OlliOlli2

Evan Narcisse writing about the sequel to the Tony Hawk Pro Skater-esque 2D platforming skate-em-up OlliOlli:

OlliOlli2: Welcome to Olliwood will drive perfectionists crazy, because they’ll want to master everything about the each of the game’s intricately tricky levels before moving on to the next one. That way lies madness. And ridiculous amounts of fun.

Out this week for PS4 and Vita, the follow-up for Roll7’s sharply-realized skating sidescroller improves just about everything that the first OlliOlli did. The visual approach is smoother and slicker, looking more like a playable micro-sized cartoon than a retro-pixel homage. It’s faster, too, with sections that require quicker, more nimble fingers to ollie over and grind through. Another improvement comes in the form of a dedicated quick-restart button for when you bail and want to get right back on your board. You’re going to be using that a lot because OlliOli2 is harder than its predecessor.

OlliOlli 2 is one of the free games this month for Playstation Plus subscribers. New in this Olli are manuals and their implementation is more natural and easier to pull off than in Tony Hawk, so I’ve been loving the addition. Unfortunately, OlliOlli2 is locked up in some kind of exclusivity agreement with Sony for now. Though the original Olli is 75% off the regular price of $13 on Steam for the next 16 hours.

If you’ve missed skating with Tony Hawk, you will love OlliOlli. OlliOlli2 is $15 without Playstation Plus for Playstation 4 and Vita.