Posted by Risk of Rain 2 is a game that my friends and I come back to every few months, and it just so happens that we were picking up the game again when the new DLC Seekers of the Storm released. Risk of Rain 2 is a third-person roguelite where you play as a survivor with powerful abilities attempting to grow more powerful by collecting items and upgrades while navigating randomly selected stages before facing off with a few different bosses, ending the game through other victory conditions, dying, or having your game crash. Seekers of the Storm adds a decent amount of content, both large and small, for the relatively low price of $15.
Beginning with the small, Seekers of the Storm adds a few new enemies, a new boss, and new elite variants. The new enemies consist of Children, Scorch Wurms, and Halcyonites. To be honest, the only enemy I realized was new was the Children. Children are similar to Parents and Grandparents, just much smaller. Scorch Wurms are little flaming worms. Halcyonites are another variation on the stone golem/titan kind of monster. All three are fine, though Halyconites can be very annoying to fight when doing a Halcyon Shrine. The new elite monster variants consist of Gilded and Twisted. Gilded steal your money when you damage them and Twisted deal insane damage and reflect it back at you. From my understanding, neither is particularly well-received by the community, though I personally struggle to remember any Twisted elites I’ve encountered in the last dozen or so runs I’ve done since the DLC released. As for Gilded elites, they’re definitely annoying, but I don’t mind them. The new boss is the False Son, and he’s pretty cool. He’s a three phase fight that’s somewhat similar to Mithrix in that the False Son is a relentless melee enemy with some ranged attacks. During his final phase, he disables your abilities temporarily. I’ve only fought him a few times, but I think he’s a decent enough fight.
Seekers of the Storm also adds in two new shrines: Halcyon Shrines and Shrines of Shaping. Halcyon Shrines sap your money to build, but once they’re completed, they can give you some really strong items. Shrines of Shaping take 30% of your health but allow you respawn if you die during the stage. Both are cool and nice additions to the game. The DLC also includes a new artifact: Artifact of Rebirth. This artifact is obtained after defeating the False Son, and it allows you to choose an item you currently have equipped to start a new run with if you deposit it in the pool of rebirth in the False Son’s arena, or it starts you with a random item in your next run. The Artifact of Rebirth is definitely a nice addition to have.
The items are the weakest part of Survivors of the Storm. The DLC adds in a decent amount of new items of each rarity, but most of them are useless if not outright bad. Beginning with the common items, the Knockback Fin uselessly knocks enemies into the air without stunning them or really doing anything useful, the Bolstering Lantern provides a damage buff when under 50% health which can be good but is fairly situational, the Antler Shield reflects damage back at enemies which sounds good on paper but doesn’t really do anything in practice, the Chronic Expansion increases damage after killing multiple enemies and can actually be fairly solid under the right circumstances, and the Warped Echo splits damage so you take some up front and then the rest after a few seconds and it’s frankly not that great outside of niche circumstances. Of the five new common items, they’re either ok at best or outright bad. The uncommon items include the Noxious Thorns that proc bleed or another debuff on enemies when they hit you, the Sale Star that gives you an additional item the first time you open a chest on a stage, the Chance Doll that upgrades your rewards obtained from a Shrine of Chance, the Luminous Shot increases your primary attack after using a charge of your secondary skill, the Prayer Beads store some additional stat increases every time you level up and provide them back after you discard the item, and the Unstable Transmitter teleports you to a random location on the map when at low health. Of these seven new items, the Unstable Transmitter is definitely the worst. Noxious Thorns are ok at best, and Prayer Beads are kind of an annoyance to use. Luminous Shot can be very strong on some survivors while being useless on others. Sale Star and Chance Doll are both fantastic new additions to the game because they allow you to get better items easier. As for the legendary items, Sonorous Whispers makes large monsters drop items and gives elites a change to drop items when killed, Growth Nectar provides a 20% buff to all stats when you have five unique buffs, the Electric Boomerang fires a boomerang that damages and stuns enemies, the Runic Lens has a chance to summon a meteor on enemies when you hit them, and War Bonds allows you to start the stage with some gold. War Bonds is awful and barely benefits you in practice. Growth Nectar seems fine, though I have yet to really mess around with it. Electric Boomerang and Runic Lens both seem like fairly fun new items. Sonorous Whispers is another very strong item because it allows you get even more items and become even stronger. Seekers of the Storm adds in the new Seed of Life equipment that allows you to revive a teammate, and it seems useable enough. I believe the DLC also adds in a new lunar item or two, but I can’t seem to find much about them. I don’t use lunar items ever when playing, so I’m unsure what they do and how good they are. Overall, Seekers of the Storm does add in some really strong items, but the majority of new additions are either useless, barely useable, or incredibly niche.
The DLC’s new stages are all pretty solid. They range from rather small and simple to detailed and sprawling. I don’t dislike any of the new stages added. The most interesting addition to Risk of Rain 2 is the three new survivors: Seeker, The False Son, and Chef. Seeker is very powerful with the best mobility/traversal ability in the game and some solid sustainability options built directly into her kit. She also comes with an incredibly powerful support skill that can really save your teammates if you know how to use it. The False Son is a slow but powerful melee bruiser with some unique ranged abilities that can influence his speed, health, and armor. I really like The False Son; he’s definitely my favorite character in the DLC and might be my favorite character to play in the game. Chef is a combo character that can do some very silly things when chaining his skills. He seems pretty strong, even if he may not be my preferred character to play. All existing survivors also receive a new skin that’s obtained from defeating the False Son, and the skins look really good.
In conclusion, Seekers of the Storm isn’t perfect. It’s a mixed bag really. It adds some really strong items, characters, world events, and abilities. However, it also adds in some really poorly balanced ones that can ruin a run within seconds. With all that being said, it’s only $15. If you enjoy Risk of Rain 2, there’s no reason not to pick up Seekers of the Storm.
Broad Scope Entertainment 