Count Vile has returned from Hades, and he has a horrible new plan. He's already captured Zack Nimbus(who spent the last one accepting his role as the hero who has to save the world) and Sam(who developed a relationship with aforementioned... so it makes sense to move the spotlight away from these two. They spend this playing Jackamo in a dim room), so it's up to their estranged, ultraviolent ninja friend, Lin-Ku(whose lust for blood has gone over the top) and the upbeat Princess Xanna(who represents girly software, and poses a polar opposite to him, leading to a buddy comedy dynamic... and they may learn a thing or two from each other over the course of this), both of them still quite likable, to get the job done this time. This is even better than the first one is, and I love that one as well as this. They learned from the experience of making it, and applied that here. Where that one felt more like a quest, with numerous locations that our team had to travel through, this has our duo sneaking through hallways and offices, stealthily taking out orc guards and zombies(in case you ever wondered what they do when not attacking the player, this offers a few suggestions). It doesn't feel like the same thing over again. And yes, those are about the only common henchmen they come across in this(which might be about the same as in the old one, I don't recall for sure), though they meet half a dozen other enemies, including several characters(and all of them in this are well-written, they come off as "real", not just there to be a punchline... in general, the script is masterful) from the show(Morgan, Scarthcaroth, and seen only in video conference, Vlad(in 3D, and he looks amazing!), among others), who are very enjoyable. The action is fantastic, well-choreographed, fast and nicely varied(martial arts(with and without bladed weapons), telekinesis, even a few superpowers). This brings in new gags and jokes(other than a few running ones), and while the humor can still be pretty dry, this should make most VG fans(a group that everyone who made this clearly belongs to, as well) laugh(even if much of the material mainly revolves around classic titles). It pokes fun at the conventions of the medium, comments on the console wars, and makes points about fads and gimmicks. The end battle is worth the price of admission by itself. At a running time of roughly 80 minutes, this is well-paced and flies right by. You're left satisfied, yet hungry for more. The music is beyond reproach, again. Not goofy, and partly homage to what it's parodying. In fact, that goes for the entire movie. This is tighter than the original, with superior production values, filming, editing, lighting, etc. The FX are rather impressive. Nothing comes off as low-budget in this, they know their limitations and did fantastic work with little money. There is some disturbing content in this. The DVD comes with 3 interesting and amusing commentary tracks(#1: director and writer, #2: Ed Glaser again and production designer, #3: the cast(Al Morrison, Joshua Stafford, and Alex Mitchell)), a 12 minute well-done making of, a 6 minute short(I expected it to be like Adventures, but it's, well, screw it, they did it live!) of the trio in a Resident Evil situation, and a minute and a half long trailer for it. I recommend this to anyone who likes electronic games. 10/10
