is this game REALLY that bad?

[Jack The Ripper]

is it? yeah the comedy is a bit uhh.. but the gameplay could still be fun maybe?

[Vazeyo]

I replay all Serious Sam games right now and I was surprised how much fun the gameplay really is in this one. You should give it a try. Sure, it looks weird at first, but I came behind these weird aesthetics pretty fast and now they are basically normal for me. Give it a try if its on sale. I don´t think you will lose that much. It´s still Serious Sam.

[The A**kins Diet]

No, this game is tight. Turn the fov up in the .ini file and go to town. Super fun with a friend and $2 on sale

[Jack The Ripper]

i'll give it a shot. for $2 you can't really go wrong plus I don't think i'll mind the goofy cartoon style.

[puddingtopf]

SS2 is pretty divisive. It depends on your personal taste whether you like it or not.
The gameplay is definitely not as interesting as in the other games, but it's still fun enough, and the creative, colorful, varied environments together with the great soundtrack make the game pretty fun if it's your thing.

[Mexicutioner]

No, it's not. This game has the most personality out of any SS game. It's fun, try it out.

[APOLLODORUS]

Gameplay is boring, repetitive, and even frustrating. The things that made the gameplay of the originals so engaging are missing here and the game feels more like a grindfest tbh. Pacing is also a huge issue. The first 3 worlds are really mediocre and some levels are outright trash, 4th planet is cool, 5th planet is arguably the weakest one with a bad boss fight and boring Shrek-like music. The last 2 worlds are pretty good, but going through the first few ones is not worth it imo. Also, the jokes and the cutscenes are bad.

Because of the fact that this game is pretty old, it doesn't have steam workshop, achievements and leaderboard (the reason why I still play SSHD and BFE), and the co-op experience can be a bit inconsistent due to the crappy netcode.

Overall, it's not a terrible game but I would say that it's my least favorite, together with SS4. It's quite cheap, though.

[TNTrigger]

No game in this series is a masterpiece. Some would argue that even TSE is s*it, and that is not counting boomer shooter elitists, who seem to have a hate boner for it and anything that is both in full 3D and was released in 21st century.
This game might be pants-on-head level of r***rded when it comes to it's presentation, but it did some significant amount of things right:

- The infamous S+LMB formula has the least presence here;
- Levels are short and with nonexistent-to-minimal amount of backtracking;
- Lives and grenades are pretty useful to not get stuck/get out of a tough spot;
- There are vehicles, even turrets, but they are optional (at least on lower difficulties) and are far and between anyway (shame the Raptor is available only on first level);
- Huge campaign (some would argue it's actually a flaw, though) with varied environments, largest number of levels and enemies in the entire series. You even get to visit Mental's fortress planet and kick his a*s (well... kind of...);
- New weapons, and while there are the typical starter guns, the rest of the arsenal is pretty well balanced (except double Uzis, but they are nerfed now). The only FPS that i've played in my life which actually breaks id Software's convention of 1994 ("thine double-barreled shotgun must make the pump-action one obsolete as soon as you pick it up");

And that is without the latest patch which not only made it playable on new systems, but also added double-wielding and mixing of *any* guns and some QoL stuff like sprint (fully optional, even if you enable it), so it's even less tedious walking in between gunfights.

Too bad it got so much hate that Croteam deemed it to be an irredeemable piece of garbage, rolled back on pretty much all of the above, and made a tedious snoozefest that is Serious Sam 3 instead...

[KatArus]

Yes it is, not as an absolute, but comparatively to the other games of the era. It has a lot of innovation for the sake of innovation at the expense of it's core design. Kinda like Doom 3, for example.

[Coffee]

I currently replay it and the game looks so awesome still and damn fun!
Much better than in my memories!

[PepeFan]

The last level was probably one of the worst levels I've ever played. It was an absolute slog that felt like it was never going to end. And to make it worst I quit the game to take a break only for my profile to be "damaged" preventing me from actually getting to the final boss.