The Attack on Titan 2 felt like it came out in the wrong time. The anime was ongoing at the point but the developers decided to go out of their new narrative events and settled with its story mode. Final Battle Upgrade is a growth that adds narrative content from Strike on Titan 2’s last season plus it makes the game today feel like the definitive way to experience the events.
First, to receive the significant negative out of the method, the asking price for the last Battle Upgrade is a bit too steep at $39.99, and the content that it adds doesn’t appear to justify this purchase if you already own the original Attack on Titan 2. That said, it creates Attack on Titan two the ideal point to jump in as a newcomer and go through the definitive edition. If you’ve just completed the season and want to play it in the video game, that feels great enough.
In the original Attack on Titan 2, which we have reviewed here, you played a user-created character who had the opportunity to journey together with Eren, Mikasa, Armin, and others in a group. In the Final Battle Upgrade, you get a separate story mode which now features the various characters from the anime in action. You can now play through the events seen in the anime from the point of view of the key characters and enjoy it as it was originally intended.
Sadly, the main story mode doesn’t seem to intersect with these new character-focused episodes. They are completely different from the hub-based and mission-oriented nature of the original story mode. This makes the price of this expansion a little odd considering the content offered doesn’t seem to justify the asking price. It is also quite short and will take you three to four hours to complete it, or slightly more if you want to achieve the perfect rank in every mission.
There is another new mode added as part of this Upgrade Pack. This mode is accessible from the main menu and called Territory Recovery Mode. This feels like a small spin-off that features Attack on Titan 2 gameplay. While the story mode is short, this one can take longer depending on if you like it enough to spend some time with it. You can control one of the playable characters in this mode to reclaim the territory from Titans beyond the walls.
In addition to working towards reclaiming territories, you can also customize your regiment, recruit new members for them or forge friendship. There is a sense of camaraderie with conversations that can occur in this mode. Team balance is important if you want to reclaim your territories and thus team management becomes a key aspect of the Territory Reclaim Mode. Upgrading your team members, gathering resources for improving combat abilities, and forging new friendship is essential to achieve success. It makes for a good time sink which is separate from the main campaign.
Gameplay changes are minor enough that it is hard to feel if they make a meaningful impact on the combat. You get a couple of new ways to kill Titans like the ability to use guns instead of swords, and a new weapon called Thunder Spear. This one basically makes it one-hit kill for most of the regular Titans and will be useful when fighting armored Titans. Aside from that, there are a couple of new playable characters but that should be more than enough to cover what this upgrade has to offer for the original game owners.
Attack on Titan 2 is a great game but when it comes to the Final Battle Upgrade pack, the content offered struggles to justify the price. Make no mistake, this is still a great game especially if you are a fan of the show and the new character episodes are incredibly fun and full of action-packed moments, but if you have the original game already, it is best to wait for a sale. If you haven’t played it, then this is the best time to jump in the game and experience it with this new definitive edition.
