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655 games
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t15.9 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 2\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tGood ingredients, but somehow a worse game than the original

Moonlighter 2 has the ingredients of a good game. The basic loop is still fun, the shop is still enjoyable, and the new perk system is actually pretty interesting. But honestly, it feels like they have taken a lot of the things that made the original Moonlighter charming and satisfying and replaced them with things that are just worse.

The biggest one for me is the item gathering. In the original, most of your materials came from killing monsters, and they went into stacks in your inventory. It made dungeon runs feel really satisfying. You'd fight your way through, fill your bags with materials, then bring them back and work out what to sell or use.

In this, so much of the loot comes from chests instead, and the fact that items don't stack makes gathering stuff feel like a massive faff. It's a much less satisfying part of the loop than it was in the first game.

The shop is still fun, but I think that's also a step backwards from the original. There's something about the first Moonlighter that was just really charming. The visuals, the simple systems, the way the dungeon crawling and shopkeeping fed into each other. Moonlighter 2 feels like it's added more stuff without really making that core loop better.

Combat is also pretty disappointing. It looks nicer, but everything feels very floaty and insubstantial. There's just not much weight to hitting things, which makes the combat feel a bit rubbish even when the underlying systems are fine.

And then there's the performance. This game has absolutely no business making a PC sweat this much for what are, frankly, fairly mediocre graphics. 😅 The performance is bad enough on PC, and on Steam Deck I don't think it's really acceptable at all.

It's frustrating because I don't think this is a fundamentally bad game. There's clearly a good game in here. The perks are interesting, the shop loop can still be fun, and I can see what they were going for. It just feels like they've moved away from a lot of the things that made the original so appealing, while somehow making it considerably harder to run.

If you're interested in Moonlighter 2, I'd honestly just recommend playing the first one instead. It's charming, it runs well, the material gathering is much more satisfying, and I think it's simply a better game.

I'd recommend the first Moonlighter and give this one a miss.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Bazzite
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AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 8-Core Processor - RAM: 31 GB
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AMD AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT (radeonsi, gfx1201, ACO, DRM 3.64, 6.17.7-ba29.fc43.x86_64) - VRAM: 16 GB
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A developer has responded on Sep 3 @ 7:13am
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85 games
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t20.6 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(18.3 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 6\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDirect from Steam\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tTL;DR: Almost 19 hours into the game, and a disclaimer, I have not finished it yet.

While the game on its own is good, entertaining, and at times fairly challenging, I don't feel amazing recommending it if you played the first Moonlighter and are looking for more of that same experience.

Moonlighter 2 has a lot of improvements compared to the first game, but it definitely does not deliver the same enjoyment I had with the original.

I appreciate the move to 3D, and the design language is honestly amazing. The game looks great, the environments are nice, and visually I think they did a really good job.

But the game gets way too repetitive compared to the first one, and the scaling of the economy is, honest to God, ♄♄♄♄♄♄♄♄.

In almost every run of the first game, you felt like you were actually progressing. You were finding new stuff, getting excited to see what was in the next room, wondering what the next monster, biome, weapon, or relic was going to be. There was always this feeling that you were moving forward, even if the run itself wasn't perfect.

It was such a satisfying experience.

Here, you can play for hours upon hours and still feel like you're basically in the same place because upgrades cost an arm and a leg. Even when you finally get new weapons or upgrade the ones you have, you often don't really feel like you've gone anywhere.

There are simply too many things competing for your money and resources. Weapons, health, shop upgrades, town upgrades, relic-related upgrades, vendors, and everything else. Instead of constantly feeling stronger, I often feel like I'm just trying to keep up with the game.

And yes, Moonlighter 2 has much stronger roguelike elements because of the temporary perks and builds you get during a run. But compare that system to other games that do the same thing and this one really falls flat on its face.

Your run can depend way too much on RNG. Sometimes the perks work together and you get a genuinely strong build. Other times, you're offered perks that barely interact with what you're using, or you simply don't get what you need. Some weapons also feel considerably stronger or more useful than others, while some seem to depend much more heavily on getting the correct perks before they actually feel good.

That doesn't make me want to experiment. It makes me feel like I got unlucky.

The dungeons themselves also start feeling very samey. Yes, the biomes look different, and there are different enemies and environmental mechanics, but the actual gameplay loop between them doesn't change enough. After enough hours, you start recognizing the same type of rooms, the same structure, and the same routine over and over again.

The first game was repetitive too, obviously, that's part of the genre. But it hid that repetition much better because every run felt rewarding and meaningful.

The shop is another area where I feel like some of the soul of the original has been lost.

There are technically more systems now, more perks, more things to upgrade, and more mechanics happening around you, but somehow selling the stuff you bring home feels less personal and less satisfying. The original had this simple but really addictive relationship between exploring, figuring out what your loot was worth, selling it, upgrading yourself, and immediately wanting to go back out again.

Moonlighter 2 has more stuff, but more stuff doesn't automatically mean a better system.

In many moments, the game is also genuinely unfair because of clipping, questionable hit detection, and attacks hitting you when you are nowhere near where the attack visually appears to be.

Some enemy attacks are also just difficult to read. Between the camera angle, verticality, effects on the screen, and certain attack animations, there are times where taking damage feels less like "I made a mistake" and more like "What the ♄♄♄♄ even hit me?"

That is a very bad feeling in a game where dying can cost you an entire run.

Getting physically stuck somewhere is also something I have experienced, and it cost me my whole run. When a game is built around risking everything you've collected and deciding whether to continue or leave, losing everything because the game itself broke is incredibly frustrating.

While you definitely can balance getting good relics with getting enough upgrades to beat bosses, that isn't always the case. Sometimes everything comes together perfectly. Sometimes it doesn't. It is very hit or miss, and the amount of RNG involved makes that even more noticeable.

There are also things happening in the game that are barely explained.

For example, getting a quest early in the game, spending time trying to figure out how to progress it, only to eventually realize that you basically cannot do anything meaningful with it until much later in the game.

What's the point?

Why give me the quest now, at the beginning of the game, when I can't actually progress it until I'm much further into the game?

What I'm specifically talking about here is the Bloblets, or whatever they're called.

The game also still has technical problems. Stuttering, inconsistent performance, crashes, and other bugs are complaints that keep coming up. In a game where a single run can represent a significant amount of time, instability hurts a lot more than it would in something where you can just reload a checkpoint.

Ultimately, I do recommend Moonlighter 2 as a game.

What I have a much harder time doing is recommending it as a sequel to Moonlighter.

If you never played the first one, there is genuinely a lot to enjoy here. The game looks great, the basic combat is fun, selling relics is still satisfying to an extent, and there is a lot of content and progression to work through.

But if you loved the first Moonlighter and you're coming here because you want that same feeling again, I think you might be disappointed.

It has the same basic dungeon-crawling and selling mechanics, but in my opinion, it doesn't have the good old soul that its predecessor had.

The first game made me excited to do another run.

Moonlighter 2 often makes me feel like I need to do another run.

And that difference is probably my biggest problem with the game.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\n\t\t\t\t\tWas this review helpful?\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t89 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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TotallyMad
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18 reviews
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t21.7 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(4.3 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 5\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI want to preface this by saying that I did not play the first Moonlighter and only picked up Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault after its 1.0 release.

This means I ultimately cannot compare it to the previous installment.

That said, I cannot share some of the criticism people have directed at it. Namely, the bashing of the new art style feels disingenuous to me.

The art style is cute, cohesive and distinct. Yes, it isn't the pixel art of the first game, but that doesn't automatically make it bad. It is simply a different style.

If it isn't your style, that is perfectly fine. But calling it outright bad just because it moved away from pixel art is unfair.



Gameplay

The core gameplay loop of venturing out, collecting artifacts and selling them in your shop sounds simple, but it has a surprising amount of depth and addictiveness to it.

Every expedition feeds directly into the shopkeeping and progression systems, which then motivate you to head out for another run.

It is one of those gameplay loops where "just one more run" can very quickly turn into several.

Combat

The gameplay is well-rounded and the combat feels fun and responsive.

You essentially have four different weapon classes that follow the same basic combat fundamentals. Over time, however, you unlock additional weapons within these classes that can alter the gameplay style quite significantly.

This makes the combat easy to get the hang of while still offering a good amount of depth through different weapons, synergies and learning curves.

You do not need to study a spreadsheet before picking up a new weapon, but there is still enough room to experiment and find combinations that suit your playstyle.

Artifacts & Backpack Mechanics

The roguelite mechanics are well-made and the base camp has A LOT of upgrades!

All upgrades, modifiers and power-ups have been easy to understand and clear about what they actually do so far, which isn't always a given with these kinds of games.

I never felt like I had to browse a wiki just to understand whether an upgrade was useful or how two effects interacted with each other.

And then there is the dopamine rush of combining, reacting and chaining artifact effects inside your backpack.

This system scratches that Balatro itch of seeing number go higher, multipliers triggering and you cashing out big when everything works.

Properly arranging your artifacts and watching one effect activate another is highly addictive, insanely fun and unique.

It is easily one of the standout mechanics of the game.



Progression & Shopkeeping

Once you make it back with a backpack full of valuable artifacts, it is up to you to sell them in your shop.

You can decorate your shop and unlock additional furniture that can boost or alter the way you sell your items. This adds another layer to the gameplay beyond simply throwing everything onto a shelf and waiting for customers to buy it.

Progression is tied to the amount of gold you earn. There are milestones the game sets for you and, once you reach them, new features are unlocked and the game gradually expands.

It is a simple but effective progression system:

Exploring earns you artifacts.
Artifacts earn you gold.
Gold unlocks more of the game.

All parts of the gameplay loop feed naturally into one another.



The Story

The story is simple enough and mostly acts as a vehicle for the mechanics.

It is a continuation of the first installment and contains several nods to the original game, as far as I was able to tell.

However, it is delivered in a way that does not make playing the first game mandatory to understand the plot or follow what is happening.

That is especially nice for people like me who started with this game. I never felt completely lost just because I did not already know every returning character or reference.



Performance & Technicalities

Performance has been smooth so far.

I can't say I share the sentiment that the game "performs worse than it should for its looks."

Lighting quality, polygon count, effects and enemy density all seem in line with the performance that is to be expected.

It isn't some crazy optimization miracle, but it also isn't a micro-stutter fest. It runs well and plays nicely.

The game can be played with Mouse & Keyboard as well as with a controller. I personally prefer using a controller and am happy that it natively supports PlayStation button glyphs as well as Steam Input.

Keyboard and controller bindings can be changed in-game, allowing you to customize the entire layout.

Nice!

One criticism I do have, however, is that the game only supports FSR 3 as an upscaling technology.

There is no DLSS or XeSS support, which is a bummer and will hopefully be addressed in the future.

These features are essentials for PC releases in 2026 and should not be treated as optional extras. There are rarely technical circumstances where FSR can be implemented but DLSS and XeSS cannot, or vice versa.

The good thing is that FSR 3 can be used by GPUs from all manufacturers, which offsets the negative somewhat.

Still, supporting all three major upscaling technologies should be the standard.



Final Verdict

Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault is a fun and enjoyable roguelite Hack n Slash that combines elements of Hades with a sprinkle of Balatro number-magic and a shopkeeping simulator.

I enjoy it greatly and find its particular mix of mechanics genuinely unique.

It might lack the same level of depth in any single category as some of the games it can be compared to, but the way it combines those individual ideas gives it an identity of its own.

It is easy fun that doesn't expect you to min-max every decision or number crunch like crazy. You can engage deeply with its systems if you want to, but it remains enjoyable even if you simply want to complete a few runs, sell some artifacts and watch the numbers go up.

Cute art style, satisfying combat, addictive artifact combinations and a gameplay loop that makes it dangerously easy to start another run.

Rating: ★★★★★★★★âŻȘ☆ (8.5/10)

An easy recommendation for roguelite fans and anyone who enjoys watching numbers go up.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 11
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 - VRAM: 31 GB
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t50 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Hiraky Matsu
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170 games
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6 reviews
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Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t72.4 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(41.6 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Early Access Review
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: August 31\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tits a very fun game with alot of playstyles , was worried with the bad reviews but thats just people complaining that its diff from the first game\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\n\t\t\t\t\tWas this review helpful?\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t96 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
2 people found this review funny\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Drewsdaman
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21 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t27.4 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(14.8 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Early Access Review
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI loved the first game, but I can't recommend this one as it is. I saw it was about to release so I thought I would start the ground work to get ready for 1.0. I absolutely loved the first one, even though it's not at all my sort of game, but it was such a cool idea that I tried it about a year ago and instantly bought the EA for the sequel. I didn't want to burn out before the 1.0, so I held off till now, and am just left disappointed. I wished I played when it launched so I could have given feedback before the development is mostly finalized.

First of all, this feels like Moon Lite-r 2. They've "casualized" the shop to remove all friction. Now the game tells you within a range what is a cheap, good, high, and greedy, on top of massively inflating the money to make it "feel like more". So for example, in the first game, lets say a slim blob is worth selling at 20. You sell it as 15, it's marked as cheap, next time 15, marked as good, 17, marked as good, so on. Until you found the exact dollar amount to maximize profit, or you could just stop once it was "well priced", and that could take 5-10 sells depending on the item and range. Now, the relic equivalent of a blob is 10x, you price it at 150 and it says cheap, but when you go to price it again, it tells you a large range what is cheap and what is ???, so you aren't going up and down by small increments looking for the perfect price, you just keep going up until "cheap" turns into ??? and you know the next category is wll priced. You just adjust it by 10-20 at a time and the game gives you a "grace" price range. It eliminates the tedium, but way too much, so now you pretty much get the exact perfect price within 1-3 sales. It eliminates the give and take of selling too cheap, or missing a sale because you priced something too high. You also don't ever run out of customers. They flood in until you are out of everything, and leave instantly. So there are no "missing customers" because you opened a shop with 3 items. No storing good items to wait for the perfect sale of all your good stuff, while keeping your upgrades afloat by selling your cheaper items. Now, you just sell everything every time you come back, taking out the strategy of when and what to sell. There is no complexity to the shop now. You sell every time, sell everything, and have the perfect price on all the items after getting them a couple times. I definitely think there should be a "classic mode" and a "casual mode" so that people that liked Moonlighter can get the complexity and strategy of the shop, while those here to get in and out in a handful of hours can just speed through the game at their own pace. As it is now, it only leaves you the latter so the shop just feels boring.

There are good things they did with the dumbing down of the mechanics, like being able to restart a run instead of going home empty handed. That just saves time, and prevents you from going back home with nothing and a day being wasted. Upgrades are more streamlined, and the economy (even though it's massively inflated with extra 0's on the end to make everything seem "bigger") is better balanced so you can get a couple upgrades per successful run instead of multiple runs just to get a single upgrade like the first game. I just think it was taken way too far to the "simple" extreme.

The reason I can't recommend though, is the combat. It's wildly inconsistent. You'll get hit and be confused how, maybe an attack didn't do the wind up period and just instantly came out with no warning. Another big one is the verticality, which is great on paper, but different enemies have weird rules on what will or won't "go over or under you". I get hit by grenades that get stuck on something in the sky geometry, on the corner of the screen, and I die to it. The grenade is 100 feet away, but directly above you in the sky-box, so it hits you directly below. There are other attacks that have weird rules that are hit or miss like the large bug mini-bosses. The actual mini-boss version does a twirl attack, simple, you just get out of range and then go back in once it's finished. But sometimes you get sucked in like a whirlwind effect is pulling you from out of range, into range. Maybe 10% of the time, but there is no telling when or why sometimes you get pulled, and most of the time you are safe just out of range. Some enemies have a "stun bar", but sometimes you hit the threshold and they get to do one last attack before they enter a stun state, but the rest of the time their animations are cancelled once that threshold is hit. Most of the time you have i-frames, sometimes you randomly don't, sometimes you just can't dodge for no reason like it gets buffered by another input. Those are examples of specific things that are 90% of all hits I take on a given run. I'm not complaining that the game is too hard, I think the difficulty is spot on and the combat as a whole is actually really fun. It's just not consistent, and that is something mandatory for rogue-like games where death can mean your time was wasted. The timing of every attack needs to be exactly the same, and the rules of it need to be clear and repeatable.

Graphics and art style are awesome, performance is great, no serious bugs to speak of (minus combat, but that isn't so much bugs as just lack of polish), all the other areas of the game are extremely well done and the devs have done great work importing this idea from 2D to 3D.

I really like the Moonlighter series, and I see the vision here. There just needs to be some updates on the combat to make it consistently fair, and run ends be because of my mistakes or greed instead of getting screwed over by spaghetti code logic fighting itself as to the rules of any given combat. I understand why the shop was dumbed down so much, I'm sure the more casual or new to the genre players found it tedious and just wanted to fight stuff and buy upgrades, but it removes what makes this series unique and turns it into another in the massive line-up of rogue-likes. Polish up combat, I will change it to a recommend with a neutrally toned written review. Add a separate mode so the shop works like the first game and fix up the combat, then it's an easy thumbs up all the way through from me.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 10
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Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-10900K CPU @ 3.70GHz - RAM: 32 GB
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 - VRAM: 16 GB
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\n\n\t\t\t\t\tWas this review helpful?\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t50 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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1 person found this review funny\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Blue
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6 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t153.5 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 8\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tThis is regrettably one of the saddest reviews I've left on Steam. I love Moonlighter, and I think there are truly redeemable qualities in Moonlighter 2, but I can not in good conscience recommend it to anyone until they patch some of the unfun and frustrating mechanics.

The exponential growth in shop prices near the back half of the game, made everything I did in the early game feel pointless. I got to a point where money became irrelevant, but I had to run like 50 boss fights for resources to upgrade every piece of gear I wanted to use. Speaking of gear, most of the weapons are garbage. Some of them are quirky or change up the playstyle, but a lot of them are just bad. Which is a real hard pill to swallow after spending 4 hours farming enough bosses to upgrade it, only to find out it's worse than your previous weapon. Going even further, I will say the weapons need some rebalancing in a big way. The elements you get on each individual run do a LOT of the heavy lifting in the damage department. Especially with fist weapons, which are miserable to use in their base form. All the variant guns are bad, and not because their design is bad, but because too many enemies fly out of reach or require a gun to knock them down or interrupt them for any of the "quirky" guns to be viable. Not unless I want to spend 30 seconds running around the map avoiding aerial death lasers because I like the "shotgun" style gun. The low ammo guns also make any of the elements that proc off guns basically useless.

Combat for the most part felt fun and just aggressive enough to be a challenge, but there are some particular enemies that need some tuning, like the jackasses with harpoons, something is wrong with their hit registration it's like they ignore i-frames or their attacks don't deal damage at the same time as the animation. There's these little red mages that teleport all over the place, which is fine, but something needs to be fixed with their AI, because they just teleport off to BFE and don't engage, and in the later "Greed" rounds they have like a billion health, and you have to deal with these stupid f***ing things teleporting from one end of the map to the other, jumping from island to island for a chance to hit them with one combo if you're lucky for like 3 mins. It's not challenging, it is wasting my time for no reason, and this feels like what they are intended to do, which only makes it more infuriating.

I played this game a lot when it came out in Early Access. I enjoyed it, I sent feedback, and I had high hopes for the official launch, but this disappointed me immensely. It took me like 3-4 total runs from where I left off in the very first EA patch (I never went back for the later patches) to hit the Credits screen, and the post game content? "Go grind the same bosses you've already killed, just 100 times" Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING requires 2 of some end stage boss resource to upgrade it to it's max level. All of the end game content, the Greed levels, the Spark Perks, all of it does f*** all to help you get more resources, and money became very quickly irrelevant, so there was no reason for me to run the dungeon anymore other than for the resources. I was literally leaving relics behind because the money served no purpose to me. Selling items at the shop was just a waste of time at that point. Which is going to bring me to my last point....

The main focus of Moonlighter was like an arpg dungeon crawler mixed with a shop sim. The new shop has like 10 different mechanics...and they are all irrelevant. Tips, customer types, perks, decorations, bloblets, all useless. The static bonuses from all of these are based on the Base price of the items being sold, or flat values between 50-1000 in the case of tips. The direct impact that quality of the relic has on the price means that 98-99% of the price of an item in the mid to late game is determined by how well you played the "Bag" minigame and you could sell them one base unmodified pedestals. On my last run before I quit, I made 36,000,000 in one day. My Common quality relics sold for like 300k, The pedestals that increase values of the relics would change the price by less than 1k. I didn't even look at the bonuses anymore, I basically clicked perks based on whether or not it would try to make me clean stains off the floor. Once money became useless, the heart and soul of what made Moonlighter great started to become the biggest waste of time in the game.

This game isn't Monster Hunter, respect your player's time, rebalance the shop to be meaningful, add the correct resources to the vendor who lets you buy them and let us buy them more than one at a time ffs. There were a lot of very poor decisions made in terms of Quality of Life, and you somehow made a gameplay loop that made a key part of your game useless. Genuinely disappointed, and that's a huge fall from grace for me, because I came into this game a huge fan of the previous title and I wanted to enjoy this, I just can't.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\n\t\t\t\t\tWas this review helpful?\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t13 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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45 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t12.5 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Early Access Review
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: August 31\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tTL;DR: If you want a Moonlighter experience, play Moonlighter 1 and don't buy this game.
A lot of the reviews say this game is worse than Moonlighter 1 in every way, and this is one of them. Yes I'm technically writing an early access review, no I'm not critiquing it on how finished it is (the full release it next week but there will be a major update so it should be less buggy). I'm writing this on the aspect of the game that definitely won't be changing at this point, the gameplay. I can already tell I won't be finishing this game. In every way, this game is inferior to Moonlighter 1. I think the devs played a bit of Cuisineer (a game I feel falls well short of Moonlighter) and said "Hey this game is awesome lets make Moonlighter like it instead". The first game had some issues, yes, but this game abandons everything good about the first game.
- The pets that were added in one of the later Moonlighter updates are gone.
- Gone are any good combat upgrades, instead we have "generic potion with upgradeable uses" and "generic weapon a with gimmick" and I've seen mentions of armor but I can't even find the merchant for this, not that armor matters at all anymore. The game doesn't have some kind of damage given/taken progression anymore, now its just get gud and get lucky.
- The worst change IMO is that this is not in any way a dungeon crawler. You don't explore dungeons with secrets, you teleport to the next arena that you get to choose on a Slay the Spire map. Combat gets boring fast and nothing is introduced to keep it fresh, which is really why it feels so much like Cuisineer imo.
- The shop got some changes too, I remember the shop being a lot more enjoyable and upgrades being something I used, now I haven't upgraded my shop at all because it feels like money not put into making combat better is money wasted. And the upgrades aren't very good, at least not for a while. I think I might be about 60% done with the game according to the guide content, but it's felt extremely repetitive and boring. Nothing has changed since the beginning.
- When I initially saw the move to 3D I was worried that they had messed up, but I figured they were just switching to a new perspective and would be smart enough to keep the combat as good as the first. They did not, this combat sucks and the 3D only hinders the experience. The Pixel art was good, this art is mid, the 2D top down combat was great, this 2.5D top-down combat is pretty annoying.
- The hub world also is very annoying, it should be much smaller so that you don't have to walk around so much.
- The inventory management is entirely different as well, this is probably something they can change instead of keeping, but Moonlighter 1 had strict placement of items and interesting effects. Strict placement is gone, and the effects are now basically limited to "Item 1 destroys item 2 but you get a tiny upgrade" with a small amount of variation. Idk I liked how moonlighter 1 forced you to fight over real estate on the edges or think through what your final backpack would look like.
- The bosses are lame and no longer have exclusive drops. They have higher chances to drop better items.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 10
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12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-12400 - RAM: 48 GB
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti - VRAM: 16 GB
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t65 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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2 people found this review funny\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Taka
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31 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t28.6 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 17\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI looked forward to this game after enjoying the first game even though I had some gripes with it, I hoped Moonlighter 2 would improve on those. but after finishing the game I'm pretty mixed about it overall, and have to say I would currently not recommend it.

The pros:

- Inventory management during runs is fun, sorting the backpack and finding item combination/synergies to increase their value adds a new layer to collecting relics to sell

- Initially the game is fun and each biome is different enough (in terms of enemies and the relic mechanics) that they all play differently

- the bossfights are pretty cool for the first time fighting them

- all 4 weapon types play different from each other, and some of the subweapons feel pretty different from their base version

The cons:

- while the bosses are cool at first, they become very boring fast, with simple movesets, and in some cases long invulnerability phases that make 90% of the boss fight just waiting for the boss to become attackable again

- there are so many money sinks and incremental upgrades that after unlocking some base stuff each further upgrade feels very miniscule and unrewarding. You make tons of money in the postgame, however most upgrades still need boss materials from both minibosses as well as the general bosses, making unlocking more stuff a grind.

- after you find out good prices for each item the shop phase gets very boring. The added tipping system and the different item pedestals and traits during the shopping phase only add miniscule amounts of money compared to how much the item quality is weighted. Why should I care that an items base sell value increases by 20% (so maybe 1-2k gold at most), when the item is already worth 1 million gold due to it's quality?
So after a while you just max your item quality (especially in the post game with the limit break) and ignore all other shop systems. I maybe used aromas once after unlocking them late in the game, and they were pretty underwhelming as well

- some bugs and jank, but nothing that could not be fixed by patches, e.g. the armor that makes you immune to a single boss hit making me immune during the whole boss fight, or enemies dying and leaving behind invisible hitboxes that still damage you

- while different combat perk types are a good idea in general, some of them feel pretty underwhelming, leading to little difference between runs

- and, while completely optional, the difficulty modifiers unlocked after the story mode (used to grind money for the remaining cosmetics/stuff for achievements and so on) often feel tedious. Stacking more elite enemies, with more HP while reducing the damage you do and even costing you ammo to dodge roll makes fights take ages. But as I said, both these modifiers as well as the arena mode after each run are optional, and only affected me when finishing some remaining achievements after the story

I'm also mixed on the artstlye. While I like how the game looks, I preferred the pixel art of the first game.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 11
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12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-12600KF - RAM: 32 GB
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti - VRAM: 16 GB
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\n\n\t\t\t\t\tWas this review helpful?\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t5 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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1,016 games
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t4.7 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(4.2 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDirect from Steam\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tThis is a mediocre game and a bad sequel. I’m not a fan of roguelikes, but the first Moonlighter was a pleasant exception. It was more of a roguelite, with well-designed progression and an interesting story. The sequel, however, is just mediocre. There’s a lot of grind, it isn’t fun to play, and the mechanics are either poorly explained or simply don’t work properly.

Note: I rewrote this review after spending more time with the game, in order to better explain what I didn’t like.


Problems with the controls and combat

You can’t rebind WASD. But the problems go deeper than that.

WASD gives you 8-direction movement, while a gamepad gives you full analog movement. Yet Will attacks in only 8 directions, so you can miss an enemy standing right next to you between them. This is especially noticeable with the spear. ML2 tries to solve this with attack auto-aim, but even at 0% it still kicks in and can make Will attack enemies beside or behind you. The result is a fight between directional attacks and auto-aim that makes some hits feel unpredictable.

Will also sometimes ignores inputs for no apparent reason. I’ve had a few delayed responses too, though those may have simply been lag.

Attacks also force Will forward, even from a standstill. With the spear and gauntlets, you can easily run past an enemy and expose your back, forcing you to constantly reposition with movement or dodges. That gets especially tiring on arenas where it’s easy to fall, and dodging on the left trigger makes constant use uncomfortable.

Hades handles this much better. Attacks can be performed from a standstill or with momentum, and attack/dash controls are grouped together. In ML2, active actions are spread across distant buttons, which makes the controls more tiring.


Enemy behavior has bugs too

There are a lot of different enemy attacks, which is a good thing because it adds variety. The problem is that some attacks are difficult to read, while others are clearly buggy.

For example, an enemy prepares an area attack, with a targeting line or circle moving toward Will and giving you a moment to dodge. You roll behind the enemy, but when the animation ends, it instantly turns and attacks exactly where Will is!

So the apparent targeting can be misleading. But not always. Good luck figuring out which attacks are fair...

Enemies also spawn in waves in the middle of the arena. They don’t come from the edge or out of holes. They simply seem to teleport in, which looks strange.


The camera gets in the way too. It has a mind of its own.

ML2 moves the game into 3D with an isometric-style camera. Parts of the arena can be hidden behind higher levels of the environment or large enemies, making relative positions harder to read.

The levels are made of simple randomly scattered elements, with bridges, stairs, and arena edges angled to the camera. This often forces diagonal movement, which is especially awkward when dodging. One missed input or wrong stick angle and Will falls off and loses health.

Why not add railings to bridges or more barriers around arena edges?

The worst part is that the camera doesn’t always stay at one angle. During boss fights, it can rotate and pull back. Just when you get used to the isometric view, similar environments suddenly use a different angle, which is disorienting.

Enemies can also attack from outside the visible area, which is especially frustrating in a game already struggling with visibility. Overall, these arenas feel like a chore: hope something invisible doesn’t hit you and kill everything quickly.


Bosses

They’re cool. This is genuinely one of the game’s strongest points.

But the balance is broken. Bosses often enter invulnerable phases where you have to run around the map dodging large area attacks. It feels unfair.

I also think dodges are too short and their invulnerability window too brief. Even against regular enemies, one dodge often isn’t enough to escape an attack. Making them longer would probably just make Will fall off platforms even more often, further exposing the level design problems.


UI problems

The strangest thing is that I couldn’t find a screen showing which effects are active. Runs can last half an hour, so keeping track of your current build gets tiring. The UI and item descriptions are often unclear or misleading. For example, I picked a buff that should give me a chance to get spikes when hit, but got a burning effect instead. Some buffs say they last forever, but apparently “forever” only means for the current run.

The inventory is basically a separate mini-game that doesn’t affect the run itself. Combat happens separately, while arranging relics to increase their quality and sale value is a completely different activity. Item interactions are also poorly explained and don’t always seem to work, especially with curses affecting vertically arranged items.

Will essentially has separate inventories for loot and equipment, and the whole system feels underdeveloped. Quick-move still requires pressing pick-up after selecting an item, saving only a couple of clicks.

I also get squares instead of actual button names in control hints. During the prologue, parts of the UI and some text were missing, leaving me softlocked until I restarted the game.


The shop no longer feels like your own place

The sequel has lost some of its immersion. In ML1, loading a save started with Will waking up in bed, then walking through the shop and looking over your little kingdom before heading out. In ML2, we... just spawn outside.

The shop no longer feels like a refuge or something you own. It’s just another location with its own problems. You also can’t sell a whole stack of identical relics at once, so you have to micromanage them, and there are fewer relic pedestals than in ML1.

Once you expand the shop, the camera won’t give you enough of a view to track all the customers’ reactions. By the end of the game, you need to sell as efficiently as possible with little room for mistakes, so this quickly becomes frustrating.


The story, without spoilers

It’s been 8 years since ML1 came out. That’s a long time, but the sequel doesn’t do a good job of reminding you what happened before.

The story picks up from the very last moment of ML1 without properly reintroducing the characters, then starts dragging, going nowhere between occasional cutscenes.
Right from the prologue, there are plot holes and illogical character decisions. The storytelling feels rushed and included just for the sake of having a story.


What is the point of all this?

As a sequel, Moonlighter 2 is disappointing because it buries some of the ideas that made the first Moonlighter work in favor of typical genre conventions. In some places, it even takes a step backward by breaking seamless gameplay into disconnected pieces. In the first game, you feel like you’re winning through skill, not because things happen to go your way.

The sequel seems to have wanted to move the genre in some direction... I honestly don’t know where. It feels like it wandered off the road of sensible game design and straight into a ditch.

I understand why some people might like it. It looks stylish, and the music is sometimes quite pleasant. The imperfect stick response also isn’t unusual in games, and you can adapt to it.
But for me, the game’s shortcomings outweigh whatever fun it has to offer.
Is this what a sequel should be? For me, no.

P.S. And apparently, the "Endless" Vault isn’t actually endless either. The developer just confirmed that there is a limit to the number of thresholds, while the gold requirement keeps getting higher and higher. So in practice, it’s "endless" only because reaching each new threshold takes more and more grinding, until the requirements become so frustratingly high that you eventually give up. That feels pretty misleading.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t37 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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910 games
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370 reviews
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Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t12.6 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(3.6 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 3\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tAn overall solid game with the most baffling choice to avoid the most basic QoL:
- A sprint button, but your dodge roll has no cooldown, so its Ocarina of Time all over again.
- No way to instantly move items from one inventory to another. I know this is to avoid curses applying where you dont want them, but its silly when in the store.
- You have to hold down the button for most interactions, even selecting your map destination, and its murder on my carpal tunnel, there is no way to turn this off. There are also no other Accessibility settings to speak of.
- And while I understand that its likely an intentional decision, enemies have NO stagger. Meaning I can smash a guy in the face with a massive greatsword and he still has flawless aim to shoot me with a gun. This combined with the intentional choice to limit healing as much as possible, makes for a somewhat frustrating experience. You are able to get used to it, but there is a reason why Staggers are standard in these types of games now. Sephiria is a perfect example of this done well.

But my experience is a lot more positive than with the first game, they made the individual runs satisfying. However, I have been playing Sephiria a lot which also has top down combat, and Moonlighter's run variety is a fragile fraction compared to its combos. It does not help that both feature inventory based mechanics, and Sephiria does them a lot better as well.

TL;DR - Fun, but I expected more with 1.0\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Notice
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327 games
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3 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t31.6 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 5\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tTLDR: Game can be fun, just spam click through the story and pretend it's not real. Worth picking up on sale, but I wouldn't pay full 30$ price.

Shop mechanics, upgrades, and combat are still fun, but the story is pretty bad. It's really cliché at times and the characters seem a bit two dimensional. Also, the final boss at the end is beaten by a singular SHIFT press quick time event. I actually was left wondering if the boss was some sort of joke or fake out, but nope, you just kill the guy they've been building up for the whole game in a 10 second cutscene.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
3
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shadowq
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21 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t7.5 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(6.1 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 6\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI really liked Moonlighter 1. It was a great fusion of shop management and OG Zelda. Both halves of the game were fun and melded together really well. I was looking forward to Moonlighter 2. I liked the first one so much that I did not really watch anything about Moonlighter 2, just expecting that the devs would knock it out of the park.

Unfortunately, Moonlighter 2 is not an improvement on Moonlighter 1. I quickly found out that Moonlighter 2 is basically Hades. Don't get me wrong, Hades is a great game. It's just ... not Moonlighter. Moonlighter 2 just feels like a Hades clone with worse relic and shopkeeping mechanics than the first Moonlighter.

IMHO, go play Moonlighter 1 for a great Moonlighter game. Then go play Hades...and skip Moonlighter 2.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t8 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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ellie jae
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71 games
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3 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t30.3 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 16\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI was so excited to hear they were making a second moonlighter. I loved the first one so so much! 20 ish hours on pc and over 200 hours on switch.

I've been waiting for moonlighter 2 to come out of early access for over a year now and finally got to play it. I've beaten the 3rd world and don't really feel like there's a reason to play anymore.

I will still complete the game to see what's at the end out of principle, but here's my thoughts thus far.

TLDR - The game has lost what made the original so good. Too many yoinked things from hades. Moonlighter 1 had so much original sauce to it which just isn't here.

THE GOOD

- The backpack eject is a great mechanic where you can smash melee enemies off the screen which feels satisfying.
- I like that the secondary currency for upgrades no longer takes up backpack space.
- The coloured item rarity system is a welcome edition
- The anti greed shop pricing to let you know if the price you list is just too high which is much better than the first game.

THE BAD

- Too many yoinked things from Hades and the boss fights feel so empty and forced.
- Why are blueprints locked behind runs instead of natural game progression?
- Why did you get rid of the dungeon format?
- The gameplay loop gets old and each run doesn't feel worth your time.
- Upgrades feel so lackluster/ meaningless once you get to a certain point.
- The bosses in moonlighter 1 were so memorable and satisfying. Moonlighter 2 the bosses don't really feel the same.
- The weapons feel dull to use/ you don't really get to experiment as much as you'd like to due to being locked behind blueprints/ why invest resources if they feel crap.
- Why is everything in the main hub spread so far out where the first game the town felt cohesive.
- Cosmetic dlc day 1 of out of early access was a slap in the face.
- You can have a great run and get combo'd so fast and have to tele out early on.
- I had 2 major bugs happen during the Aeolia world where my character was suck in place and had to teleport out and the other my caracter was just floating and unstuck myself through trial and error.

RECOMMENDATION TO THE DEVS

If I could recommend anything to the devs it would be this.
- Get rid of blueprints alltogether and just have players unlock everything if they have the coin and secondary currency needed.
- Scrap the shielded phases from bosses as it doesn't add anything.

If you ever do an expansion please make it like moonlighter 1 dungeons\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"FĂŁ\t\t\t\t\t\t
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FĂŁ da LarissaManoela
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567 games
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7 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t30 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 4\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tThis game just isn't as good as the first one. After 30 hours to 100% it, the grind just feels extreme and boring. The shopping part of the game doesn't feel nice anymore. At least for me, it was a part of the game I saw myself wanting to skip instead of looking forward to selling my items after an incursion. 8 ♄♄♄♄♄♄♄ million gold for a single inventory slot is insane.
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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[A.] KSib
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1,881 games
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130 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t44.4 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(44.4 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 14\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tI kind of feel like they ran out of interesting things to do in this game around the halfway point as the objectives just become... the same. I almost feel like this was released too early and they had more they wanted to add but couldn't.

I enjoyed my initial 10 hours or so with the game, and I'd go as far to say the it's maybe even worth the sale price of $21, but there had to have been better things to task me to do than what it has me doing at the end of the game, surely. The weaponry and fights aren't enough to run through these same levels so many times.

Instead of challenging the player's skill, it challenges their patience/wastes their time and puts some story elements behind this monotony

I was on the fence about if I wanted to lean recommend or not, but I went with not.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 11
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12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-12700K - RAM: 32 GB
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 - VRAM: 16 GB
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t3 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Jarek
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736 games
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9 reviews
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Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t89.1 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(70.1 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Early Access Review
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 1\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tThis game has been a real blast to play. That's not to say it's perfect in every way; like most games on release it'll need just a bit more time to bake after full release to really hit that top notch level, but I already really enjoy it as it is.

The first little bit of the game I was honestly a bit worried that there wasn't going to be enough in the game, but when it started ramping up it definitely had me hooked. I'd almost complain that there are TOO many choices as to where to spend your money now :D

You can pretty safely ignore most of the negative reviews. From what I've seen they're a lot like the Frostpunk 2 reviews from a lot of people. They didn't want a sequel, they wanted DLC for the first one.

So if you're just looking for a fun time in a game that is a fun sequel to the first one and not just more of exactly the same, this is a great one.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
1 person found this review funny\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Valderi
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1 review
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t11.7 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(3.4 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 2\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tMajor performance issues on desktop and steamdeck alike, the stuttering is so bad out of the box, its unplayable, it somehow is worse at 1.0 then the steam deck EA launch, and the steam deck struggles to begin with.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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Windows 11
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AMD Ryzen 7 3800X 8-Core Processor - RAM: 32 GB
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AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT - VRAM: 12 GB
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t3 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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A developer has responded on Sep 3 @ 7:07am
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SmallMight
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337 games
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6 reviews
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Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t65.2 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(59.4 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tThis is one of my favorite roguelikes!

If you like games that mix cozy shopkeeping, management puzzles, and combat, this is the game for you.

(TL;DR: Nothing groundbreaking, but it's fun, satisfying, and feels familiar/builds upon first game without simply being the exact same game in a new skin.)

Story: Mid.
If you played the first game, you'll probably have some attachment to the old town and its look. The story plays into that, but ultimately it's a very simple, very "just play the game and the cutscenes will do their thing" kind of story. I feel bad saying this, but I didn't really care about the story. I did chuckle at it, though, and there were a few things I found pretty funny. It was fun to read something mildly-to-moderately interesting here and there while I rushed away to enter the dungeon again or run the shop.


Combat: Rewarding and Fun, Treading Familiar Waters
-There are 4 main melee weapon types, with different variants/aspects to experiment with, alongside guns and other gadgets. You get a pretty good selection of toys to play with, and the weapons can gain upgrades and perks during your runs.
-The perk system is also really interesting, A lot of the perks can synergize with each other in ways that make your build feel surprisingly powerful. Things like spreading effects between enemies or having multiple explosive effects work together can create some really satisfying combinations. Sorry, I'm trying not to give too much away here.
-There are 3 main dimensions, each with their own dungeon areas. While I wouldn't call the overall variety massive, the maps are pretty to look at, have interesting environmental elements you can use to your advantage, and feature some fun bosses — both in design and combat. Nothing here is something you haven't seen before, but honestly, that doesn't take away from the fun.

FOR THOSE LOOKING FOR A MORE COZY EXPERIENCE -
-The game is very approachable. You can adjust the difficulty, so if you aren't looking for a brutally difficult roguelike experience, you don't have to play it that way. The game lets you take things at your own pace, and that's something I really appreciate.
You can just take it easy and have fun with it.


Shopkeeping: Simple, Addictive, and say it with me now, Familiar.
-The shopkeeping still functions on the same basic fundamentals as the first game, but it builds on them with some new systems.
-There are shop perks, Bloblets that can provide bonuses during your shop runs, different pedestal/showcase options, shop customization and upgrades, and even improved price guidance to help you figure out how much your relics are actually worth.
-My only real gripe with the shop is that I wish I could customize MORE. Let me customize my bed. Let me decorate my room. Let me put lights wherever I damn well please.
Stupid little things like that.

As I said before, I am a simple guy, so I really don't know it all. However, some of these other reviews are really selling this game short for seemingly no reason.

This feels like a real Moonlighter 2.

Moonlighter 1 already exists. It's a wonderful game that gave this development team the opportunity to do something new — change the art, change the aesthetic, take a chance on something different — and I think this game NAILS IT.
It's not Moonlighter 1
And I don't think it should be.
It's a sequel that takes what worked, changes things up, and makes its own identity.

I'm no reviewer so this may just all seem like rambling, but it's all to say: I think this game is a great sequel and a really fun time.
If the videos and screenshots look like a good time to you, then you're probably going to have a good time playing it.
If you're extremely hard to please, a Moonlighter 1 purist, or — God forbid — both, this might not be the game for you.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Kira
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855 games
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25 reviews
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Not Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t55.8 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(21.3 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 6\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tYou don't get to do Early Access, for seemingly no reason, hit that 1.0 button, and have as many bugs as this game has.

From quests that have their progression steps not spawn at all to perks that don't actually work, or rotating mechanics that don't actually rotate.

Absolute disgrace. Pathetic. No standards.

Do not reward this behavoir with your money.\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t4 people found this review helpful\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
1 person found this review funny\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t
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Soren
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124 reviews
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Recommended
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t18.2 hrs on record\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(4.3 hrs at review time)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted: September 2\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tFantastic game. Definitely give it a shot. Ignore the reviews complaining about the game not being Moonlighter 1 Remastered, or whatever they were expecting. The game description and trailers show you exactly what to expect.\t\t\t\t\t
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Reviewer's PC Specs:
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CachyOS
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AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D 8-Core Processor - RAM: 60 GB
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AMD AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT (radeonsi, gfx1201, ACO, DRM 3.64, 7.0.8-1-cachyos) - VRAM: 16 GB
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\n\t\t","dayrange":30,"start_date":-1,"end_date":-1,"recommendationids":["234342617","234632160","234521729","234152455","234280052","234758595","234145134","235459549","234336321","234388971","234580124","234640081","235442428","234497408","235305842","234263538","234344076","234593315","234669939","234323328"],"cursor":"AoIFQFZL/GAAAABw2O/9Bg=="}