I thought about writing something very clever about Dark Souls and its ilk, but I know from talking to those that don’t like those games, it will come off that I’m into sadomasochism. What I do with your mother on a Thursday night is irrelevant. However, this masochism business with very leathery high platform boots, leather masks, and tight corsets sounds fun. I just need to find out my sizes. No, seriously, I go through Souls and Souls-like games like your mum breaking every one of her new year resolutions by January 5th. I nibble at one, switch to another, try a different one, and keep going. A bit like me in a bakery.

One of the many mammoths I’ve coerced with the sore bit of a halberd or equivalent thereof has been Deck 13’s The Surge 2. As much as the first was bogged down with reviews that were not too happy with it, this third attempt at not being FromSoftware’s toilet paper was good. I said it the other day in a very pretentious article, I liked it but it was nowhere near Game of the Year. It didn’t help that some of those bosses were taking no short amount of metabolic waste. I’d have better luck doing a blind run of Dark Souls. However, there is one thing that monolithic beast from the east does not have, a lore that it can just play around with for fun.

If I say the name of the previously mentioned franchise once more I’ll have a bad pavlovian response, however what is so solid about it, is its strict lore. I’ll be honest, in a future world where a flying blender is trying to inseminate me, a big digger wants to part me like the red sea, and a man with half a dishwasher on his face wants my hood ornament when they are done doesn’t need to stick to that lore too much. In fact, the only thing that something like The Surge 2 could use to differentiate itself from Dark Souls is to be stupid with it. Let’s say a perfectly manicured Bree Van De Kamp-style suburbia taken over by a bunch of robots that went through Cyberdog in the dark.

“The Kraken” expansion for The Surge 2 is set to release just next Thursday, adding “hours of narrative-driven content with a brand-new storyline and location, as well as a wealth of new weapons, implants, and armor to discover and craft.” In the quaint little land of suburbia where you won’t be meeting Jesus, but will find: “robot pirates, deranged security systems, and an imposing new boss.” All of which are supposedly coming with their own unique combat mechanics from this piece of DLC.

No, as surprised by it as I am, there is only one boss in this entire expansion. Set just outside of Jericho City, where you’re expected to have “A little bit of the bubbly!” there is a downed aircraft carrier after Nick Fury crashed, that has become a home for the rich and famous. From here you’ll be battling the robot pirates and electric whisks to find out about this ex-military garage for high-speed toys. Who knows, a bit of suburban living never hurt anybody, aside from that time I took a man with a skull for a face tobogganing down that slight hill and we killed Mrs. Miggins.

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