Little Nightmares (in being bad at video game) 2: Demo impressions

Back at it again in a surreal hell with Mono and Six in Little Nightmares 2. Thanks to Bandai Namco Entertainment, I had a chance to test out a tiny (haha) slice of the game that will be coming out 11 February 2021. In 10 minutes, I was reminded of two things:

• I really don’t like games with poor lighting
• I am bad at games, clearly

In any case, after much repeated death and practically accosting a colleague to play it instead, here’s my impressions of the demo.

WAKING UP

No sunshine here, waking up in front of a TV screen, in an abandoned hospital completely out of context. The residents of this place are mannequins, with parts scattered around, missing pieces, and looking benign. You control Mono, with Six trailing just a little behind. The music is muted, the brightest colour pretty much only Six in her iconic yellow raincoat, and your combined miniscule frames barely reach anything 2 inches above your head.

It looks like the elevator and the door down the hallway are missing fuses. They’re not going to make it easy to find them, are they? You move from room to room, soundlessly, walking past more assorted plastic parts, until you find an entryway. Six motions to you, cupping her hands. Interacting with her has Six boost Mono into the air, and you’re in the next room. Alone. The door will not open.

You must move forward. You can only move forward. All the while, not even your breathing will keep you company.

BEING MONO

Size notwithstanding, Mono doesn’t have many actions he can do, pretty much only the same controls as Six had from the previous game. I feel that this game is better played on a controller as I felt the keyboard/mouse was a tad off.

There’s no signposting in the game, so you’ll have to count on trial and error, as well as observation except for key points. You see, you get a torchlight that you can shine on the enemies to stun them, which may not be intuitive as you had no means to defend yourself besides distraction in the first game. You’re also able to attack enemies in the sequel! The enemies do often dwarf Mono, so even with these additions, it can feel quite intense, with the tension ramped up with accompanying music.

You can move the camera around relatively freely around Mono to help you identify key areas as you explore. As much as I did, the part I had trouble with was down to a tiny difference in timing. I gave up because it didn’t feel sane to keep trying the same thing…

TO BE CONTINUED

With only this little slice of a demo, I of course cannot pass full judgment onto the game. It made me frustrated when I couldn’t get through the demo because I was blocked off from a poor combination of timing and skill, that the atmosphere was lost on me once I died too many times at the same point. I always like having assist/accessibility options in games no matter what they are so long they’re optional, so I would agree to having one here to help get past roadblocks should it be available in the full release.

What awaits Mono and Six? How much more involved will Six be in the full game? I’m also curious about co-op options, with how the duo get split up in this demo itself. We’ll have to just wait and see.

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