Remnant 2 first impressions: Don't let this gorgeous shooter slip by

Action-RPG shooter, Remnant II, is now available on Xbox Series X|S, taking us to beautiful worlds filled with challenging enemies. Here are our early thoughts.

Tom West

Published 26 Jul 2023

I've heard many opinions recently about how underrated Remnant: From the Ashes was as players prepared for the launch of its sequel, Remnant II. After playing around six hours of Gunfire Games' latest third-person shooter, I now regret being one of the players that let the original game slip by. Remnant II is absolutely gorgeous and has a healthy dose of challenging combat, intricate puzzles, and character customization options.

Remnant 2 now available on Xbox Series X|S

In the lead-up to Remnant II's launch, many trailers grabbed my attention, but for whatever reason, I had it in my head that it was essentially a hardcore Soulslike game with guns. While the harder difficulties, or even the Hardcore mode, would no doubt offer that experience, the base difficulty level, Survival, while challenging in its own right, gives an entry-level experience that is a ton of fun to play.

Following the initial tutorial level that introduces you to a decaying world overrun by an entity known as the Root — it also serves as an introduction to the basic combat and movement controls for the game. After a rather deadly encounter with a horde of Root creatures, we meet up with two people from a nearby settlement called Ward 13. This settlement acts as the main hub for Remnant II, and it's where you can purchase a wealth of items and upgrade your character so you're equipped with the power to take on the challenging enemies you'll face on your journey. It's soon after arriving in Ward 13 that we're offered our choice of archetype, or class, to play as: Challenger, Handler, Hunter, Medic, and, if you pre-ordered the game, Gunslinger. I decided to go with the Handler as it has a dog companion — which is just called Dog because I haven't worked out if I can change its name or not!

With your character all prepped and ready to go, our journey to find Ward 13 is complete, but resting on our laurels like the characters originally wanted to do wouldn't make a very good video game, would it? So, after a couple of your new companions disappear into a large red crystal known as a World Stone, which acts as way shrines and checkpoints throughout Remnant II, we go after them on a journey across time and space to other worlds.

I'm still very early into my playthrough, but it's already clear that Remnant II is going to be an exciting game to explore. The three worlds you visit first are randomly generated for each playthrough, so you may travel to a completely different world compared to other players. My first world was Yaesha, a gorgeous mystical forest-themed world bursting with color. It's honestly a beautiful place to explore and filled with all manner of secrets; I just wish there was a photo mode I could play with for a few screenshots. Exploring the worlds and defeating the roaming enemies is a great way to increase your character's prowess in battle, as there is secret loot, upgrade points, experience, materials, and a host of other things to uncover — and you'll need all the help you can get.

Some of the better loot is safely nestled away behind boss fights, while others are rewards for solving puzzles found around the world. One puzzle I came across in a dungeon requires you to correctly select the order of symbols on a sundial-shaped device. The clues, however, are on rocks in various parts of the dungeon, hidden in secret areas. It added a whole new dimension to my exploration of the large zone — although I had to clear through all of the respawned enemies as I made my way back to the strange rocks I naively ignored on my initial run through the dungeon. It was a good bit of fun!

I'm playing on the easiest difficulty, Survival, and even here, I'm coming across boss creatures and elite enemies that have had me working my fingers hard in an attempt to survive. One dungeon boss I met was a flying manta ray-style creature known as a Mantacore, which had the rather annoying ability to slightly change my location in a blur of displacer energy whenever I shot it. That wouldn't have been too bad, but the location displacing also saw me attract a number of other creatures as well. As my first boss encounter, it was pretty exhilarating and felt like an achievement when I brought the beast down. Much like other Souls-like games, you only have a set number of healing charges and ammo to play with in Remnant II, so visiting World Stones to replenish them and save a checkpoint is needed, with the caveat that all basic creatures in your world will respawn after you've used it.

So far, my early impressions of Remnant II have been positive, and the combat feels as rewarding as it is challenging. Character progression offers enough choices that your character can feel unique to you, thanks to the likes of mutators, trait points, modifiers, long guns, handguns, and melee weapons, armor, archetypes, relics, and so much more. I'm having a blast with it. The world map could use a little refining as it's not very easy to work out who or what some things are, and an objective list would be handy, but for the most part, Remnant II is proving to be an awesome adventure!

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Xbox Series X|S

Written by Tom West

Tom has been playing video games since he was old enough to hold a controller, experimenting with a number of systems until he eventually fell in love with Xbox. With a passion for the platform, he decided to make a career out of it, and now happily spends his days writing about that which he loves. If he’s not hunting for Xbox achievements, you’ll likely find him somewhere in The Elder Scrolls Online or fighting for survival in Battlefield.