Skip to main content

‘Guacamelee! 2’ hands-on preview

'Guacamelee! 2' adds more jokes, more moves, and more chickens in a new Luchador brawler

guacamelee 2 review 14989
Image used with permission by copyright holder
“From battles and platforming to chickens, "Guacamelee! 2" is amping up what fans loved about the original.”
Pros
  • Graphical upgrade makes the series’ fun art even better
  • Just as tough as the original
  • Good balance between new moves and smart challenges
  • Hilarious writing
Cons
  • New 4-player co-op is still a question

“Why you can trust Digital Trends – We have a 20-year history of testing, reviewing, and rating products, services and apps to help you make a sound buying decision. Find out more about how we test and score products.“

The chickens are back, and at least some of them are giant, in Guacamelee! 2.

Recommended Videos

Developer Drinkbox’s 2013 side-scrolling brawler recaptures the elements that made the first a hit, from its luchador-inspired fighting-game-style combos, to its goofy, humorous writing. Guacamelee! 2 does what good sequels should: Recaptures the highlights of the first game, while expanding on the scope to reinvigorate the formula.

Guacamelee! 2 picks up seven years after the original. Players reprise the role of Juan, the blue-masked Luchador with spiritual powers, who must work through another “Metroidvania”-style world, beating down bosses and finding new paths on an adventure to save the world from a mysterious new foe.

While many of the game’s core mechanics remain unchanged, Guacamelee! 2 uses the mechanic much more aggressively. Juan will, for example, continue solving puzzles by hopping back and forth between the real and spirit worlds, but in this game the ability seems to be used to amp up the challenge instead of giving you a leg up over your enemies. In one platforming sequence, we were forced to fight waves of enemies across both realms as world-altering waves of energy shifted the world from spirit to normal every few moments. To smash skeletal bad guys, you have to time your attacks to hit them in the physical realm, while avoiding the waves that would send you back to the world of the dead, rendering them invulnerable.

Like the original, Guacamelee! 2 follows the Metroidvania playbook closely.

Though the bones of Guacamelee! remain more or less unchanged in the sequel, Designer Chris McQuinn told Digital Trends that Guacamelee! 2 was an opportunity for Drinkbox to dig in and add some of the more interesting concepts they couldn’t fit into the first game.

“We had a whole list of ideas we had to leave on the board,” McQuinn explained. “One of them was robust upgrade system, or the idea of adding four-player co-op.”

Though it wasn’t in our demo at PlayStation Experience 2017, McQuinn said the sequel’s upgrade system will allow you to customize your abilities and make Juan’s moves reflect your particular combat style.

Over the course of his adventure, Juan will meet a number of trainers, each associated with a particular special move that players will learn throughout the game. You’ll be able to spend money earned from beating enemies to amp up the abilities you like or use most, making them more powerful and even adding better animations. The result is luchador combat that you can make more your own as you play, McQuinn said.

Like the original, Guacamelee! 2 follows the Metroidvania playbook closely. Players earn new moves that, in time, let them go back and access areas of the game they couldn’t get into before. The new abilities Juan learns define the experience.

We used one of these new skills, a grappling hook called the “Eagle Boost,” which lets Juan grab onto specific nodes throughout the game, shooting him through the air. Navigating hazards with the Eagle Boost means getting into a rhythm with Guacamelee! 2’s platforming, something that definitely takes a second to pick up.

The demo also sees Juan regain his ability to transform into a chicken to sneak through tight corridors (don’t ask). In Guacamelee! 2, Juan learns new abilities in chicken form as well. In the demo, Juan the chicken could turn into a divebomber that smashes through rocks. While it had a clear function for exploration, the ability was just useful for enemies that popped up along the way. When things got particularly hairy for chicken Juan, though, he was able to transform into a giant, kaiju-style chicken that stomped its way through all challengers.

If that doesn’t sound wacky enough, McQuinn teased “lots of surprises on the chicken side.” Whatever that means.

Some of Guacamelee! 2’s most interesting new features remain to be seen

In a boss fight, we put Juan’s fighting skills to the test. Fighting a masked magician on the hunt for a sacred relic, Juan had to use his grappling hook abilities to fly through the air and connect a few combos with the floating wizard before dropping to the ground. The magician had tricks of his own, though, hucking waves of chickens at Juan that added some dodging to the brawler boss fight.

So far, Guacamelee! 2 feels like a very familiar return of a game that did a strong job of marrying its brawler fighting style to some tricky platforming and funny writing. From what we saw, there was no shortage of jokes along the way. A lot of them came rom by Juan’s nemesis, the magician — we almost felt bad laying a beatdown on him.

Some of Guacamelee! 2’s most the most interesting-sounding new features remain to be seen, including its aforementioned upgrade system and four-player drop-in, drop-out co-op. McQuinn said the game scales up in difficulty on the fly as you add more players, helping to keep things challenging even as you add more fighters to the chaos. Even in single-player, Guacamelee! 2 seems tuned to push players to hone their brawling, jumping, and grappling hook skills in order to make it through.

Guacamelee! 2 is currently on track to launch on PlayStation 4 in the “spring or summer” of 2018.

Phil Hornshaw
Phil Hornshaw is an author, freelance writer and journalist living in Los Angeles. He is the co-author of The Space Hero's…
Sony raises PS5 prices in a surprise selection of countries
A PS5 Pro sits on a table with a DualSense.

While most stories about price increases in the past few weeks have been US-based, yesterday's PlayStation 5 price hike announcement from Sony only applies to the UK, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and other select markets in the Middle East and Africa.

Citing "a challenging economic environment," Sony has upped the RRP of the digital edition PS5 in Europe and the UK and increased the RRP for both the standard and digital editions in Australia and New Zealand.

Read more
All PlayStation consoles, ranked
best ps1 games sony ps1

The origins of PlayStation are a direct result of a deal gone bad with Nintendo. To make a long story short, Sony was planning on making a disc-based Nintendo console, but Nintendo backed out of the deal at the last minute and partnered with Phillips. After that betrayal, Sony launched the PS1, and the rest is history. We're now enjoying the best PS5 games, with new and old PlayStation franchises keeping the console popular. But which of Sony's consoles had the greatest impact on the gaming industry? We need to take more into consideration besides great games when ranking a console, and the result is by no means scientific. Based on the cultural impact, reception, and nostalgia, these are all the PlayStation consoles ranked from worst to best.

7. PSP

Read more
Switch 2 vs. PS5: which console is worth owning in 2025
The Switch 2 next to a TV with Mario Kart.

Before the Switch 2, it was a tight race in terms of power between the PS5 vs. Xbox Series X. However, Nintendo is releasing its most powerful console yet, which seems like it could rival the current market leader. There's a clear winner when comparing the Switch 2 vs. the Switch, but things get a little more complicated when pitting this new hybrid system against Sony's home console. There's a lot that makes a system worth owning besides the specs, including controllers, current and upcoming video games, and the all-important price tag. We are comparing the Switch 2 and PS5 in every category to see which one you should own in 2025.

If you're more of a handheld person, we did the same treatment for the Switch 2 vs. Steam Deck.

Read more