Anyone who tried to play the original Under The Knife will forget the innovative premise and smart controls but will remember the ridiculously high difficultly level. Despite that it was a decent puzzler that could get quite tense at times but was always frustrating. Since then we have had two Wii incarnations although one of them was a remake of said original. The latest instalment is Under The Knife 2, a return the DS roots and most importantly not a return to the difficultly problems that plagued its predecessor.
Set some three years after UTK1 the man made terrorist disease named GUILT has been eradicated and our protagonist, Dr Stiles is in the fictional African state of Costigar. While at a refugee camp you (obviously) perform various operations before being called back to good ol’ Caduceus. After a few missions there you’ll start to encounter Post GUILT Syndrome, a new disease that is only seen in original suffers of GUILT. The story then progress’ as you help fight and cure PGS.
The story is surprisingly in-depth, relatively interesting and provides a decent backdrop for most cases you’ll encounter. The only problem is that there is way to much dialogue. So much in fact you’ll want to skip past it all but even skipping it takes time as you can’t truly just move on to the next operation, you have to watch the dialogue flash past slightly faster. Otherwise it’s a solid series of events for what your doing.
What you’re actually doing is very similar to previous Trauma Center’s. The tool set is basically identical and they all work in the same way meaning for anyone who picked up Under The Knife 1 will feel right at home. The fact that it’s the same means that it’s still crazy addictive and the new operations keep you on your toes this time.
Maybe because now you can actually do them now due to the addition of multiple difficulty settings. Anyone who did play the predecessor and was put off by this fact should give this ago. It’s a lot more accessible and actually doable this time around making for an overall enjoyable experience and that’s an experience that will last. Under The Knife 2 offers up to 8 to 12 hours of gameplay which for a DS game is fairly decent. That’s not even taking into account failed attempts & the multiple difficulties to try.
Under The Knife 2 is more accessible, more of the same & most importantly a lot more enjoyable. The end result is an improved iteration on the original and luckily the innovation that the original provided has translated well. Despite this you can’t help but think this should have been the game to come out 3 years ago instead of the original.
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