Not Blue Colony, but Better!

Red Colony 2 is a 2D survival horror game from Runic Codes that is available on the Nintendo Switch platform July 15, 2021. It honestly hasn't been that long since I reviewed the original Red Colony, and with my time with it fresh in my head I can tell you now that game is an improvement in EVERY aspect. This time around you play a mother trying to rescue her lost daughter after returning from a secret mission forced upon her by the Mars government. Spoiler for the first game: you basically caused the destruction of the entire Red Colony.After cleaning up loose ends at the end of her mission, the main character Nicole returns to the Blue Colony only to be attacked and knocked unconscious. After awakening she finds that the Blue Colony is now under attack by the exact same zombie creatures and dinosaurs that destroyed the Red Colony.

I'll stop there for the story, because I find it one of the most improved aspects of this game compared to the original. Nicole, as a character, goes through a dark and warranted growth which I found to be greatly entertaining. Don't get me wrong, this story is pure, distilled B movie horror at it's finest so it may not be for everyone. I, however, would have went to see this in a theater multiple times. All of this, combined with the multiple ending (I've found 3 so far) add up to a story that I'll come back to every once in a while.

In the gameplay department Red Colony 2 plays almost identical to its predecessor, except for the one HUGE change that, to me, is the number one greatest improvement. There is no longer a knife! Every weapon in this game is restricted to a very limited supply of ammunition, and in the case of the melee weapon (Baseball Bats) a limited number of hits before it breaks. This one thing cements this game as a TRUE survival horror. In Red Colony 1 I equipped the knife and was able to take down any enemy fairly easily; I almost never used a gun. This honestly took away any feeling of fear when facing the zombie hordes, but with the small amount of resources given to you in Red Colony 2 every encounter is make or break. It's important to try and sneak past enemies (and in some cases absolutely necessary) otherwise you'll end up with no way of fighting back when you need to. The puzzle system is also improved. You'll still be looking through data entries for number codes, but the devs have also hidden special locker codes in the environment itself and some of these are very well thought out. Other than those there are also now four letter word locks on certain cache bags needed to unlock WristGear upgrades and crafting materials.

I also have to give a shoutout to the level design. The Red District is treated as a "hub world" with different parts of the colony branching off in different areas. The paths that you need to take always circle back around and connect to the hub making every part of the colony's infrastructure feel like a true city complex.

Graphically, this game is over sexualized in a borderline offensive way, but considering the inspirations it's an understandable parody. The main character's walk and run animation is unnatural and reminds me of paper dolls, but overall the general character design is good. All the environments are well done and set up a creepy, desolate atmosphere that fits well. There are also a few comic-strip-like cut scenes that have a cool, stylized aesthetic and are used in places where the actions wouldn't necessarily fit the character movements.

In the end Red Colony 2 is an entertaining Indie Survival Horror that I found quite enjoyable. Yes, there are aspects of this game some people will be turned off by but if you're willing to give it a try you might enjoy it for what it is.