Calum Petrie reviews The Coma 2: Vicious Sisters…
When it comes to horror games, I have never been the genre’s biggest fan. I always have the thoughts in my head that the time I spend gaming is downtime from real life, so why would I want to spend my time in escapism frightening myself?
The opportunity to review The Coma 2: Vicious Sisters arose and I decided to push myself out of my comfort zone. I would try to find out why the horror genre is not only a thing, but why The Coma as a series has been so highly regarded when Googling the game. I will say at this point I have not played the original game, but this title does fill in the gaps and does a good job at catching you up with the story.
The Coma 2: Vicious Sisters is a Korean horror game from Devespresso Games, that has no combat mechanics. Gameplay is based on exploration and puzzle solving, all the while running from the demonic entities that are out to get you.
We play as Mina Park, a school student who has to deal with unwanted attention from guys, her grades slipping at school and her friend Youngho (the main character from the first game), who is in hospital and has been unconscious for some time.
The journey for us takes place with Mina going about her daily routine before very quickly unravelling into all kinds of hell. The games levels are broken down to: The School, Police Station, Dokkaebi Market, Underground Station, Hospital and Gymnasium. These areas can all be explored to great extent, also players can run through with the bare minimum effort where you do just enough to progress.
Some areas of the game will give you the opportunities to use workbenches to craft items; these will consist of three items to combine to create something new. When these opportunities arise be sure to follow the side quest to completion, as failure to do so will result in Mina permanently losing a block of health for the rest of the game.
The games’ play time would come in around the 6 to 8 hour mark depending on how much time and effort you want to put into exploration. There are collectables to be found throughout the game which may lead those achievement hunters to their 100% completion goal. The game also has different endings, so that adds some form of replay value but I wouldn’t say enough to play more than two or three times at best.
In the first playthrough though you can expect a horrific side story linked to a specific ghost that pulls players out of the demonic realm and shows the evil of human beings as a whole. I will not say any more than that on the matter.
The animation in The Coma 2 is in no way a triple-A big budget title; instead it has its own beautiful art style which is an improvement over the original Coma. There is a great deal of detail around the landscapes and background in this game which I appreciated a lot. The inside of building may be slightly repetitive and slightly boring to a degree, yet all the locations that are in the game make sense to have a recurring, repetitive background system.
The demonic/shadow realm aspect that tinges just about every backdrop in this game makes for an extremely atmospheric playthrough. Where demonic hands swipe at your ankles from under desks or at your head from the ceilings. The game will have your eyes darting about for enemies, item boxes or hiding places from the “Vicious Sisters”.
The Vicious Sisters are the main enemies in the game. These are the only enemies who will pursue Mina into buildings and rooms, meaning you will need to duck under cover, in cabinets, toilet stalls or just try and make a run for it.
When hiding your will have a varying degree of breath, with button prompts whenever aVicious Sister passes you in game. After two or three of these prompts the music will change and the sister will jump off screen letting you know you are free to pursue your exploration once again. Though if you are inside a room and here the footsteps in game, wait until they pass before leaving otherwise you are going to be reloading very soon.
The largest issue I had with The Coma 2 is the randomness of the Vicious Sister, I could load the game up and walk out the room only for the Vicious Sister to spawn in front of me, initiating an instant kill. This, on more than one occasion, caused me to turn the game off and come back five-to-ten minutes later for a fresh take on the game.
The music soundtrack in this game is very dark, complex and hauntingly beautiful. I always try to listen to the soundtrack while writing reviews and this one pulled me back into the twisted world that the game took me through. The composition of the soundtrack works extremely well in tandem with the game’s overall design to bring something special to the player. I for one might be introducing this soundtrack into future home games of D&D if possible.
Gameplay can seem daunting with players having to trudge up and down stair cases. Treading over the same ground you have just double backed from can be frustrating, but the game’s pay off is somewhat worth it. The ending part might possibly be the worst part of the game for me however. Trying to introduce a boss type encounter into a game where combat is not an option was always going to be difficult, and though the ending is by no means terrible, it could slightly explain itself better.
For someone who does not usually play horror games, I found myself enjoying The Coma 2. The good points outweigh that negatives on this occasion; where the repetitive exploration bored me at first; that ended up being my favourite part of the game in the end. I enjoyed returning to areas with a better understanding of how unlocking new areas opened up more gameplay.
The Coma 2: Vicious Sisters is certainly a game I would recommend to someone wanting a not bad introduction to horror style games, but could be an interesting adventure for long time fans of the genre.
Pros:
- Art style
- Soundtrack
- Interesting story
Cons:
- Lots of backtracking
- Enemy AI too unpredictable
The Coma 2: Vicious Sisters is out now on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows, Linux, macOS.
You can follow me on Twitter – @Cetrie
