The original Saints & Sinners game was one of the most impactful VR releases back in 2020 and stands as a true classic now, at least in my book. Unfortunately, the sequel does not take it to the new level neither for VR gaming as a whole nor for the series itself.

In fact, despite being sold as a separate game, technically Retribution is more like a DLC or an expansion pack. In essence, it is the same game with a different campaign + 3 new locations, a night mode and some new weapons and enemies. You can even import your save game from the original and get all of your inventory and materials.

At the same time Retribution is pretty buggy: it is eight months after the release now, and - minor nuisances aside - there still are major blocker bugs in the game. I had to replay one of the final (and longer) missions because the closing dialog failed to start during the first run. This is, of course, frustrating. Also, the AI of the human enemies is almost non-existent at times. You can headshot the tower soldier and his buddy, who stands right next to him, just does not react at all. More like a shooting range than an action game, if you ask me.

Despite all that, I am still giving Retribution a positive review. Thing is, if you loved the original, you are very likely to enjoy this one too. For starters, the core gameplay is still there and dispatching hordes of walkers still feels immensely satisfying and almost visceral, especially with some of the new weapons (sap gloves are my favorite but all the others are very good too). The new locations are done in much more detail than the original ones. They just feel bigger and much funnier to explore. The design of the missions is better than in the original game, largely due to the introduction of the night mode with the proper stealth component. And finally, it's a full-fledged game that took me 20 hours to complete the main story (could have been less if not for the bugs).

Personally, I have enjoyed my experience with Retribution. It might not be better than the original, but it still delivers the proper Saints & Sinners gameplay in large quantities.

Honestly, I'm loving it.I was really scared when I saw the first negative reviews flood in and I questioned my choice of purchasing the game immediately on release. True, when I launched it for the first time, it stuttered so hard I had to stop playing after five minutes.I wondered if perhaps I should refund the game. I'm a big big fan of the first one, and I was scared this one would be a letdown. Turns out, when you only play for ten minutes, you can't give a serious and well thought-out review (just like most of the ones I'm seeing here, being overly critical and disrespectful of the devs' work).So I took the time to play it again. I tweaked the settings, and simply changing the shadow quality to Medium and keeping the rest on Ultra made a big difference. I can play just like I played the first one now.Moving on to the actual game, of course, some bugs remain (some of them are actually hilarious, like doors doing a 360 through the wall). However, I know what Skydance Interactive can do, and they will not let us down. They patch stuff, they listen to bug reports, and they actually care about their product and their audience. Saying they don't is just blatantly disrespectful for their hard work to bring one of the only good, full-fledged VR games to our headsets.The story so far has kept me interested. The addition of new characters make the world feel livelier and gives the quests a better sense of purpose than the ones in the first chapter (which were already really good), and I really feel like I'm the Tourist. So far so good.I love the fact that it's an expansion of the first game. The new home base is crazy good, the new maps are a fine addition to the initial ones, and the story just evolves and doesn't keep up that old "good vs bad" cliché.Keeping my first save also feels kind of nostalgic since I haven't played in a while. I loved being able to move all my junk from the bus to my (now) neat storage shelves. I feel like I'm gonna have fun just organizing stuff and making a whole armory.Overall, despite the bugs and whatever people may say, keep in mind there's hardworking people behind this who are working to make it a more polished experience. I love this game, it's not perfect (might be soon), but it's a great sequel to an already great first chapter.

I can't believe that this game did a crossover with Resident Evil! I wasn't expecting invisible zombies!
10/10

The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners - Chapter 2: Retribution is well as its name suggests, is a direct sequel to Chapter 1 of Saints & Sinners. It picks up where you left off and continues the story while expanding upon the game in various ways.

Pros:
- Direct continuation of the story that is not bad
- Dialogue system with choices are still apparent
- The vibe of The Walking Dead is still there
- The ability to import a save file from Chapter 1, meaning you get to keep all your items, resources and recipes from Chapter 1
- Being able to scavenge both during the day and during the night
- New maps that are fun to explore and look visually pleasing
- New weapons, upgrades, attachements and so on.
- Combat is still as great as it was
- The character of Gerik was really damn good, he had great voice acting and was a menace.
- Steam Achievements

Neutral:
- The voice acting is sometimes really great, when at other times quite meh
- The game lets you go out scavenging during the night, however if you are doing exile orders for example and want to sleep until nights, you'd had to sleep twice every single time you go back to your resting place. An option to sleep until night would have been a tremendous QoL feature
- NPCs repeat the same voice lines over and over in the span of 5 minutes
- Human enemies still drop broken weapons 90% of the time
- The chainsaw was a letdown, though not that horrible

Cons:
- Launching the game in SteamVR causes the game to not recognize the correct VR inputs, I played on Quest 2 and the easiest workaround was to not launch the game within SteamVR but to use either Quest Link/Air Link. (Steam Link unfortunately forces SteamVR to launch)
- Had many bugs during my playthrough
- Exile Orders are a hassle to complete, essentially fetch quests that are only available during the night and you have to put all the items in the lockers during one scavenge run otherwise its progress resets
- Weapon durabilities are still quite low
- The Checkpoint system is extremely flawed, especially towards the end
- NPCs are as dumb as a rock with the peripheral vision of a fish

8/10 Even though the game expanded upon the game in quite many ways it also felt like two steps back and one step forward. However, I still find the game really enjoyable and hopefully we may get a Chapter 3 as well in the future.

My The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners Chapter 1 Review

I recommend this game only under certain circumstances. As a full priced game, it isn't really worth it. The game is more suited as a DLC. As a DLC it would be fantastic but it's a full priced game. I'd suggest getting this when it's on sale then it's worth it.

The reason I say this is because despite being a separate game, it doesn't really change enough to justify being called a separate game.

Same map, 3 extra locations, only 1 of them is actually interesting that being the tower. You got a whole bunch of new weapons which is nice and of course a new story.

Main issue with the story is that your decisions from the first game? Yeah forget about it, they don't matter. I'd say the only good part of the story in this game is the Axeman and the Tower conclusion those moments were fantastic.

The ending of the game was pretty interesting, left with another moral choice but it creates a pretty solid conclusion to the story.

I can't really see where they can expand from here however. I don't think it's a bad game, it just feels like an incredible DLC but a disappointing full priced game. No hate against the developers. I would love to see more projects from them in the future, although with the way the story ends in this game I don't really think they can expand on this project further.

Some additional points:

For whatever reason when you make your way back to the reserve via the church you experience the most god awful lag spike I've ever experienced in a VR game. It's horrific and it lasts for quite a bit, however. This is the only occasion in which it happens and if you take the shortcut to the reserve it doesn't happen.


Zombie spawning mechanics are god awful. You will kill some zombies, walk forward, turn around and zombies will be there. It really takes you out of the whole killing zombie things, I know the world can't be devoid of zombies but at least make them spawn naturally and not right behind you.

Not a negative point, actually a good one. This game is quite a bit harder than the first. Not only for battles but for resources. I found myself struggling with resources and battles despite having gathered an huge amount in the first game. It's quite a challenge but that's part of the fun.

So to sum it all up, as a full priced game, not worth, at a discount it makes for one fantastic DLC.

What happened, Rick? I thought you weren't the good guy anymore. Ain't that what you said?! Even right here, right now, you ain't gonna fight for 'em? I'm a better father than you, Rick. I'm better for Lori than you, man! It's 'cause I'm a better man than you, Rick. 'Cause I can be here and I'll fight for it. But you come back here and you just DESTROY EVERYTHING! You got a broken woman. You got a weak boy. You aint got the first clue how to fix it

If you read other reviews you'd think this is a complete piece of crap that doesn't work and is riddled with bugs. It's not- the bugs are present, sure, but it's not nearly as awful. Is this game as good as the previous? Hell no.
It doesn't feel like a sequel, but rather a DLC that continues directly from first one and assumes you have the resources and unlocks from the previous one (you can, AND SHOULD, import your save) and continues on the threads that were not concluded last time, while throwing a new element in form of a serial killer that somehow feels like a slasher villain. In The Walking Dead universe. If that sounds dumb and silly, it's because it is- the Axeman takes about 2 hours of playtime to learn of his identity, at which point I lost all my respect and fear for the guy, it was so dumb.
The game throws way more humans at you and it makes you realize that the AI is super dumb. Like "stand three feet, take two shots from a gun but still doesn't notice you" dumb. I swear walkers are a bigger challenge, because at least they can overwhelm you, while these guys can only kill you if you run out of ammo- which you shouldn't.

Do I still recommend it? Yes but on sale and only if you absolutely need more Saint%Sinners, which is a sentiment I understand. It's still enjoyable, just don't expect miracles.

Not having any frame issues with my quest 2 plugged in to my pc. No real complaints so far very enjoyable just like the first.

Edit: The Axeman made me poopy my pant :(

Quest Pro - link cable ,
Lock 90fps on 13900k/4090,
Graphic at ultra, anti alias off,
Ingame option Resolution @150
6% reprojection
WIN 11 v22621.1344
Nvidia v531.29

To ppl with fps issues, (before the rollback, All my VR Games are stuttering every 10sec and unplayable)
Latest Windows 11 Update KB5023706 May Slow SSD Performance, A rollback reportedly fixes this problem for those affected.

So this is gonna be my review of this game after several hours of engaging combat and feeling the story of it.

-Combat (Gun play & Melee)
The combat in general has just been a lot smoother and its not only for the melee combat but also the guns, one major issue in the first game for me was the guns felt so wobbly and that my character has Parkinson's disease or something but in this game the guns feel like it actually has weight and heft to it. My experience of the melee combat has been better too especially for large hordes of zombies because my swings are a lot more smoother and also the braining is a lot more satisfying because you don't have to tug on it so much.

-Performance & Optimization
From my experience with my gear a (3060 OC'd with 12 GB's of VRAM and also a Ryzen 55600x) i've yet to experience and game breaking quest bugs(thankfully) or any FPS counts that would render the game unplayable so i do not have much to say for this part. P.S i play with all ultra settings in the graphics section

I will be continuing my playthrough of the game and i will make edits for this review if anything worth of nothing comes up, thanks for reading and keep enjoying VR!