Preview | Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days

Io Interactive’s 2007 third person shooter Kane and Lynch was average at best. The act of shooting in the game never had the right kind of feedback, the cover mechanic was not well implemented, and the writing came off as overwrought and gratuitous.

Despite its legacy, Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days looks to be evidence that Io Interactive has learned from their previous game and actively tried to improved the mechanics and presentation.

The visual presentation of Kane and Lynch 2 is chiefly one of the most noticeable changes to the franchise. The game adopts an Internet video quality to the presentation, complete with compression artifacting, color saturation and light flares. Even the load screens are reminiscent to the YouTube graphic for buffering. The camera system bobs up and down as if a third party member was filming the entire game, so much so that the game has an almost voyeuristic quality. Of what was played and experienced, the video effects and post processing gives Kane and Lynch 2 an identifiable quality that distinguishes itself from other games in the genre; one – that in hindsight – was sorely missed in the previous iteration.

Beyond the new aesthetic, the core gameplay has been noticeably refined and retuned. For one, the cover mechanic finally feels intuitive. The player can move swiftly from cover to cover or move out of cover altogether and into a full on sprint forward – a lá Gears of War or Splinter Cell Conviction. The animations work well in selling the mechanic as something smooth and believable – as opposed to the much-maligned gliding into cover that is seen in the Gears franchise.

The core interaction that a player has in a shooter like Kane and Lynch is the actual shooting. If the guns do not have the right kind of report or feedback, the said interaction is muted and the game invariably suffers for it. Io has always had issue with this interaction, both in the first Kane and Lynch, as well as in the entire Hitman series. Shooting was not the strong suit of these previous games. With Kane and Lynch 2, the shooting seems what it should be. There is a distinct tactile difference between the different automatic weapons in the build I played. The environment that the player is placed in has plenty of pedestrians and destructibility that contributes to the positive feedback loop of shooting things.

Io Interactive seems to have learned their lessons with the first Kane and Lynch, bringing with them a redefined visual style and tuned mechanics for the sequel. While there is still much to be seen in the full retail release, Io Interactive has shown that their sequel is on the right track to do something new and compelling.