must rescue the Duke who was kidnapped by a gang of ruffians. The game is a beat-em-up at its core, and it also has some rogue-lite features.
The rogue-lite features in Maximus 2 include the ability to build up your character. Each run your character maintains the level, buffs, and items. Other than that you will be mashing the A button to fight the hordes of enemies that you encounter.
You don’t have to fight alone. One of the abilities you have early on is to create a scarecrow person to help you out. You also will encounter enemies who are riding different creatures, and you can knock them off the creature and proceed to ride the creature and utilize its special attack. If you prefer players controlled by humans, then you can play with up to 3 other players. If you are trying to speed run the game, it does keep track of how many times you died, and how long you have taken during your current run. Speaking of dying, I died quite a bit. The nice thing is that you are given 25 continues to use during your run. When your character is killed, you have the option of using one of those continues, or restarting from the last checkpoint.
Graphics
Maximus 2 has a fairly simple graphical style, but it works for the game. The game can throw a lot of enemies at you at once, and despite that I don’t see any signs of slowdown, or frame drops. The enemies are detailed in the simple style, and there are a number of varieties of them you will encounter. The one disappointment that I had with graphics in the game is that your characters appearance doesn’t change with different armor you buy during your run. The only way you can change your appearance is to buy a different skin on the character select screen.
Sound
The music in Maximus 2 is well designed. I found it blended into the back ground during a big fight, and other times it was grand and was cheering me on to victory. I will have to play a run with headphones next time to fully experience the sound.
Story
This is a beat-em-up game, so there isn’t much of a story here. The basic premise is a bunch of bad guys kidnapped the duke, and your job as the hero is to rescue the duke. My first run through of the game was done in under an hour, so I don’t think you can reasonably expect narrative magic.
Value
Maximus 2 is 4.99 on the Nintendo eShop, and I think it is well worth the price. You may tell me that the game is free on the Android and Apple App Stores, however version has ads. I downloaded the free app on Android. You would have to spend $4.99 to permanently remove the ads from the game. I may be in the minority, but I don’t like using touchscreen controls. The Nintendo Switch release allows you to use the physical controller. While the game is short, you can still find plenty to do. Also there are a few branches of the progression that you may not take every time.
Conclusion
Maximus 2 is on the Nintendo eShop for $4.99 as of January 5th 2023. You can also pick it up on the Android Play Store, and Apple App Store. This game is perfect for pick up and play. You can start a game and complete it in as little as an hour. The game looks great, runs great, and is a lot of fun to play. I like it when good phone games come to the eShop with the in app purchases taken out. Combine that with the ease of using a physical controller, you can’t go wrong.
