Survival horror sequel Heaven Dust 2 from indienova and One Gruel Studio is ready to haunt you on Nintendo Switch. Can you survive the outbreak? Check our Heaven Dust 2 review!

 

Survival horror sequel Heaven Dust 2 from indienova and One Gruel Studio is ready to haunt you on Nintendo Switch. Can you survive the outbreak? After a press conference, something goes terribly wrong at the First Research Center. Steve, who was inside of a cryogenic pod, wakes up to step right into a nightmare of a situation. It’s been almost two years since we got a chance to play Heaven Dust on Nintendo’s console, so it’s time to check out what has changed for this sequel and if there are any improvements made to the formula.

You’re going to be able to get into this journey in one of three difficulty settings – Casual, Normal, and Expert – depending on your skill level. For Casual, you’ll have enough ammo to spare, combat will be easier, and there will be more healing items for you to use to recover from any wounds you suffer during combat. Normal offers the standard experience as the developer intended. Ammo will be limited, enemies will pose a bigger challenge, and you’ll have to pay attention to your surroundings at all times. And once you complete the game once, you’ll unlock the Expert difficulty setting, which will considerably increase the challenge, making every mistake you make considerably hurt your chances of surviving.

[Beyond PlayStation] Heaven Dust Review

 

You’ll move Steve around with the left analog stick, sprinting by pressing and holding down the B button. To interact with an object, you can press the A button after the corresponding icon pops up. This will allow you to read documents, collect items, push or pull boxes, etc. Press the ZL button to raise your gun – if you have one equipped –, aim with the right analog stick, and fire with the R button. When you need to reload, quickly press the Y button so that you’re not caught in a fight without enough bullets in your gun. If you have a fire grenade, it can be thrown with the R button. Electric grenades are mapped to the X button. You can also use a melee weapon by pressing in on the right analog stick.

Your game menu can be accessed by pressing the + button. In there, you can check four sections: Inventory, Files, Map, and System. Inventory will have all of the items, weapons, and ammo you’ve managed to collect. Files will allow you to review all of the files you’ve collected, as well as any tutorials you’ve read. The Map will show you the unlocked maps for each area you explore. System is where you can go to load save files or close down the game and go back to the main menu.

Just from taking a quick look at the game’s trailer and the screens for this Heaven Dust 2 review, you can notice a considerable difference between the graphics for prequel Heaven Dust and what this sequel is setting out to do. While Heaven Dust certainly paid homage to the Resident Evil series from an isometric point of view, Heaven Dust 2 really dives into the Resident Evil vibe and groove. The game’s look has been completely revamped, starting with protagonist Steve feeling two steps closer to Chris Redfield and Leon Kennedy and the zombie designs being crazier and deadlier.

 

The First Research Center demands to be explored, and explore you must if you’re going to find the emblems, keys, cranks, and other items you’d expect to find in an homage such as this one in order to be able to progress further and further to find out what the institution is really hiding. You never know when an enemy might be waiting for you right around the corner – or inside of a room you’re about to explore – so you should make good use of the answering machines you find. Answering machines will allow you to save your progress, and they will also have a storage box nearby where you can store some of your items.

Don’t worry about them since you’ll be able to recover them from any of the other storage boxes you find! This is great for gaining some extra storage spots in your inventory so that you can collect important items or resources that can be combined to produce new items. Take, for example, the gunpowder and ammo shells you’ll find around as you explore each area. Depending on if you’re playing on Casual or Normal, they’re going to be more plentiful or a bit scarcer to locate, but once you do, you should combine them in your inventory! As you can probably guess, this will give you some ammo for your pistol, which you can certainly use to defeat a zombie or two.

 

Heaven Dust 2 bumps up the content, so you can expect to play through an adventure twice as long as what Heaven Dust had to offer. This also means that you’re going to take on more boss fights during your time with Heaven Dust 2. And yes, these boss fights will definitely remind you of some of the bosses in the Resident Evil series – the first trilogy in particular. You’re going to have to use every weapon and ammo you can get your hands on to defeat these deadly mutated titans, and be sure to have a healing item or two in your inventory in case you can’t get out of the way when they go all out and unleash their special attack.

Heaven Dust 2 improves on everything that its prequel did while still very much wearing its Resident Evil influence on its sleeve. It does a great job at paying homage to the series while more than doubling the content of its prequel, improving the graphics and lighting, adding more enemy types, more bosses, and more puzzles to solve, making it an easy one to recommend on Nintendo’s console. Heaven Dust 2 is out on Nintendo Switch with a $14.99 price.

Disclaimer
This Heaven Dust 2 review is based on a Nintendo Switch copy provided by indienova.