What’s better than surviving your time on a broken down ship with a bloodthirsty monster? BRINGING YOUR FRIENDS! That’s right, the legends at Junkfish are back with Monstrum 2! This asymmetric multiplayer sequel to their first survival horror game gives you the same horror thrills but with twice the fun, as you and your friends (or 3 strangers) attempt to restore power and escape the deadly beast pursuing you. Alternatively, you can choose to be the genetically altered monster, and enjoy an evening of casually devouring strangers!

Play as one of four prisoners trapped onboard a derelict sea-based facility where your mission is to scavenge items throughout and restore power to a submarine via a multitude of power switches. It’s your only hope of survival.

The main task involves powering up switches that can be found by following the power cables along the floor of the environment, which also light up once the switch is flipped to save you backtracking constantly. Each switch then requires adjustments made by the items you find around, including bolt cutters to remove debris, tape to repair wires, fuses to repair power boxes, and a multitude more. To make this task even more arduous, you’re on a time limit. What? Still too easy for you? Don’t worry, the ‘monsters’ at Junkfish have also supplied… A MONSTER! You’ll need to use both the items you find and the environment itself to hide from the beast while you complete these tasks.

Option 2- BE the monster! Who wants to be a scared prisoner trying to escape a monster, when you can be the beast?! Choose to play as one of three genetically mutated monsters, each with unique abilities that help them hunt the prisoners down. You can bulldoze your way through breakable walls, jump from the roof, or use a range of other skills to surprise your prey. Time is on your side, so stalk your prey carefully, or go stomping around and make them fear you. Either way, you’ve got four prisoners for dinner.

What makes Monstrum 2 really unique in the realm of survival horrors is that while the map may look similar, it’s always different! That’s right, extensive procedurally generated environments ensure that it’s a new challenge every time you load into a game. You’ll have to search for the items and power switches from scratch each time. Good luck… *insert evil grinning Junkfish logo here*

Monstrum 2 is pushing into a market that has a rapidly expanding player base, as more and more gamers are enjoying the asymmetric survival gameplay. However, that also means that we need to compare Monstrum 2 against the other games in it’s genre. Most notable amongst them being Dead By Daylight. While they have a very similar game concept, Monstrum 2 lacks a little in the areas of graphics and options. All the prisoners are the same character and, with only two monsters currently available, it just feels lacking. No options to swap predefined characters, genders, nothing. The other real limitation I found when playing was the controls. I wasn’t comfortable with the preset controls and found no way to customise them, something I’d really love to see added into the finished product.

I love the concept of this game. I think it’s a faster fresher game when compared to something like Dead By Daylight, and has the potential to outshine it. The fact that the power switches are instant once ‘fixed’ means that you’re constantly moving, making it a much faster paced game. Their focus on creatures means they can expand into all forms of Sci-Fi based monsters- Alien, Predator, Werewolves, their imagination the only limit… Well, that and copyright, but you get the idea.

What I’d love to see is a bit of game balancing. As it stands, during our BETA runs we weren’t able to get more than four or five of the switches flipped, yet alone over to the submarine. Not sure where the balance comes in, but here’s just a few ideas:

Prisoners get abilities; one to find items, one to find switches, one to track the monster? Something that gives them an edge whilst making teamwork a more crucial element
Adjust the time limit; make the time limit extend every time a switch is powered, or potentially remove it altogether
Less switches.

As a fan of the genre, I really loved the concept, and look forward to trying out the finished product.

Written by: HadesTheHobo