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This second part of the BAT series takes place in ROMA 2, the most important
city of the planet Shedishan. The United Galaxies Organization has contacted the
"Bureau of Astral Troubleshooters (BAT) in order to investigate the murder of a BAT
agent named Sylvia Hatford who tried to uncover the businesses of a mysterious dealer
of important raw materials. You are playing the second agent, Jehan Menais, now
involved in the dangerous investigations. The game itself is a mixture between
graphics adventure, space combat simulator and strategy game. The adventure part is
realized in a classic 2D point-and-click environment, the space combat can be best
described as a small version of Firebird's Elite and the various small arcade games
included can either be played in a strategic mode or an arcade mode where your
reaction skills are required. It improves upon its predecessor in every respect,
including a more intelligible plot that actually *develops* into an interesting
pan-galactic drama. However, as in the first game you still have the freedom to ignore
the plotline for as long as you wish to explore the wonderfully realized gameworld
that is populated by colorful characters, shops, and strange gadget to find and use,
including the programmable B.O.B. computer in your arm that is much more versatile and intelligent than in the previous game. Your tasks this time around are much more
questionable if not downright strange (burglarizing a bank as a pretense to saving
the galaxy is, after all, not a very common cop-thing). As in B.A.T. 1, the freedom
the game affords you can be a double-edged sword: while it makes it much more fun to
explore, it does mean less clues and frequent hunting for a store (among dozens) that
sells the particular item you need. The world, while large, is also very disorienting
since it's not laid out in easy cardinal directions, and the fact that you only need
to use less than a fifth of all objects you can collect make puzzle-solving more
difficult. Despite all these shortcomings, however, B.A.T. 2 is still a highly
atmospheric and original game that will please sci-fi lovers and anyone who likes
non-linear games. A 1994 Deluxe Edition CD version features CDA tracks as opposed to the MOD tracks from the original, allowing clear speech and a better sound ambiance, large FMV-videos of noticeable length, digitized speech and in-game manual. |
