izigame.me

This is a VERY mixed review that slanted to the negative side due to some quirks.
Positives:
-The creators really outdid themselves with the pixel art, it looks amazing honestly.
-Music in the areas are the same good quality as the last game.
-The areas are interesting, ESPECIALLY the extra stage (I absolutely adore the reference)

Negatives:
-I get the story and message of the game, but it leans too much into the goofy/overly evil for the clear evil side. The last game gradually made the evil group more evil over time (From simple racism to outright distopian nightmare). However, this game makes the evil group not only goofy, but starts with that intensity way up. Maybe you could of had it that the southern group starts out small, but gains influence over time, spreading more and more in the south. Maybe have a area you go to in roadtrip 1 be revisited in roadtrip 3, but you could see how that influence has done to the area. Speaking of the locations.

-The areas never get enough time to have you kind of settle in like the bars in the first game, only having 2 shifts in a million different locations get a little annoying. For example: you could be in a location that demands a special way of getting tickets, only to throw that technique away until the 2nd or 3rd road trip (Like the musical tickets)

-Why is there luck related ticket conditions? Its the worst! ESPECIALLY in GOD DAMN Las vegas (I know it fits with the gambling theme, but I don't want to have a loss because I decided that I would be higher than a Jack). I'll give a pass on the robots, they are cool.

-With visiting the locations being short, some of the friends you meet are really forgettable. You only see the wizard twice, but now he's a major ally to the heros? Didn't even recognise him in the finally. SPEAKING OFF PALS.

-WTF did you do to dave?! That isn't dave! Thats a local crackhead that has decided to help our heros! Honestly, Dave should of been one/or more of the locations you visit (Maybe doing a travelling bar that appears in all of the roadtrips). Shannon was good to see again, the role she did fit her well. Although, going on a musical tour might of been better, I dunno.

-Customisation is a little lackluster. You could have different combinations of costumes in the first game that provided buffs or made you look stupid. This game just gives each character their own costumes that you could wear, which are only for those characters. Wearing a hat is a full costume for gods sake! Sticking to the base outfit was fine, with Mari having the coolest look.

Small gripes
-The quests should tell you how to complete them (Maybe in a vague way)
-After A ranking all your first roadtrip's missions and doing one A rank in the second roadtrip, the A rank points become useless. Although it does leave some leeway in what missions you prefer to A rank, there still should of been an incentive to do them all. For example: BRINGING BACK THE HOTKEYS!!
-Why did the conversations devolve to basic big textbox dialogue? I loved when you enter a bar or location in the first game and see what the interior looks like, having a chat with your boss and leaving to see where your working at. My fav from the first game is the english boarder where you start in a small fishing troll, which makes you think your in a port of some kind, only to end up on a very makeshift boarder at the bottom of some cliff!

Conclusion
The creators definitely put a tonne of effort into this game. The art is cool, the locations are sick and it tried it's best to tell a tale of racism and politics. But it isn't a fun "not tonight" game. The creators tried to turn the long weeks of the first game, which made you appreciate each of the small locations as you tried to become their head bouncer, into a fast paced roadtrip with very little amounts of shifts you actually do with characters you will never really remember. I fondly remember the DJ priest from the first game more than I remember the whole toy subplot in the first roadtrip!

If the creators see this, which I highly doubt it, im not trying to be overly negative here (Which failed). I like the ideas the game brings to the table, it just needs refinement. Next time you do this, If another game is being considered (Please do more), I would say to keep the map (Because I love seeing all the locations on the map and you could show how much the evil influence spreads around the map) and the quality of the locations. Just make us stay in the locations longer, make the special mechanics more refined for them, and make the facism/evil slowly ramp up slower (keep it subtle at first, but then blatantly obvious at the end) and have them more evil than goofy.

Thanks for listening to my TED talk.

An all around inferior sequel to Not Tonight that still manages to be engaging enough to be worth playing
A nice fresh cast of well-written characters with some contrived usage of old favourites from Not Tonight. The way the story is told works well, with the three story-arcs for each character each being interesting and unique. The ending gives you that warm fuzzy feeling from saving all your friends, but ultimately doesn't feel dramatic or impactful to me
The wide variety of mini-games kept the game feeling fresh all the way through, and made the game feel more varied than it was challenging (compared to say, Papers Please, where there's little variety but the level of challenge just keeps going up). I don't consider myself particularly good at this genre of game, but on the default medium difficulty I got bonus 2 every single night, and only got fined for mistakes once.
The main let-down of some of these mini-games was that they were entirely luck-based and counted against your performance for the night, and the side quests, which is a monumentally stupid design decision that fortunately doesn't matter unless you're trying to go for all achievements
Speaking of the side quests, they were a welcome addition, though to me it feels stupid that you're not told explicitly what you have to do for a given quest, then either have to redo a given area if you didn't accidentally get everything, or just try and luck out enough times to get the A grades necessary for the good ending of the game. Personally, I just used a guide to tell me what I needed to do to pass the quests, as I found it frustrating to be given low grades for making ambiguous dialogue choices or outfit decisions incorrectly
Following a guide also had the added benefit that I wouldn't mess up dialogue choices that could lead to a game over and repeating a night. As far as I can tell, the only way to work out the right choices is through trial and error in a couple of sections (e.g. picking which oxygen tanks to huff when Taelore confronts Mari)
I miss the money pressure of Not Tonight and the drug selling & bribing mechanics that you could opt into to get more money for the higher risk
So yeah, overall, an interesting twist on Not Tonight that I don't think worked out that well in the end, but I was still happy to support the devs and put in the relatively short number of hours required to beat this game

While I won't say this game is terrible, but coming from the first game this one just...isn't it. the progression system lost something. I'm almost through one section of potentially 3 of the game and there have been no upgrades. The timed choices leave something to be desired for many reasons: A. There are multiple screens to click through so you may end up progressing the text and land on a timed choice without knowing. B. Not everyone reads as fast or can process things as fast when they read them. While I didn't have that problem, I know some who might... C. not very friendly for those who their first language might not be the ones that are provided. D. Just WHY? Like I get you might be forcing people to commit but never have or never will like timed choices.
I loved the charm of getting to see the inside of the pubs, bars, etc that I visited in the first game as well as getting to talk to the boss and earn double the cash and a prize if I achieved head doorman. I hate that most of this game is done via a beige box full of text and character portraits. I do understand that the map being the "homebase" sort of place is understandable because of the setting and the story but I feel so very disconnected from everything...and okay I guess in a round about way that does very much describe my experience living in America but idk
Do not come in expecting to have more of the charm you got in the first game and usually I try NOT to come at things expecting the exact same thing but unfortunately I'm not a fan of the progression system, how the story is told, the environments, the addition of character portraits, the music or even the bouncer tasks. Beware the wannabe rhythm game section as it comes with 0 forgiveness and laggy timing. It's been too long to request a refund so I will attempt to see this game through and may come with more thoughts as I go along.
This game is mostly positive so it obviously was a hit with some but it was definitely a miss for me.

Edit: So In fantastic style I'm almost through the second part of the game and I continue not caring much for the bouncer tasks. You have to play hi-lo at a casino to let people in and I was thrown back to my dad playing an ad-ridden game on his cellphone.
Also I think another thing that gets me is the tone in this one is much more serious and less satire. Like the subject matter was a serious sort of subject matter in the first one but there was a lot more weirdness and satire going on in that one. I will say that it wouldn't specifically fit with the story they have painted to do that here but IDK. The jobs are teethgrinding, there's no real progression and the story is pretty depressing honestly. This is something I might be more into if I was looking for a game like Not Tonight but...yknow wasn't actually Not Tonight. I wanted more quirky satire but honestly I'm wishing I could go back to before I had more than two hours in this game.