Kao the Kangaroo: Round 2

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Kao the Kangaroo: Round 2

Kao's Back, and he got an even bigger and awesome adventure than the previous game.
Protagonist(s): Kao
Genre(s): Platform
Action-Adventure
Platform(s): PlayStation 2
Windows
Xbox
Nintendo GameCube
PlayStation Portable
Release Date: Original
POL: November 4, 2003 (Win)
PAL: April 15, 2005
NA: March 21, 2006
Challenger
EU: October 28, 2005
NA: March 25, 2006
Developer(s): Tate Interactive
Publisher(s): POL: Cenega
PAL: JoWooD Productions
NA: Atari
Country: Polish
Series: Kao the Kangaroo
Predecessor: Kao the Kangaroo
Successor: Kao the Kangaroo: Mystery of the Volcano


Kao the Kangaroo: Round 2 (Polish: Kangurek Kao: Runda 2) is an action-adventure video game developed by Tate Interactive, and a sequel to Kao the Kangaroo. It was originally released on the PC in Poland in November 2003 by Cenega, and was later released in other European territories on PC and consoles in 2005 by JoWooD Productions, and in the US in 2006 by Atari.

An enhanced port titled Kao Challengers was released for the PlayStation Portable in October 2005 in Europe and March 2006 in North America.[1]

The game was re-released digitally to Steam on June 1, 2019, being free for users to add to their libraries for 24 hours. The game alongside the other two games in the series were added to GOG.com in February 2021. This version features widescreen resolutions, XInput controller support and compatibility fixes for modern machines, as well as achievements.

Gameplay

The game contains over 20 levels in 5 worlds which have their own unique environment. There are also some bonus levels included. In the levels there are over 30 enemies with 7 fighting techniques. Enemies all have their own different personalities which can easily be recognised from the way they attack and defend. Kao can do many actions such as flying, throwing boomerangs, cones and other objects, swimming and skating. Cut scenes explain the story as the player progresses through the levels to help and guide them. Vehicles can be driven which include a snowboard, catapult, pelican, water barrel and motor boat.

In Kao Challengers, there is also a multiplayer mode where players can use 15 different weapons including bombs, fire flamer and a magneto. A lot of special effects have been put into the game such as motion blur and blending to make it a graphically enjoyable video game.

Plot

Kao's friends are being captured by the evil hunter Barnaba, so with the aid of his allies Parrot and Firefly, Kao must explore multiple worlds to collects 3,000 coins to bribe the doorman of Barnaba's fortress to take the evil hunter down in an attempt to set his friends free.

Why It Got The Money

Original/Overall

  1. First off, it is a massive improvement over the first game (although it was still decent enough), as now the gameplay is way better and there's other things that make this game way better and pretty much the best game in the franchise, along with the 2022 game.
  2. Superb graphics for a 2003 game that is a incredible step up from the first game and still hold up extremely well to the point of being more detailled than most games that came out in the same year, this is even to the point of feeling like an HD game if you upscale it a bit and the game manage to look better than some of the games released in the same year that also had good graphics, there's a lot of reasons to list for why the graphics are great:
    • The color palette is good and fit the dark tone of the game, and while it is darker than the first game, it somehow still manage to had fitting colorful graphics, in which most edgy games at the time had not this kind of graphics.
    • The characters models are very detailled and look like they come from a 2000 CGI film due to being great, albeit just made in video game form, this is impressive for 2003 standards, and not many games at the times had such an achievement.
    • The environnements also are colorful to look at and are very varied in term of themes such as forest, mountain, beachs and even inside a pirate ship (which is in reality the hunter ship), and all of them also look detailled and still fit the dark tone of the game.
  3. Very fun gameplay that isn't that repetitive at all, since it is fast-paced and the levels are very fun to play, despite that there's still some bad levels like "Down the Mountain", and it help that the combat and controls being great and that there's upgrades.
  4. Unlike the first game, this game offer voice acting, in which it is really good in every languages, since the voices fit the characters and had lot of great dubs, such as but not limited to:
    • The english version that had great voice cast that fit the characters, especially Kao himself, Parrot and the hunter also had a very funny voice (in a good way), and it contain some hilarous moments, we can definitely say that it was made with passion, like if it was an anime english dub.
    • The French dub is also surprisingly great for a 2000s video game since much like the english dub, we can feel the passion since every characters had fitting voices such as Kao and Parrot, and it sound very good, and feel like voice acting from a tv show, even if some of the voices are annoying.
    • The Espagnol dub is also very good and somewhat funny to listen to, and in a good way.
  5. Much like the first game, there's a lot of variaty in the gameplay, even for a 2003 game, and it show right to Kao moves and the things that you can do in the game, such as:
    • There's a snowboard stage in the game, and while it isn't that good due to the awful controls of that phase, it still nice to see it and that make more variaty.
    • "The Race" level, while flawed, is pretty fun, and is a nice break from the usual platforming levels, and it is somewhat unique despite not having something new to offer.
    • Unlike the first game where most levels take place on foot, there's water levels, and they surprisingly control well despite that the water levels are being heavily panned nowadays, much like Rayman 2: The Great Escape.
  6. The atmosphere of this game is also really memorable and make you want more of this game, and while it is similar to Rayman games, here it still feel unique due to having a very different gameplay and it isn't that much of a rip-off compared to other awful 2000s games such as Frogger: The Great Quest that was a complete rip off of Rayman 2 and was an absolutely horrible game in comparison.
  7. Excellent controls that are extremely tight and responsive, and they never are unresponsive at all, and they are a huge improvement over the first game for lot of reasons.
    • First off, the controls react more faster now and Kao move way faster than he used to do in the first game, which make the gameplay way more fun and being fast-paced, this type of controls would be used in all the other games after it.
    • They always are responsive, even if the controls may be slippery in one phase of the game, even with the worst phase of the game, they are always responsive and will never be unresponsive at all, thank to how well programmed this game is.
  8. There's puzzles in this game, which are interesting and are balanced in difficulty, not too hard nor too easy.
  9. It now had a hub world, which make the game stand out from the first game, and it also make the game having more personality, despite being linear and having little to no explorations in it.
  10. The combat is a major improvement since now you had combos, you had upgrades (though it isn't visible in the combat department), and it now had way better hit-detection and also is way more faster, even if it may be not the best hit-detection sometime, but still the combat remain good and a huge improvement overall.
    • In a similar vein to one mechanic of Rayman 2: The Great Escape, you can also use a target system where you can throw your boomerangs at your enemies directly without aiming without that, and while it isn't as good as the former due to being not as well animated, it is way better than games such as Frogger: The Great Quest who tried to do this as well and it fonction well.
  11. Lot of humors is found in this game, whatever is the english or the french dub, this goes for some lines of the characters or simply the great voice acting that make it sound funnier.
    • This could be true with the line, "Where are you going, have you got the money? 3000 ducats or else nothing!" is really funny, the french version of this line is even funnier.
    • The idle animation of Kao is also very funny, as he try to spoke you but it feel more like he try to make us laugh.
  12. Much like the first game, it had cool box arts for every regions:
    • The North America box art (for both the original and Kao Challengers) is good looking despite being a little bit disturbing for a E rated game, since it involve Kao doing an angry face and throwing bombs, which hint the dark tone of the game, though it is quite misleading.
    • The PAL cover of the original is simply a cute box art featuring Kao being happy and we can see a part of the game world, also the background is pretty good looking.
    • The Polish box art is the best of them all since it is full of details and the fact that it also look colorful help a lot, also we can see Kao being happy and there's also other characters from the game that appear in the artwork as well, telling who will be in the game.
    • The PAL cover art of Kao Challengers is also well done since it is the NA cover art but with a red background instead and also still having Kao throwing bombs.
  13. The levels are all unique and are very well designed, as the level design is as great as the first game, if not better and it is kind of similar to Rayman 2, which also had this kind of level design and was also an excellent game, and the levels are also designed with Kao abilities in mind, which make everything better than they already are.
    • They also are balanced and never are too difficult nor too easy, which make the game difficulty fairly balanced despite being a pretty easy game overall, since the game is not too hard nor too easy and it still had some challenges to offer, so at least it isn't a painfully easy game, even if there's unlimited lives.
  14. While the snowboard phase isn't that great, it still way better than in the first game because here you can take hits while in the first, you die in one hit, which made the level almost unplayable.
  15. The game premise is pretty good and unique and is way better than in the first game, since not only does we know how Kao escaped from the pirate ship, but also there's way more story show here than in the first game.
    • This might explain the voice acting, the fact that there's cutscenes and that the bosses had personality this time.
    • It is also way darker than most games in the franchise (along with the 2022 reboot), and it show with the overall premise, the hub that happen only in the night and the soundtrack itself that sound way darker than the first game, and even the title card show it, kind of like both Rayman 2 and Rayman 3 (which are darker than most games in it's franchise).
  16. Unlike the first where it was designed to be an extremely linear game, here it had some explorations for finding the ducats, and the game is designed with the collect a thon system, and it still manage to had both exploration and linear elements, which is cool despite that you may not like linear or collect a thon game.
    • Also despite still being linear, the game still had some explorations in it's levels, most notably in the first world levels, where you must find something to trigger something else that make room for progressing in the game, in a similar vein to Rayman 2: The Great Escape (once again), which may make Kao fans really happy to get more things to do than in the first game.
    • Also, believe it or not but Kao 3: Mystery of the Volcano had even more explorations than this game.
  17. Great boss fights that are way better, since here they are more of a treat than in the first game and required more than hits to kill them unlike the first game where they could be hit 3 or 5 time and they we're death, and they are long in a good way.
    • Shaman is a pretty decent first boss since his paths are good and he had properly balanced difficulty, he neither too hard nor too easy, and the way to defeat him is kind of clever and unique.
    • The hunters in "The Cave" are one on one fight where you had to throw boomerangs at them to beat them and after that you need to defeat them with the coconuts machines, in which they are very fun bosses.
    • The Octopus in "Lair of Poison" is more challenging than the previous two bosses, since he had attacks that are harder to dodge, and he deal more damages too, also it is harder to attack him, making it for a challenging boss that is still balanced in difficulty wise.
    • "Pirate Bay" boss is pretty forgettable though because you just need to beat some pirates that just take 3 hits to kill and they pretty much are just regular enemies, also it is easier than the octopus and the hunters (in "The Cave"), making it safe to call them the worst boss of the game.
    • Final Duel include the fight with the hunter himself and it is very epic despite not being that hard, and even then, he is very epic and make for a good final boss especially because of the fact that his paths are great and that the boss itself is fun, making this a fitting end to such an awesome game.
  18. The characters are all likable, especially Kao himself, there's a lot of great characters introduced in this game, such as:
    • Kao is still the main protagonist and he had lot more personality than in the first game, this is mostly because in the first, he doesn't talk and here he not only talk but doesn't had any moments of being unlikable.
    • Parrot is definitely the most memorable new character of the game, since he's Kao best friends and his personality is very funny and memorable, despite being a bit rude at times, he's even more funny in the French dub.
    • Shaman, despite only being seen in his fight, is a decent villain and had an intimidating voice, and he's a decent treat to Kao despite being overall easy to defeat.
    • The hunter received more characters development than in the first game, since while he still capture animals, at least here he had more personality and he is hilarous.
  19. Kao get way more moves than in the first game, which include:
    • You can now glide on the ground, this can be useful when there's an enemy with melee attacks that is hard to dodge, and it can also serve as an attack, which is great.
    • Kao now had a double jump, which is useful and will be used a lot.
    • There's boomerangs to throw, which are great weapons and serve as a nice alternative to attack since some enemy are hard to attack with melee attacks, so they can be useful for not only the combats but even the speedrunning or having a longer jump.
  20. Great soundtrack that include a lot of great tunes that are very catchy to listen to or even tunes with an epic feel to it, also the soundtrack can be relaxing and it is so good that you may want to listen to them when you are somewhere else, or even if you are at home.[2]
  21. Kao get a lot of upgrades that are pretty decent since they are for his attacks, his jumps and his tail attack would be more useful than before, and the upgrades are fun to use.

Kao Challengers

  1. It added multiplayer mode, which is great considering that the original versions lacked a multiplayer mode, and the best thing is that the mode is very decent and play like a battle royale, it also had many characters to choose from, including the hunter (all of the characters play the same howewer).
  2. It added one new level that is exclusive to this port, which is Lost Village, and the level itself was quite good.
  3. Until the release of the Steam version (in which you can play it on Steam Deck), this was the only way to play the game on a handheld and it was a pretty decent alternative to the original game if you wanted the game on the portable console.

Bad Qualities

Original/Overall

  1. Much like the first game, there's still some bad or at least flawed levels in the game, even though most of them are carefully designed, as stated above but here the levels that had problems:
    • The Race is pretty much one of the worst level of the game because the controls aren't really the best and when you get hit by a wall or something, you're getting stun, and it make the other opponents having advantages for winning, and considering that it is a bit poorly designed, then you might fail a lot.
    • Down the Mountain is easily the absolute worst thing to come out of this game because the controls are so slippery and stoff that it make the snowboarding in the first game being way better than this, since the level could have easily been awesome but because of the poor controls, it fall in the good concept but poorly executed category.
  2. The game is still fairly easy and is even easier than the first game:
    • This is mostly because of the fact that unlike the first game, you had unlimited lives, which mean that it is impossible to get a game over, and considering that there's healths almost everywhere and also because there lot of checkpoints, it make this even worse.
    • The enemies AL isn't the best once again, since their attacks are rather easy to dodge and you can kill them easily with the boomerangs, and if you got almost all of the upgrades, then it sure make the game incredibly easy, not even the first game was that easy.
  3. Misleading NA box art: While the box art is good, there's isn't any weapons to throw bombs, and also despite being quite dark, it had a rating of E instead of E+10, which is weird for it's time since games with dark box art would get a higher age rating even if the game wasn't that dark to begin with, though the game itsem is still appropriate to that rating, despite that the game being darker than the other games in the series.
  4. The game is once again very short, clocking at 2 to 4 hours of gameplay, which is not helped by the lack of replay values in the original game since unfortunately there's not any multiplayer mode in the original game.
  5. Despite not being that, the game could feel like a bit of a rip off of Rayman 2: The Great Escape, due to how the levels feel similar to that game with it's backgrounds.
    • It doesn't help that lot of things feel like they got taken from that game, such as one part of the combat, or some parts of levels feeling like they got directly taken from Rayman without changing much.
    • Some parts of the gameplay even feel similar to that game, such as the phases where you glide on a ice floor, or in one of the water levels where we ride something that look similar to that of Rayman 2.
  6. The bonus levels are not great at all, since they are not only extremely simple in a bad way but also they had poor controls and most of them are boring.
  7. The game unfortunately lack a reward for completing it at 100%, which is a missed oportunity to add more replay values to the game, although you can replay it for having 100% completion but still, it will be useless to do that.
    • Speaking of that, the 100% completion in this game is an absolute nightmare since you had to explore all the stages without missing a place to found all of the ducats, and because of that, it may cause padding and thus was probably made to hide the short length of the game.
    • The ducats are also sometime poorly placed, since at times they are found in places where it is unlikely that they are placed there, and this will cause lot of ducats that will not be discovered, this is what make the 100 completion of the game really hard.
    • Though thankfully you doesn't need all the ducats to complete the game, and getting 3000 of them is actually easy.
  8. The animals ride are really bad compared to other games of it's time.
    • This is especially true with the bird that control terribly, since you have to keep pressing the jump button or else he will lose his momentum, and you will fall in a pit, this is extremely frustrating and it is easy to miss due to how terrible his controls are.
  9. The ending is really abrupt, since it end with only Kao defeating the hunter, and Parrot having him being in a cage, and it directly goes to the credits with the hunter crying, not to mention that they could have added a lot more such as the animals praising Kao for saving them but no.
  10. Unlike the first game, you cannot place the checkpoints and instead they are already placed on the level, which is sad because it was what make the first game unique, though thankfully the game is designed with ordinary checkpoints in mind.
    • Speaking of it, the checkpoints system is really limited since because of that, you will had to retry a good portion of levels parts if you struggle with the hardest parts of the game.

Kao Challengers

  1. It had screen crunch, though it isn't that noticeable and still play just as good as the original despite that.
  2. The graphics are slighly downgraded, due to the PSP limitation but they still look good thankfully.

Reception

The critics reviews of the game were mixed. GameRankings and Metacritic gave it a score of 62 out of 100 for the Xbox version[3], 57% and 57 out of 100 for the GameCube version[4][5], and 61% and 58 out of 100 for the PlayStation 2 version respectively.[6][7] and a 57 for the Kao Challengers[8][9]

On Gamefaqs, the game had a score of 3.53 for the Xbox version[10], 3.66 for the PS2 version[11], 3.68 for the GameCube version[12] and 3.45 for the PC version[13]

Howewer, as time went on, the game got positive reviews by gamers and is considered to be the best Kao game, due to it's level design, the combat, the controls and the story, it is also to the point of receiving a strong cult following and being extremely popular in the late 2010s, this was because peoples wanted to get a come back of the franchise and it succeded since in 2019, it was re-release on Steam and it sell extremely well, having more than 1 millions copies.

The game also received a strong cult following for the speedrun community to the point of having more than 713 runs on Speedrun.com, and it is the most speedrunned game of the entire franchise, especially on Twitch.

Trivia

  • This is the only game in the franchise to had dubs for almost every regions.
  • It was the last Kao game on a handheld until the 2022 reboot release on the Switch.
  • The Steam version only had very minor differences from the original PC release from 2003. Most notably different voices, minor bug fixes so that players cannot go "out of bounds" in certain places, and a bit different level layout – like in the "Abandoned town", factory section.
  • Round 2 was first released in Poland in November of 2003 while the rest of Europe saw a release in April of 2005, and it wouldn't see a North American release until March of 2006.
  • The second game doesn't credit any voice actors.
  • On January 9-19, 2020, Tate Multimedia ran the #Kao4Australia campaign, under which all proceeds from the sales of the Steam version were donated to the fight against bushfires in Australia.[14]

Videos

Reviews

Original

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Kao Challengers

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Gameplay/Longplays

Original

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Kao Challengers

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Others

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Kao Challengers

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Game Tips

  1. For getting more ducats, before going to a level, destroy the crates that contain coins, with that you will get about almost 80 ducats before starting the real game.
  2. In "The Volcano", when you get the 1000 ducats (if you got more than 2000), go back to the hub, this will make the level completed way before it actually does and you can skip a good portion of the game (at least the Pirate Bay boss).

References

  1. ↑ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kao_Challengers
  2. ↑ https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1HJFeDIE9axJQV2PdncbZeYU_fKJ8N-3&si=HaFw9-ua5zq_E4Q_
  3. ↑ https://www.metacritic.com/game/kao-the-kangaroo-round-2/critic-reviews/?platform=xbox
  4. ↑ https://www.metacritic.com/game/kao-the-kangaroo-round-2/critic-reviews/?platform=gamecube/
  5. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20191209011817/https://www.gamerankings.com/gamecube/926445-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2/index.html
  6. ↑ https://www.metacritic.com/game/kao-the-kangaroo-round-2/critic-reviews/?platform=playstation-2
  7. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20191209011607/https://www.gamerankings.com/ps2/926528-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2/index.html
  8. ↑ https://www.metacritic.com/game/kao-challengers/
  9. ↑ https://www.gamerankings.com/psp/929748-kao-challengers/index.html
  10. ↑ https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/xbox/926908-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2
  11. ↑ https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps2/926528-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2
  12. ↑ https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/gamecube/926445-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2
  13. ↑ https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/932460-kao-the-kangaroo-round-2
  14. ↑ https://steamcommunity.com/games/1048540/announcements/detail/1693850356628631910

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