Main and side missions will be assigned to you for completion in order to progress through the twenty plus hours of gameplay. There are also a multitude of achievements to unlock such as finding an elevator key before you are prompted or killing every mutant dog in a level without getting hit.

If you’re not that great at aiming, Dead Effect 2 provides you with an auto-fire option which can a good or bad choice depending on how you like to play. The layout of the on-screen controls can also be configured by the options menu if you wish to spread everything out or condense it.

Scattered throughout each level are hidden objectives such as informational cards that provide a bit more insight into what’s going on as well as orbs to destroy. They can be quite hard to find and you’ll find yourself going back to levels to try and track them all down.

One particular part of Dead Effect 2 that I found extra fun were the mini-puzzles. In order to unlock doors or activate computer consoles you are given a specific puzzle to complete. Some of them are as simple as pressing your finger to a “finger-print reader” whereas other, more devious puzzles require you to connect circuits that deduct certain numbers from a main number until it reaches zero.

Character Design

The graphics in Dead Effect 2 are really great and quite surprising to see in a mobile game. The attention to detail in things such as your characters hands, an enemys face or computer consoles is very impressive.

Each enemy seems to have their own fighting style. Zombies will slowly approach and smack the crap out of you whilst some might spit corrosive acid everywhere that damages you upon contact. Mutant dogs will run around the place and lunge at you when you least expect it and soldiers will relentlessly fire at you, forcing you to find cover.

With So Many Ups Must Come Downs

I wish I could say Dead Effect 2 is without fault but unfortunately it has more than it’s share of problems.

Playing through the game on an LG G3 (which I’ve found is quite a reliable gaming phone) the game crashed on me multiple times, leaving me to start off back at the last cloud save.

Lowering the video settings to Low didn’t seem to help with the crashing either so I just put it down to the fact that Dead Effect 2 requires an even more powerful phone to run it seamlessly.

That brings me to the fact that there aren’t very many autosaves. I found the game would only save your progress to the cloud once you’d completed a mission or reached a certain point in dialogue with an NPC.

Also, upgrading your abilities and weapons doesn’t seem as intuitive as it should be. It took me a few minutes to work out how to select an upgrade option and purchase it.

The team at Badfly Interactive could also be generous enough to allow us to skip cutscenes, seeing as if the game crashes frequently, you have to sit there and put up with a cutscene you may have already seen a couple of times.

Final Thoughts

Badfly Interactive have given us an incredibly amazing game that comes without a price tag. There are some in-app purchases such as premium currencies but they are completely optional. You could easily go throughout the entire game without spending a single cent which I absolutely respect.

Should you be lucky enough to not experience any crashes whilst playing Dead Effect 2 then you’re going to have an absolute blast. The fighting is satisfying and the story is passable making it one of the better first person shooters I’ve seen on a mobile device.

If you happen to have a gamepad as well, then you’re going to be set for a good twenty or more hours. Head on over to the GooglePlay or Apple App store and get downloading!

Score

4 stars – incredible game for a mobile device that suffers from crashes.