Conduit 2 is the sequel to High Voltage Software's Nintendo Wii First-Person Shooter The Conduit. Once again, the player is Michael Ford, a former Secret Service agent caught in the middle of an Alien Invasion set in the near future. Taking place immediately after the first game, Ford must travel around the world, engage in firefights against dueling alien factions, and try to wrest the fate of the Earth back from the Big Bad and his supporters.
New gameplay features include a nonlinear single-player campaign, a larger selection of weapons, individual character classes and attribute enhancements, and split-screen local cooperative and competitive play.
This game is developer High Voltage's attempt at fixing the shortcomings from The Conduit. Instead of making the engine and actual game simultaneously, they focused entirely on the game. Instead of making levels with no planning, they made actual concept art. The respawning egg sacs, static cutscenes and exploding Drudge mines were removed. They toned down the hype, perhaps a bit too much — Sega chose April 19th as the date for the game's release, the same day as Portal 2, Mortal Kombat 9 and SOCOM 4, and Conduit 2 was released with next to no fanfare. The sites that did review it criticized the game for a short, disjointed single-player campaign and perceived deficiencies in the voice acting, level design and story but praised the multiplayer, which improved upon the original despite it already being the game's strongest point.
Conduit 2 provides examples of:
- Air-Vent Passageway: Played straight in D.C.
- Alien Invasion: The Drudge.
- Played with. The climax of the first game reveals that the Drudge were grown here on Earth from a captive Prometheus. Adams, however, is also revealed to be an alien.
- America Saves the Day: The ending has George Washington and Abraham Lincoln in futuristic armor arrive as reinforcements.
- Animal Mecha: One of the new enemies is a robotic puma/leopard/tiger.
- Area of Effect: Played straight with the Radiation Grenades.
- Played doubly straight with the Reverse Damage Upgrade, which heals you and your allies.
- Armor Is Useless: Whatever armor you buy for your character model is purely for aesthetics, with the exception of the Heavy Armor, Light Armor, and Helmet upgrades.
- Michael's new armor doesn't seem to actually DO much, really.
- And yet armor sure seems to help the Trust Advancers.
- Isn't it his new armor that allows him to use the upgrades?
- Michael's new armor doesn't seem to actually DO much, really.
- Atlantis: This is the main hub in the game.
- A Winner Is You: "You're Winner!"
- Back Stab: Played straight.
- Badass Normal: Ford is a One-Man Army who is out for revenge, underestimated by his enemies, and wears Cool Shades (although swaps them out with a helmet early on).
- Beating A Dead Player: If and when you get killed by a swarm of mites, enjoy the additional cacophony of them beating your dead body to a pulp as the words "Mission Failed" quickly appear letter by letter.
- Bee-Bee Gun: The Hive Cannon, which now allows targets to be tagged with sticky bait so the bees can home in on it.
- Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: John Adams as the Big Bad and a former President Evil.
- The Bermuda Triangle: The first level takes place on a deep-ocean platform in the middle of the Triangle.
- Big, Bulky Bomb: The pulsing, pre-modern Nazi nuclear Doomsday Device in D.C. that Prometheus must disable before it blows.
- Though he has no idea how to actually do that until 10 seconds before it goes off, much to Michael's despair.
- Bland-Name Product: There are vending machines for Orange Soda brand orange soda.
- Bond One-Liner: Lots.
- Boom, Headshot!: Headshots deal one-hit kills as usual. In fact, they are the only way to kill those terrifying, armored Trust Advancers.
- Brain Uploading: Prometheus."Aren't you a disembodied alien in a ball?!"
- Bug War
- Bullet Catch: One of the game's new weapons is the Aegis gun, which has the ability to suspend incoming bullets in a force-field, then fire them back at opponents.
- Cleavage Window: Andromeda's full-body armor covers everything except her face... and the tops of her breasts.
- Clothes Make the Superman: Mentioned almost straight in one of the campaign achievements, right after Michael Ford obtains his Destroyer armor.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: In the single player campaign, friendly aliens appear a different color than enemy aliens and some enemies (notably the mites) are distinguishable by their differing colors. Online, team matches have a Red Team and a Blue Team, and some maps have an indicated Red Side and Blue Side. Even in free-for-all.
- Concealment Equals Cover: Hiding behind that knocked over table, halved bookcase, or knocked over soda machine will totally protect you from bullets, plasma, radiation and explosions.
- Concept Art Gallery: Comes with the Gamestop-exclusive Limited Edition of the game.
- Cosmetic Award: Subverted, as achievements and medals always award you with either experience points, credits, or both.
- Conspiracy Kitchen Sink
- Copy-and-Paste Environments:
- The Washington D.C level seems to be an excuse to recycle assets from the first game. Overall though, it's greately reduced compared to the first game.
- There's also three levels that are clearly repurposed multiplayer maps. Thankfully, two are optional and one just serves as an arena for a boss battle.
- Lampshaded in the Siberia level: Ford asks himself if he's seen this hallway before, and Prometheus responds that architects often repeat structures in a building to save money.
- Then he goes on to state that developers often copy the practice in videogames.
- Crosshair Aware: Whenever you're being tuned by an enemy's Phase Rifle.
- Cyborg: Trust forces now include cyborg soldiers, who rest in recharging chambers.
- Darker and Edgier: Arguably more than the original — one of the first things Michael learns is that his family was killed with everyone else in Washington D.C. On the other hand, the campy one-liners and Indecisive Parody suggest High Voltage is making fun of Darker and Edgier shooters.
- Death by Irony: In the campaign, where Michael travels to China to save Emperor Li from Adams, only to end up having to kill him in self defense.
- Denser and Wackier: The Conduit was a first person shooter about a shadowy organization called The Trust, trying to usurp control of the United States government, and the invasion of Washington D.C. by an alien race known as the Drudge, where the main character is a surly, no nonsense government agent. Conduit 2 is a globe-hopping adventure, visiting locations ranging from Siberia to Atlantis, shooting not only humans and aliens, but at one point a giant sea monster, while the protagonist has become a wise guy voiced by Jon St. John. To drive the point home, the game concludes with a cutscene where the protagonist travels to the moon, where Abraham Lincoln and George Washington step out of a portal wearing power armour.
- Die, Chair, Die!: Plenty of boxes and cars to shoot up.
- Disintegrator Ray: To a lesser extent, as whatever energy weapon you use must be the one to fire the kill shot to actually have the effect.
- Enemy Civil War: Enemies of different factions will attack each other."Sweet! Now they're fighting each other!"
- Energy Weapon: The Carbonizer Mk16. Totally travels at the speed of light, so you don't have to do any leading.
- Every Bullet is a Tracer
- Epic Fail: Spoken straight by Michael.
- Faceless Goons: Every enemy in the game has a mask or helmet of some sort. Even if you shoot said helmet off.
- Gainax Ending: Oh my, yes.
- Game-Breaking Bug: The game initially shipped with a potentially fatal bug that occurs more than halfway into the first level, in which Ford can get stranded on a balcony of the oil rig after activating the third primer, making the game Unintentionally Unwinnable from the start. The only way the bug could be fixed was to connect your Wii to the internet to download some patches that fixed the issue. Unfortunately, with online support for this game gone, your only hope of continuing may be to import a save that got past the first level, but if you have a Wii mini, that's out of the question. Your last resort would be to keep restarting the level by deleting and creating a new file until the bug doesn't happen.
- Grimy Water: In China, Prometheus warns Ford that the water isn't exactly water...and it'll kill you instantly if you fall in.
- Gun Accessories: Averted. Weapons can't be customized at all.
- Although they do have plenty of preloaded Secondary Fire functions.
- Heroic BSoD: When Prometheus sacrifices himself in order to give Michael's Destroyer armor the power to stop Adams.
- Also, Take Up My Sword, which is basically the reason for Michael wearing the Destroyer armor in the first place.
- Historical Hilarity: The game ends with ends with Abraham Lincoln and George Washington stepping out of a portal wearing Power Armor, announcing they're "here to help," with the alien invasion.
- Hostile Precipitation and Thunderbolts and Lightning is the name of game in the Oil Rig level.
- Humanoid Aliens
- Insectoid Aliens: The Drudge, who now come in even more exotic and bizarre varieties.
- Lizard Folk: John Adams and the other members of his faction.
- Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels: Like the prequel, difficulty levels are named after the five levels of the Homeland Security Advisory System: Low, Guarded, Elevated, High, and Severe.
- In-Game TV: Subverted. There are radio shows, but no TVs.
- Instant Death Bullet: The HVS45 handgun.
- IKEA Weaponry: The Phase Rifle and Carbonizer Mk16 (though only in animation), definitely the Widowmaker turret.
- I'll Kill You!: Said straight from Michael, after Adams tells him that his family and everyone else in D.C. is dead.
- Indecisive Parody: High Voltage claimed that the game is supposed to be "tongue-in-cheek", and portions the game are clearly taking the piss (Ford's Duke Nukem-esque dialogue for instance), but other parts of the game are done completely seriously (like the conspiracy objects), and still others are ambiguous (the ending). High Voltage later admiited that they had a much more serious story planned, but the huge amount of cutscenes required and the reaction people had towards the original heavy-handed storyline meant that they rewrote the entire script at the last minute.
- Infinite Flashlight: In the metro of D.C.
- Infinity +1 Sword: The Dark Star, which can only be found upon completing the game.
- Insecurity Camera: Present In Katarina's fortress, in Siberia.
- Invisibility: Capable with the AR-C Eclipse's secondary.
- La Résistance: The Free Drudge, who aid Mr. Ford against Adams' plans.
- Large Ham: Ford's lines are delivered in the most over-the-top manner possible.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: The first game revealed that the real villain is John Adams, and that Prometheus becomes Michael Ford's ally, among other things.
- Lightning Gun: The Deatomizer Mk4, TPC Launcher, and Carbonizer Mk16.
- Lightning Bruiser: The Trust Advancers and Drudge Scarabs can move pretty fast when they really want to. The latter of which can take you out in two smacks.
- Living Statue: The Jade Warriors in China. And they are brutal Mighty Glaciers that bring instant death if you're within arm's reach.
- Locked Door: Played fairly straight in China, albeit with elemental symbols instead of keys.
- Lost World: The Lost City of Z.
- Magnetic Weapons: The Phase Rifle is actually a railgun.
- Monumental Damage: D.C. has seen better days. Even when you return, they're still blowing the place to hell.
- Mook Maker: Conduits and Egg Sacs.
- Muzzle Flashlight: Well, it's there if you need it.
- Mythology Gag: Before the game came out, the developers promised abilities you could equip to your loadout like healing teammates in multiplayer with bullets. In the game, there is an upgrade that gives you an extra radiation grenade and makes it so those grenades heal you and your teammates while still damaging your enemies. The description for the upgrade includes the line "Because we couldn't teach the bullets to love".
- No Sidepaths, No Exploration, No Freedom: Averted; the single-player campaign includes a central hub to allow the player to choose the order to play the levels, and multiple routes to each level's objective are available.
- No Body Left Behind
- Nobody Poops: Averted, there's a bathroom on the oil rig in the campaign.
- Noisy Guns
- Organic Technology: All the Drudge weapons.
- Oh, Crap!: Played straight right after Michael switches a primer on the Oil Rig, only to have the Leviathan devour that whole corner of the room and roar at him.
- Outrun the Fireball: Inverted when Michael must jump out of the way of an oncoming train as soon as he gets out of the subway in D.C.Michael: "For once, that's a train that I'm glad to miss!"Prometheus: "Technically, the train missed you.Michael: "...you really know to ruin a good quip, don't you?"
- Our Weapons Will Be Boxy in the Future: Averted. The Carbonizer Mk16's very existence is in utter defiance of this trope.
- Painful Transformation: Let's just say putting on the Destroyer Armor wasn't plain sailing for our hero.
- Permanently Missable Content: At the end of the Washington D.C. level, there are a few pickups in the room inside the Smithsonian where you open the tomb statue that you MUST collect before finishing the level, including the Apple of Discord just outside the tomb, for 100% Completion before you escape to the Conduit while being covered by the Free Drudge. If you explore DC again in free play mode, the level ends immediately just before you reach the tomb statue room, rendering any collectibles there inaccessible.
- Pivotal Boss: The Leviathan from the first level of the campaign, a gigantic sea serpent who turns to attack the deep-ocean platform you're on.
- Play-Along Prisoner: In D.C., Michael Ford walks in on a Trust Soldier interrogating a Free Drudge by the name of Thex. As soon as the soldier notices Michael's presence, he gets his ass kicked by Thex.
- Portal Network: The titular Conduit, a network of portals created by aliens.
- Powered Armor: Ford gets fitted for a set of Destroyer armor, and his ally Andromeda wears a full-body suit. Trust Advancers also wear armor that makes them impervious to everything but headshots.
- Protection Mission: Michael must protect the Free Drudge a number of times throughout the campaign.
- Rage Quit: Unavoidable, but thank goodness the developers had the foresight to install host migration.
- Regenerating Health: Present.
- Roboteching: The Shrieker. Also, the Hive Cannon, but only if the target is tagged with sticky bait first.
- Scaled Up: Midway through the final showdown with Adams, after you destroy his human form, he then transforms into his true appearance, a bulky and tall lizard-like alien monster, whom you must now battle in the very center of Earth.
- Scenery Porn: The Oil Rig level. High Voltage Software's Quantum3 engine really struts its stuff here.
- The Shangri-La: One of the levels is set in Shangri-La.
- Short-Range Shotgun: Apparent in online multiplayer and splitscreen. Curiously averted in the campaign.
- Shout-Out:
- The beginning of the Siberia Crash level has Ford starting out in a cave with a wall he has to shoot out to get outside, just like how Samus Aran had to shoot several walls out in a cave tunnel to finally enter the arctic Phendrana Drifts on the planet Tallon IV in Metroid Prime. Plus, his Destroyer Armor's visor also seems to resemble that of Samus' combat visor as well.
- When you return to Atlantis after defeating the Final Boss, you can interact with Andromeda and she can tell you, among other things, that the Conduits are powered by blast processing, a reference to Sega's old Sonic the Hedgehog commercials.
- Sickly Green Glow: Subverted, as radiation always glows orange in the game.
- Sincerest Form of Flattery: Several of the weapons are clearly Expys of those from Resistance and District 9
- Spider Tank: One of the bosses.
- Splash Damage: The SMAW, Shrieker, TPC Launcher, Frag Grenades, Deatomizer Mk4 (when fired a charged blast), Warp Pistol (when the blasts ricochet), Strike Rifle (when fired a charged blast), Hive Cannon.
- Splash Damage Abuse: Played straight with the TPC Launcher, Shrieker, and the Frag Grenades.
- Split Screen, and plenty of it.
- The Stoic: Prometheus. He's certainly far less critical of Michael than he was in the prequel.
- Story Breadcrumbs
- That Satisfying "Crunch!": Played straight-on with headshots.
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: The Dark Star's secondary function, which fires a black hole that essentially acts a mobile Sphere of Destruction, which has an Area of Effect that sucks in your foes.
- Tricked-Out Gloves: The Blinding Powder upgrade.
- Turns Red: Every boss in the game does this.
- 24-Hour Armor: Lampshaded in the Heavy Armor loadout upgrade decription."Seriously, how do you go to the bathroom in that?"
- 20 Minutes into the Future
- Unflinching Faith in the Brakes: Subverted. Prometheus insists that the Leviathan is Michael's way off of the oil rig, though he doesn't seem too concerned that it's tearing the rig apart in a murderous fit of rage.
- Unflinching Walk: Subverted when Adams walks calmly into a conduit right before the Leviathan destroys the platform he and his men are on.
- Unwinnable by Design: Polite example: after activating the penultimate primer on the Trust Platform and heading into the chamber below the one where you found it, you'll notice some explosive barrels. Unfortunately, the developers played a mean trick on you here and made shooting them a trap, because the ensuing explosion will block your only path forward with electrical currents. There is no safe way ahead and you will have to commit suicide, restart from the last checkpoint and make sure you do NOT shoot the barrels next time around.
- Virtual Ghost: Prometheus.
- Washington D.C. Invasion: One of the game's levels is a return to Washington D.C., as it's in the middle of a full-blown alien invasion.
- Wave-Motion Gun: The Leviathan attacks by shooting a massive laser beam from its mouth.
- Wilhelm Scream: Uttered by a scientist right after the Leviathan destroys a platform.
- You Can't Handle the Parody: "You can't handle the truth!" may be randomly uttered by a Trust Soldier AI.
- Michael Ford: What the...You're-Abraham Lincoln: Here to help.
