Every system has its killer app. It might show off a new control style, move storytelling a step forward or be a graphical powerhouse for a new system. Infinity Blade 2, and its predecessor are the latter especially for the more recent iPad 2 or iPhone 4/4S - and then some, fortuitously given a good story to back it up. Back is the regeneration of the first game but given a twist that slowly unravels with each "rebirth" as you learn more about the world you find yourself in, and your reason for being there.
No review would be complete without mention of the graphical prowess of Infinity Blade 2, and on booting the game up it's not hard to see why. Lighting on the characters and environments takes a major step forward with effects usually reserved for Xbox 360's and PS3's. Shafts of ambient light permeate excellently rendered arenas, flickering as they are hidden by architecture or characters. It could have killed the game in the speed stakes but Epic have squeezed ever more power from the Unreal engine, with fights, sweeping cameras and screen filling beasts keeping a steady frame-rate throughout.
Because the game has been built with only a handful of different device specifications in mind, Epic have really been able to harness the power of the chipsets, and on our review device of an iPad 2, the game was silky smooth from start to finish, even when a monster as large as the screen was throwing his weight around, slime spewing from its mouth as it did.
Standard RPG mechanics are here to allow for customisation of your character, in either health, attack, defence or magic fields. Armour and weapons come with new spells to cast, as well as the ability to add crystals which add extra stats or bonus when criteria are met, such as giving you energy when you block an enemy. As you fight, bars increase and when full, allow for casting with lines drawn Nintendo DS style on the screen, most of which are easy to pull off in the heat of battle.
The storyline is, as before, slightly thin on the ground, but this time round the cutscenes at least have dialogue which adds a nice layer of intrigue and a sliver of information is delivered to you each rebirth. While Infinity Blade 1 had these, the addition of the new lighting effects and optimisations to the engine add atmosphere to the stages these play out on.
If you're looking for a game to show off the power of your new purchase, but also get value for money then you can't go far wrong with Infinity Blade 2. Even at its launch price of £4.99 it represents great value for money, especially with developers Chair due to release updates in a similar way to IB1, adding new locations, weapons and enemies to fight all set to be free DLC at the time of writing.
Above all else, the killer games alluded to at the start of the review are as good as required for the systems they are released for - and the list is ever growing on the iOS marketplace. a market originally dominated by the likes of sonic and mario now has to make room for halo, Uncharted, GTA and Angry Birds - the list goes on and on. Now we can add another to the list, with a game that stands head and shoulders above a lot of it's peers, be they derivative copies of games on other systems or other entries of action games. As a demonstration of where mobile gaming stands at the end of 2011, and an enjoyable game in its own right, Infinity Blade 2 comes highly recommended by us at Gamestyle.
