Amanda the Adventurer 2 follows on immediately from the original, with more tapes, more puzzles, and more insanity.
I recently played through Amanda the Adventurer, and found it to be a fun, light horror game with an intriguing story filled with interesting ways to interact. Playing it on console meant the controls weren’t the strongest, but playing the sequel on PC meant that any controller-related issues were put to bed. Whilst this follow up is even lighter on the scares and a touch more on-the-nose when it comes to its theming, the puzzles are more challenging than ever and it continues to expand on the story and lore of the first.
As a primer, in the first game, you play as Riley who is investigating video tapes of an early 2000s TV programme called Amanda the Adventurer. The tapes are strange, allowing you to interact with them, whilst also presenting a mystery about what happened to their characters thanks to odd imagery appearing as you watch them.
Amanda the Adventurer 2 begins right at the moment the previous game ended — assuming you reached the proper ending. There’s an assumption that you fully completed the previous game, and if you haven’t you may be a little unsure as to what just happened. Regardless of that though, you, still playing as Riley, end up being taken to a library where you can learn more about the Amanda the Adventurer tapes and what happened to the family involved in their creation.
This sequel is structured in a similar way to the first game, with you needing to solve puzzles to find tapes that then progress the story and lead to more puzzles. Here though, the puzzles are harder, but also clearer that you need to solve them. By that I mean the game tends to show you what puzzle you need to work on, rather than hiding it in the environment. I appreciated this as it meant there was less faffing about with my being unsure about what I should be doing.
With that said, the puzzles that are here are considerably harder. Even acquiring the first tape requires you to interpret bizarre scrawls inside library books to then learn the code needed to open a cupboard with the tape inside. It was initially a little off-putting, but with a little perseverance I found myself enjoying the world again. There’s even a neat feature of the printers in the library printing off a page with a hint as to what you should focus on next. Even so, you may well get to points where you’re wandering around without a clue what to do next, even early in the game, so be prepared to look up some solutions here and there.
The puzzles themselves work in a similar way to the previous game. You’ll watch and interact with a tape that shows you all sorts of odd images alongside Amanda’s ever deteriorating mental state. Paying attention to those images will allow you to solve the puzzles that appear around the library. Some of them are clear enough thanks to pretty explicit scenes in the tapes, whilst others need you to pay attention to something less obvious than what is being directly presented to you. I won’t spoil anything here, but solving some of these can be really satisfying.
Mercifully, actually getting to the end is much less convoluted this time. In the previous game, you could be locked out of getting a new ending pretty early on, forcing you to play through a full run of the game only to fail and try again. This time, there are fewer endings too. The first one you’ll reach through normal gameplay, whilst the others need a follow-up playthrough where new puzzles will be revealed, but having fewer to faff about with is nice.. You can still end up dying, but you are thankfully placed close to the point at which you died when continuing the game should you get a bad ending. This results in a much friendlier experience for the player which I couldn’t be happier about.
Much like before, the scares aren’t really terrifying. There’s more of an uncomfortable atmosphere in the library, and uncomfortable implications in the video tapes. Occasional flashes of unsettling imagery here and there might catch you out and make you jump, the things appearing behind you when you watch a tape are fun little scares, but I never got to the point that I was too scared to go on. This is very much YouTuber horror combined with lore-fiend fodder. That isn’t a bad thing as such, but you aren’t going to find a fully fledged horror experience here.
The presentation is pretty much the same as the first game. Visuals are solid and put together well. I feel some items of interest could once again be more clearly highlighted. Wandering around the library trying to find the book I need could have taken far less time if interactive objects stood out more clearly. The sound is excellent though, with ambient sounds being well implemented, especially the occasional bang or creak from outside the library implying that something is clambering around the building. Voice work is on par with the first game which I’m happy with thanks to a returning cast.
Amanda the Adventurer 2 is absolutely aimed at fans of the original who want more from the same world. The expanded scope of the puzzles and greater respect for the player’s time is very much appreciated and I’m hoping this continues in the inevitable continuation of the series. Maybe a little less of the possum next time though.
Amanda the Adventurer 2 is available now on PC.
