Before I start this rather negative review off I just want to say I am genuinely upset that I have pressed the thumbs down button for one of my favourite game series (questionable choice to many, I am more than aware) but it's truly how I felt after the credits started to roll. I sincerely hope Eerie Guest Studios (developers), tinyBuild (developers and publisher) and Steel Wool Studios (DLC developers) can redeem this game as soon as possible.

Betrayal:
2 days before the release of Deluxe Edition the short and long descriptions of this game were drastically changed to remove any mention of the neural network AI and highly anticipated locations such as the Golden Apple Amusement Park that were promised to us when pre-ordering this game back in April.

Price and Game Length:
This game is absolutely not worth the price it is being sold at in its current state especially considering the main/base game can be entirely completed from start to finish in roughly 2 hours.

Artificial "Intelligence":
The main selling point of the game: The AI, is quite frankly atrocious to play against. They lose you incredibly easy if you go anywhere remotely abstract such as on a bookshelf or a bed, they often pause when they get close to you as they are trying to calculate your next move rather than simply grabbing you and they all have such a limited set of tasks that you can often see them loop if you leave them be and just watch them do their tasks for less than a minute.

Puzzles:
The puzzles for this game are much friendlier than the ones seen in the original Hello Neighbor however to that game's credit at least those were rather creative. For the sequel at least 50% of the puzzles ended up being a "solve this combination" (number or colour) or "use scissors or a crowbar to access this".

Marketing:
On the official social media accounts for the game, we were given a little glimpse of a weather system that (according to the Ex-Lead Game Designer during a Steam Q&A that happened on the 4th of October) was (this is not an accurate quote but merely what I can remember him saying) fully functional, when I played the game myself it NEVER EVER showed up during gameplay, only for a few seconds in a scripted cutscene... There are numerous scripted/fake screenshots on the store page: You cannot pick up paint cans and chuck them at any of the neighbours anymore but you could in the Beta, there is no key to pickpocket off of the back of The Mayor in the game and the visuals look MUCH nicer in that particular screenshot than what we actually get.

Deluxe Edition Content / DLCs:
As of right now both Back to School and Late Fees are incredibly unpolished: Countless visual bugs, both of their intro cutscenes give absolutely no direction as to what your goal is and there are no save points in either of them so if the game crashes (which it more than likely will as the DLCs are unstable) you have to start over! Hello-copter is sluggish to control and the grappling hook often doesn't function properly.

Conclusion:
In conclusion, this game should have been in the oven for at least another 6 months. There is still some hope for this game in my heart as they do have a feedback channel in their Discord server that they are allegedly reading through and will be taking everything on board. I am giving this game a rating of 3/10.

Thank you for reading.
- Aidan

Edit:
Just to clarify to those in the comment section: I pre-ordered the game back in April in order to gain access to the Beta which actually has a lot of the interactions with the AI that I wanted which were stripped away in the Full Game. When you would boot up the Beta it even reassured the customer that being able to interact with boxes and also properly breaking windows would return for the Full Game and neither of them did so that's unfortunately yet another lie to add to the list.

Do not buy Hello Neighbor 2...

All the things that have been promoted in the past have been removed such as, Advanced AI (Learning from past community player choices), Free Roam Story, The Guest (He only appears in the beginning cutscene), and most of the gameplay shown from devlogs. (So don't get too excited)

Next, the Deluxe edition that people have pre-ordered/bought is very outrageous, the "early access" that people have recieved when pre-ordering the game prior or on December 1st, Is basically the Full Game when it released on the 6th. They have also added two DLC levels out on day one. (I am not counting the Flying Camera as a DLC because it is ridiculous, who in the world is going to use that in the game...)

Finally, the pricing... oh boy...

The normal game costs only $40 and $60 for the Deluxe (Which includes the DLC). If you are someone who has bought and completed the normal version of the game and paid $36 for all the DLC on the store...

Congrats! you have just spent $76 on this game!!

In Conclusion,
I am very disappointed in you, TinyBuild. You have turned one of the greatest (and one of my favorite) games into a scam, made the main gameplay last for a few hours depending on how good the players are in game, and basically gave us an ending to tell us to wait even longer for more story content while you guys were making two DLC levels to release with the game on day one?! Please, just stop working on this scam that is a game and go fix the original game, I still cannot play it even if I have my internet turned off.


Thank you for reading my review on Hello Neighbor 2...
- Acted

"Your review is 19,814 characters too long. Please shorten it and try again."
Full review here ---> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PT0il98iJYHDjXh9Hng7kngmf-nYsAeIMhoHKDFfak0/edit?usp=sharing
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FINAL SUMMARY
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+ The puzzles are GREAT (minus Late Fees)! What DOES exist for gameplay is very enjoyable and I look forward to more content being released in this manner. I only wish there was more of it.
+ The designs of the characters was very cool to me. I like the art style of the game overall, and I appreciate on a personal level the amount of older male characters with facial hair (always a plus in my book, haha)

- The game is SEVERELY unpolished.
- The game is SHOCKINGLY short, the main game clocking in at an average 1.5-2 hours on a second-time playthrough. My first playthrough was around 4 hours.
- The game's characters are not very developed, and the story is barren.
- The A.I. is functional, but NOT as marketed, and breaks a LOT (I would not focus so heavily on this if it was not the main selling point of the game).
- The whole game lacks in content and does not make up for the price it is being sold at.
- The two DLC levels are clearly unfinished, one of them does not even have an ending and I do not think they should have been released in the state that they are currently in now.
- The parkour returns in the DLCs, and it has not improved.
- The story in the DLCs is vague at best, and nonexistent elsewhere. (One of them is missing an ending)
- The amount of game content that I received for this amount of money overall was NOT worth it.

IN CONCLUSION:
I do not recommend buying Hello Neighbor 2.

Game is higher quality then the first one, but its still like a 5/10 game, i've been a fan of the series since alpha 1, so i don't like leaving a negative review, but the AI is still pretty bad, and they removed a ton of features that they promised they would, like a big open area where you can explore any house that you want, there is an open area, but its pretty small and you have to play the houses in a specific order. and they also said they were going to put lots of characters, like The Guest, who is a big part of marketing for this game. is literally in the game for less then 3 seconds in a single cutscene. the puzzles are way better then the first game, but still are pretty confusing sometimes. the game is barely replayable and as of writing this review, the DLC content can't even save and one of them doesn't have an ending at all. The DLC is also way overpriced, The ending is terrible leaving you on a bad cliffhanger, and the story isn't good either. I'll update my review if the game gets some good updates, they tell you content updates are on the way at the end of the game. but currently i cannot recommend this game for this price, even the Beta and the Alphas were better.

Edit from February 5th: These updates have improved the game quite a bit and its kind of replayable now, the DLCS save now and have endings. which they should have done from the start, still don't recommend getting into the series unless you like disappointment, but the roadmap looks good and i will continue updating this review if anything changes.

this game is missing everything it said it would have

Go play the alpha 1

To all who read the reviews BEFORE buying, please just... don't get this game. It's not worth the $40 USD markup that the game has. If you do want to play the game however, all I suggest is that you wait for a steam sale cause as I said, this game isn't worth $40 USD. Now, onto my review on the game and why I think it's not worth getting...

(notice! there are some spoilers below, however the TL;DR summary is spoiler-free at the bottom.)

First of all, let's talk about the AI. The main selling point of the game that implements the stealth mechanic of the game. Let's just say that it's not the best... When the AI sees you & starts chasing you, the AI will most of the time have stutter-y movement making it easy for the player to outrun the AI. That's fine not a big deal right? Well let's talk about hiding in the game. If the AI sees you go into a closet to hide in, they will pull you out. However, if the player turns the corner and then immediately hides in a closet, then the AI just gives up and goes back into wander mode. The AI also has a very short attention span, which means if they don't see you after walking like 2 rooms, then the AI just goes back to the wander phase. If the AI is supposed to be "revolutionary", then the AI should at least check a hiding spot in the room where they AI last spotted the player (something like outlast). Speaking of hiding, sometimes you don't even need to hide at all. If there is a simple obstacles such as the player standing on a bed in a room, then the AI does not know what to do and simply stands there waiting for the player to drop off of the bed. Sometimes even crouching for a bit behind something makes the AI go back to it's wander phase and sometimes the AI decides that your time is up and automatically does the animation where the AI catches you. Speaking of which, sometimes the AI just decide to be unfair and catch you when you're out of the AI's range. This is because the developers were too lazy to add some countermeasure like jumping to get to the player when the player is in a place where the AI can't path-find or reach which makes the game even worse than it is. Now, speaking of the AI in the game, with all the characters in the game you'd expect at least a different AI with everyone right? Well not really... with all of the characters in the game, all of their AI stays practically the same. If the AI sees the player while the player is on the AI's property, then chase them. That's all the AI is except for Mr. Otto which all is different is that he occasionally shoots at the player when in chase mode & Mr. Peterson in the finale which his movement speed is heavily increased. The developers stating that their AI is revolutionary and all of that is a flat out lie to the consumer.

Second of all, let's talk about the puzzle point of the game. The puzzles to say the least are not fun... at all... Trying to figure out what goes where & trying to find the necessary things you need to progress just feels like Hello Neighbor 1 again. There is zero guidance of what you must do or how to find the necessary things to progress. It's just a constant scavenger hunt on grabbing items in the most random places. I had to use a guide on my first play-through because I was stuck for TWO HOURS on THE FIRST HOUSE. Maybe I'm just really blind and don't observe my surrounding but when stuff is just in the most unnecessary & random places, then the game stops becoming fun and starts getting tedious.

Third thing, let's talk about the controls. As far as controls go in the game, they are pretty solid. The controls mostly act like the Hello Neighbor 1 Alpha 1 controls where you only need to press the pickup key once instead of having to hold a multi-instance key to pick up items. The movement in game mostly sticks faithful to the original Hello Neighbor however the only complaint I have is that you are just really slow even when sprinting. I understand that this is supposed to be a stealth game and not a "outrun the threat like hello neighbor 1" game which is why the player is really slow in the first place, but if the developers altered the speed just slightly, then in my opinion, it would be a lot better because getting to other places wouldn't be as tedious. However, I don't mind the speed. As far as new mechanics go such as being able to grab onto ledges & the inventory system, I say that they're also pretty solid. The only thing that I would complain about is the sliding. If you start sprinting and hit the crouch key while sprinting, you'll do a slide. I personally found this really annoying in some circumstances & overall didn't really like it. This is a stealth game, not a first person shooter. I don't see why the sliding is necessary at all.

Final thing, the story... The story is in my opinion just bad. The entire plot of the story is that you see the neighbor keeping his son away, you crash into a barn, the neighbor knocks you unconscious & now you decide that you have to save the kid. Sometimes you would go unconscious during the story and wake up back in the building you first woke up at where the TV screens show you your next objective. Overall, the premise is that the keys to the museum that the neighbor has his son inside are in different houses for just no reason. The game states that the story of this game is a story on how Mr. Peterson becomes "The Neighbor" but I feel that the story isn't exactly that. If I explained the story wrong and if there is more to it, then I do apologize considering that I never really looked into the story that much. I just went and beat the game.

OVERALL the game is just like how it turned out in the first game. It is the same deal where you have to go on a tedious scavenger hunt with items in random places & having to solve un-fun puzzles with an AI that is bad.

Before going onto the summary, I do have one more thing to state about the game, the crashes... oh my god the crashes... you can crash at any point at any time for no reason. I've had the game bug out on me and would not let me past a loading screen when I was at the final part of the game where you get locked up in the neighbor's museum meaning I had to fully make a new game and replay the entire game through again. However playing the game with knowledge on where everything is cuts playtime on a run to like 20 minutes.

SUMMARY
tl;dr The game is not worth the price point. The AI isn't very good. The puzzles in the game are not fun and are tedious. Finding items to progress is just another scavenger hunt like HN1. Controls are semi-decent & story isn't the best either. I suggest to either wait for a steam sale on the game before buying or don't get the game at all.

RATINGS

AI (Main part of what makes the game a stealth game) - 4/10
Puzzles - 2/10
Controls - 7/10
Story - 4/10

Extra Ratings

Physics - 6/10 (You don't get flung when doing anything in the game anymore however physics are still clunky)
Aesthetics (deco, enviornment, etc.) - 7/10 (big improvement in looks compared to the first game)
Achievements - 2/10 (all but 3 achivements are just playing the game normally.)

Hopefully this steam review is somewhat helpful to anyone. This is my first time actually making a lengthy and legitimate review on a game instead of making a joke review.

-----Pros-----
- Amazing visuals
- Great sound design
- Great map
- Engaging story (until the end)

-----Cons-----
- Extremely buggy and unpolished (the devs didn't even program swimming/water effects when walking in water, you just fall right through the water texture)
- AI is either broken or stupid (worse than the first game imo)
- Puzzles are like a scavenger hunt, and feel like they were made solely to pad out the game
- Don't play the game for its story (ESPECIALLY if you played the first game): Nothing actually happens in the story. The events at the start are the same until the end. Nothing is revealed in concrete. Wouldn't be surprised if there's a Hello Neighbour 3 which also doesn't do anything with the story.

The $60 price tag for this game is outrageous. None of the features/mechanics shown in the marketing for this game are here. I hardly write reviews for games (this is my first negative review), but considering the overall reviews here are currently mixed, I wanted to warn anyone thinking about getting this game.

In summary; forget about this game. Play with your dog or something.

My favorite part of this game are all the missing features they promised in their marketing, it really makes the whole experience feel mysterious!

Far too expensive, no secrets, no extra things to collect like in the previous game, they also removed the ability to pickup/throw any items to climb up or to activate machanisms. Just 4+1 small houses to explore.
Do not buy unless it's below 15€.