High on Life 2 review: bigger, better, funnier – and not without technical problems

Domagoj Belancic

12/2/2026

Translation: Megan Cornish

I’m going to make a bold statement: High on Life 2’s the funniest game I’ve ever played. That’s not clickbait – I mean it. But be warned: the humour isn’t for the faint-hearted.

I’m a simple guy. I like knob gags. That’s why I also like High on Life 2. There are more than enough funny genitals in the game. So, that concludes this review. Five out of five stars.

Kidding.

It’d be unfair to reduce Squanch Games’ latest work to nothing more than juvenile humour involving genitalia. High on Life 2’s a mad goodie bag of surprisingly strong gameplay mechanics, clever satire and enough crazy ideas for a dozen games.

The game’s an improvement on its predecessor in every way. If it weren’t for the sometimes disastrous technical execution, I’d immediately add High on Life 2 to my list of GOTY candidates.

Note: you’ll find a competition at the end of this article. Read the review carefully to answer the question. Good luck!

«Wait, was that a penis?»

You don’t need to know the story of the first game to play High on Life 2. All you need to know is that a huge pharmaceutical company wants to kill people and turn them into alien drugs.

The company claims that humans are purely livestock with no awareness. I disagree. So, I’m taking on the role of the celebrated bounty hunter from the first game and assassinating all the key decision-makers and investors of the evil corporation.

I recognise a lot of characters from the first game – even though they’ve changed drastically since then. My sister’s now an intergalactically wanted eco terrorist («the good kind of terrorist», she claims). My parents? Divorced. Because my mother ran off with one of the talking guns from the first game (more on that later). At least former bounty hunter Gene’s stayed true to himself and still lazes in front of the TV all day (very endearing).

The characters are more developed, and there’s a more complex narrative structure which addresses socially critical themes within a satirical sci-fi context and is peppered with countless pop culture references. It even deals with philosophical questions including «What does it mean to be human?».

Whether you enjoy High on Life 2 mainly depends on whether you appreciate its humour. Overall, it’s somewhat more subtle than in the original. And it’s easier to control, because the game packs a lot of gags into optional content and dialogue that I can ignore if I’m not in the mood.

But – and I can’t stress this enough – the kind of humour «High on Life 2» delivers is still louder and more «in your face» than any other game out there.

I find it difficult to do justice to the game’s humour within the scope of a review.

I’d love to explain to you why I find it funny that a character in the game is called Poopoo Crappy Shitfucker. I’d also love to write a whole paragraph about my horny fishing rod that has orgasms while fishing. Not to mention the PS5 trophy «Was that a penis? », which I’m awarded for drawing a penis on a piece of paper.

But all of that would be pointless, because you have to experience these moments yourself rather than reading about them.

Taking individual jokes out of their narrative context does the game a disservice. In isolation, the name Poopoo Crappy Shitfucker comes across as lowbrow toilet humour. Within the context of the story’s surreal meta humour, though, the joke doesn’t feel out of place.

The gameplay context’s equally important. In High on Life 2, humour and gameplay are so closely intertwined that jokes arise from the gameplay, while the gameplay’s also built around the punchlines. This symbiosis works much better than in the original game, where jokes were often forced for the sake of making them.

Before this review degenerates into a doctoral thesis on humour theory, let me try to summarise. The humour in High on Life 2 only works within the narrative and gameplay context of the game as a whole. And humour’s a matter of taste.

I’m sure some people will find High on Life 2 too penis-heavy much. But if my review so far’s piqued your interest even a little, I recommend giving this quirky game a chance.

I shoot babies at aliens

One of the unique features of the first game was the talking weapons that chattered away during shootouts. Many of them are back in High on Life 2, plus there are some excellent new additions.

The weapons aren’t just items that occasionally talk. They’re real characters with backstories and distinctive personality traits.

I was particularly taken with the new weapon, Travis. I meet him in a bar. He’s afraid his wife, Jan (pronounced /dʒæn/ – not to be confused with my colleague Jan) – is going to leave him because he’s «a wimp». After a wild drinking binge, we become friends and I bring him into my team. As the game progresses, the wimp transforms into a killing machine, and Jan falls back in love with him. Heartwarming.

Each weapon fires differently. For example, Gus works as a slow shotgun for close-quarters combat, while the Bowie bow and arrow headshots enemies from a distance. Not all weapons fit into traditional weapon types. Creature, for instance, constantly produces babies and uses its offspring as deadly ammunition (I mean, what?!).

The weapons also have special attacks. Travis can make enemies float helplessly in the air temporarily. The «time bubble» from Sweezy’s laser pistol makes the game run in slow motion. I also need these special abilities to move around the world and solve (surprisingly clever) puzzles.

The gunplay feels so much better in the sequel. The shootouts are fast, chaotic and quite demanding. Shots have more weight, the hit feedback is more pronounced, and enemies are faster and nastier. Even the melee attacks with my talking knife, Knifey, feel more satisfying and gorier.

The boss fights in particular benefit from the more precise gunplay and shine with brilliantly implemented ideas that take the overall gaming experience to a new level.

Move over Tony Hawk, it’s time for High on Life 2

The biggest gameplay innovation’s the skateboard. It’s so convincing that I never want to play a shooter without a skateboard again. I’m serious.

Relatively early in the game, I take the board from a defeated enemy and use it from then on. I activate it with the sprint button (L3 on the PS5) and zoom through the levels at record speed. I grind on rails, ride on walls in short bursts, perform double jumps in mid-air and activate a turbo boost.

I can’t stress enough how fluid, intuitive and satisfying skating feels. In just a few minutes, I’m combining moves and reaching places that initially seem impossibly far away.

The skateboard mechanics have a huge impact on the level design. Rails, halfpipes and ramps are scattered throughout the levels, just waiting to be ridden. Thanks to increased mobility and high skating speed, the game worlds are often larger and more vertical than in the first game. However, this isn’t without its drawbacks, as some areas can look unnaturally bloated, empty and dull.

The skateboard also adds extra depth to the already improved gunfights.

I dodge enemies with my board and use rails to get to safety quickly. I also misuse the skateboard as an improvised melee weapon, knocking enemies away with blows to the head or groin. Or I just ram them without regard for the consequences.

How do people come up with such sick ideas?

High on Life 2 has enough ideas for at least a dozen games. This means the mission design’s incredibly varied, far surpassing the original. Gone are the boring, continuous shooting sections with endless hordes of enemies. Instead, I’m constantly surprised by crazy gameplay twists.

During a boss fight, I suddenly find myself playing the obscure NES game Bible Adventures – because the enemy hacked my suit’s operating system and installed the ROM. In another mission, I unexpectedly find myself in the middle of a murder mystery. Someone beat me to it, murdered a target, and… for some reason, peed on their body?! I play detective, gathering clues and questioning suspects to identify the culprit – of both the murder and the urination.

I love it when games think outside the box and constantly bring up unpredictable situations. This is where the symbiosis of humour and gameplay mechanics works perfectly. The gags work so well because they’re embedded in the gameplay – and vice versa.

The new hub worlds are also quite varied. I frequently return to them between linear missions. I explore a futuristic city, a tropical resort and a zoo. The areas work similarly to Blim City in the first game – only bigger, better and with more secrets.

Besides hidden weapon upgrades, collectibles and bizarre dialogues with NPCs, there are also plenty of optional side missions. Squanch Games has pulled out all the stops here too. I catch fish for my aquarium, attend comedy shows, play a Crazy Taxi mini-game and break out of escape rooms.

The skateboard races are especially impressive. The new movement mechanics really shine. If anyone from Squanch Games is reading this: a) you guys are great, keep up the good work, and b) please make a skateboard racing spin-off in the High on Life universe. Or skate DLC for High on Life 2? I’d buy either.

My secret base completes the diverse array of ideas. I decorate it with new items throughout the game and play other obscure retro games – besides Bible Adventures – that I find on cartridges during my adventures.

As in the first game, the TV screens show numerous intergalactic programmes and obscure trash films that Squanch Games has unearthed from the graveyard of licensing rights. Where do they find these gems?

A technical disaster

Visually, High on Life 2 on the PS5 Pro has a lot of highs and lows. The exaggerated art style with its brightly coloured environments and grotesquely deformed alien figures is still impressive.

Unfortunately, the beautiful visual core is trapped in an Unreal Engine 5 shell. Unpleasant flickering, annoying visual artefacts, textures that load far too slowly and pixellated shadows often ruin the intergalactic idyll.

The game also makes excessive use of ray-traced reflections – especially in the hub worlds, where there’s a lot of glass and metal. On the PS5 Pro, the quality of these reflections is awful. Some scenes look downright ugly, with distorted, low-poly reflections that look like a fever-dream version of a PS1 game.

Technically, High on Life 2 feels like a house of cards, ready to collapse at any moment. Literally. During testing, the game crashed three times. I also had to reload checkpoints multiple times – sometimes my weapons disappeared, sometimes boss enemies didn’t show up. There were also numerous refresh rate drops and occasional loading screen interruptions lasting several seconds. Squanch Games promises to address many of the performance issues with updates. When and how remains unclear.

But hey, I’m looking on the bright side. This is an improvement over the first game – which I couldn’t finish for my review due to a critical bug.

I don’t know what the situation’s like on PC or Xbox Series X/S. However, the current state of the game on the PS5 makes me apprehensive about the planned Switch 2 version.

High on Life 2 comes out on 13 February for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC. A version for Switch 2 will follow on 20 April. The PS5 (Pro) version was provided to me by Squanch Games for review purposes._

Domagoj Belancic

Senior Editor

Domagoj.Belancic@digitecgalaxus.ch

My love of video games was unleashed at the tender age of five by the original Gameboy. Over the years, it's grown in leaps and bounds.

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