Video Game / Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number

All spoilers from the first game will be unmarked ahead. You Have Been Warned!

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"You really like hurting other people, don't you?"

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Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number is the 2015 Sequel to Hotline Miami, made by Dennaton Games and published by Devolver Digital. The game was released for Windows, Linux, OSX, PlayStation 3, Play Station Vita, and PlayStation 4. A digital comic book serving as a prequel for the game began publication on Steam on February 17, 2015, providing background on the various characters and factions featured in the first and second games.

Set in an Alternate History version of The '80s and The '90s, Wrong Number serves as something of a Mind Screwdriver. Whereas the first game featured a Jigsaw Puzzle Plot that left several pieces intentionally missing, Wrong Number uses Pulp Fiction-style Simultaneous Arcs played in Anachronic Order to explore the backstory of the world and the aftermath of the first game, providing insight to some of the weirder plot threads as a result.

Originally envisioned as a quick piece of DLC for the first game to tie up loose ends, the levels and stories quickly grew to the point that it was significantly longer than the original, so it was decided to simply package it as a sequel and go all-out with the development. Feeling that they had basically perfected the series' core gameplay with the first title, the devs instead opted to explore what cool new things they could do with it. The result is a game that is significantly harder than its predecessor, with sprawling, intricate levels containing a more pronounced artistic flair.

Each character, as well, plays vastly differently, and gameplay remains constantly varied as a result - for example, one character is a Spec-Ops soldier who can use a knife and gun at the same time, but cannot pick up new weapons, while another is a Brother–Sister Team that moves as a single unit, with one firing guns while the other swings a chainsaw. Each character has their own storyline that connects to the rest, be it by coincidence or directly crossing paths, and the story mode takes place between 1985-1991, jumping back and forth to create a sense of gradually developing history to the world the game takes place in, and allows for a reasonable progression of difficulty in the levels.

Previews: Teaser Trailer

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Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number provides examples of:

A-C

• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: Several throughout the story.
  • The end of "First Trial," where Manny and Evan have drinks while discussing their day.
  • The hidden sequence with Evan and the Biker, where a drunk Biker rambles about the events of the first game.
  • The beginning of "Stronghold," where the Ghost Wolves relax on the beach, talking about what they want to do when they go home.
  • The scenes with Richter and his mother.
• Adaptational Villainy: An in-universe example. The movie Midnight Animal, based on the events of the first game, portrays the Pig Butcher, who stands in for Jacket, as a psychotic, bloodthirsty monster.
• Adventure Duo: The Swan Twins, a Brother–Sister Team of killers. The brother, Ash, uses guns and stays behind the playable sister, Alex, who uses a large neon-orange chainsaw.
• After the End: The after credits screen and Hard Mode stage select shows the Miami skyline in ruins.
• All There in the Manual: The digital comic series, which was released separatedly before the game's premiere, explains backstories of main protagonists and general setting of the game.
• Alternate History: US/Soviet Union relations were considerably different in Hotline Miami's version of history.
  • Beard's levels are all set during a fictional invasion of Hawaii by the Soviets.
  • San Francisco gets nuked by Russia in 1986 to force a surrender. As a direct result, the Soviet Union and the US begin negotiations to turn the American government into a Puppet State under the "Russo-American Coalition".
  • In 1991, the Soviet Union and the US start a nuclear holocaust when their leaders are assassinated in an American Military Coup, implied to have been orchestrated by 50 Blessings.
• Anachronic Order: The game jumps between prequel stories, sequel stories, and stories set around the same time as the first game.
• Anti-Frustration Features: It’s extremely hard to notice during pitched firefights, but most player characters are capable of surviving one bullet (or getting grazed by a shotgun). Considering the fact the game has tons of open spaces and/or windows, it’s mostly to prevent extremely cheap deaths in a game where everyone is still a One-Hit-Point Wonder^note  You will still die if you eat another bullet, and since most computers fire pistols quickly, have automatic weapons or the magnum, which ignores this rule, or catch you in the middle of a shotgun blast, so don’t grow too reliant.
  • Evan is unable to use guns normally, and passing his Rage Breaking Point requires you to sit throw a couple of long execution mechanics, which can spell doom in urgent situations. Thankfully, Evan never runs across Thugs, who need to be killed with gunfire, or Dogs, whose speed would spell doom for Evan without a blunt weapon equipped.
• Anyone Can Die: While the first game isn't shy about killing characters off, this one is even more trigger happy, as playable characters can be killed off at the end of their respective storylines. Characters introduced in the first game aren't safe either. In the end, everyone who survived up to that point unceremoniously dies in a nuclear exchange between America and the Soviets.
• Apocalypse How: Towards the end of the game, the assassination of the presidents of the United States and Russia triggers World War III. At best, this might cause a Planetary Societal Collapse. At worst, we might have Planetary Extinction in our hands.
• Artifact Mook: In Hard Mode, katana-wielding Colombians can be seen fighting alongside the Russian mobsters in First Blood and Demolition. That said, First Blood and Demolition take place before the first Hotline Miami, during the period of time when the Russian Mafia and the Colombians were still on good terms with each other.
• Artificial Brilliance: As in the first game, enemies alternate between acting incredibly sharp and able to kill you extremely quickly...
• Artificial Stupidity: ...and being so unbelievably idiotic that they don't even bother to react to you shooting their comrades half the time.
• Ascended Extra: You get to play as "Beard", the guy at the convenience store in the first game, in the Soldier sections of Wrong Number.
• Asshole Victim: While several of the player characters are bloodthirsty psychos, the majority of the enemies are murderous criminals themselves. Still, even though Tony surrendered, it's hard to argue that he and the rest of The Fans didn't have their violent deaths coming.
• Attention Whore: The Miami Mutilator (aka Manny Pardo), is revealed to be this, murdering his victims for the sole purpose of attention and fame, and even killing the last survivor of the Fans to remove any competition to his publicity.
• Bad Guy Bar:
  • The Fans regularly hang out in a dingy bar.
  • The Easter Egg bar where Evan meets Biker; though whether it's canon or not is debatable, seeing that characters who should be already dead at the time are there. The bar's name? "The Bar of Broken Heroes".
• Bald of Authority: The Colonel is the bald, commanding officer (later Lieutenant General) of the Ghost Wolves, and is depicted as caring deeply for the members of his unit.
• Bland-Name Product: In the level "Homicide", set in a department store under siege by a street gang, there's a "Super Fun Entertainment System" on display.
• Blamed for Being Railroaded: Richard is a lot more willing to ask why you're playing a violent game than why the developers made a violent game.
• Bloodier and Gorier: Impossible though it may sound, this game is even more violent than the first one, albeit in a subtle but still VERY noticeable manner. You may notice that the deaths are more graphic and detailed this time around (you'll see guts spilling out from enemies a lot more often and in larger amounts, for one thing) once you examine them, the executions are much more sadistic and disturbing, and the amount of bloodshed is higher.
• Bonus Level: Named "The Abyss". It takes place in the abandoned 50 Blessings HQ, now populated by raving junkies. Unlocking it is a Guide Dang It! — reach the third floor of Withdrawl (Jake's final mission) and clear the floor without dying. After you clear it, leave in your truck after speaking to the Volunteer. In ensuing cutscene, as the Volunteer goes to get "coffee", right click and Jake will grab a floppy disk off the table. When investigating his clothes as Evan, right-click near the floppy to pick it up, and the level will be unlocked.
• Book Ends:
  • The first and last levels are shown by themselves in the level select screen, instead of being part of an act. They also both have information about the "movie" in place of your best time and score when selected.
  • The series begins with Jacket and ends with a shot of his last moments before the nuke hits.
• Boss Bonanza: The final level sees the player facing down each of the Fans, one after the other, as viewed through the Son's drugged hallucinations.
• Bragging Rights Reward:
  • The rank-related achievement only calls for getting A+ ranks every level, so getting the better S ranks could be considered to be this.
  • Also, as Richard points out in the opening cutscene, beating Hard Mode will not change the story whatsoever, with the exception of adding a symbolic, patriotic poem in the ending credits. At least there's an achievement for beating Hard Mode.
• Briefcase Full of Money: Jake can take such briefcase at the end of Hard News. Doing so gets him an arcade machine and a monster truck in the intro to Withdrawal.
• The Cameo: In the bar where the Fans meet, many of the NPCs there are the same artists who made the soundtrack of the game.
• The Cartel: The Son's missions involve taking out the Columbian gang that took over their territory after the events of the first game.
• Central Theme: Two major ones, actually:
  • Like the first game, the pointlessness and self-destructive nature of violence is a recurring message in each of Wrong Number's successive storylines.
    • Martin Brown, who relishes the chance to play the killer in a violent slasher film, ends up losing his grip on reality and is accidentally killed when a loaded gun ends up on set instead of a prop.
    • The Henchman, who made his living as a killer for the Russian mafia, is abandoned by his girlfriend when he tries to leave with money stolen from the Colombian Cartel and killed by the Fans soon after.
    • Biker, who became one of the masked killers in Hotline Miami out of boredom, has become a sad drunk after losing his will to fight between the two games.
    • The Soldier, who kept fighting in a pointless war that everyone knew America was losing, is killed after being discharged, when Russia nukes an American city to force a surrender.
    • The Fans, who became copycat killers for fun, are slaughtered after getting in over their heads.
    • The Son leads a bloody turf war against the Colombians, only to overdose on drugs celebrating his victory, kill dozens of his subordinates, and then jump off a skyscraper.
    • Manny Pardo, a Glory Hound detective who became a serial killer to advance his career with Engineered Heroics, fails to achieve fame and instead ends up a paranoid wreck hiding in his own home, terrified that his wrongdoings will eventually be discovered by the police precinct.
    • If Evan keeps obsessing over the violent Masked Maniac killings, his wife and kids leave him for good.
    • 50 Blessings, who believed they could use violence to "save" America from Russian influence, end up inciting a nuclear holocaust that destroys Hawaii and Miami instead.
  • Additionally, there are expectations - namely, how nothing ever goes the way people expect. Every character expects something to come out of their exploits and believe that they are working towards a certain fate. However, the only character to get a somewhat satisfying ending is Richter, who just goes with the flow. This is further underlined by the Richard hallucination being comforting and friendly to him, instead of confrontational and taunting. Apart from them, not even the players are safe.
• Chain Pain: Chainlinks are a new weapon in this game, commonly seen in the hands of Gang members. They have a slow swing speed and an unique execution where your character uses it to slash the enemy's head apart.
• Chainsaw Good:
  • Alex's only weapon is a large, bright orange chainsaw.
  • The Gang variants of the Dodgers are distinguished from other Gang members in that they wield chainsaws similar to that of Alex's (although it's likely that they don't use them with the power on, since their attack sound is the same as most sharp melee weapons), as well as wearing green masks.
• Color-Coded Armies: The Russian Mafia follows a strict dress code comprised of a pale blue shirt under an open white jacket and pants. The Colombian Cartel, their main rivals, are pretty much an inverted Palette Swap, wearing a black jacket and pants over a purple shirt.
• Cowboy Cop: Deconstructed with Manny Pardo. The only reason he's a detective is because all the copycat killers emulating Jacket are stealing his thunder. He's privileged to go into danger zones first, and gets to tamper with evidence. He survives until the end of the game, but holed up with paranoia in his house.
• Cutting Off the Branches: Of the few choices and story branches the player was given in the first game, all of them are given a canon outcome.
  • Biker is still alive in 1991, as is Jacket, canonicizing the outcome that Jacket won their fight by smashing Biker in the face with a golf club, but hallucinated bashing Biker's head in afterwards. Or he simply misremembered the fight, given that it was only shown in his coma while he was recollecting the events leading up to his awakening.
  • Richter and the Janitors appear in the 1990s segments, establishing that sparing them is the canon choice in the first game. Biker might not have even found the Janitors in the first place.

D-F

• Damn You, Muscle Memory!:
  • In the PS3 and Vita versions of the first game, the Circle button is used as the "drop/switch weapon" button, since throwing a weapon as opposed to simply dropping it can easily cause unwanted commotion. Here, the dropping feature is inexplicably gone, forcing you to throw a weapon every time you switch to another. Speedrun enthusiasts used to the first game's controls or people who want to get an A+ ranking on every stage will surely have a field day.
  • When replaying levels in the first game, the "Skip Intro?" prompt is set to "yes" by default. Here it's set to "no".
• Darker and Edgier: The first game was already utterly bleak and ultraviolent, but this one manages to dig further, not just by being Bloodier and Gorier, but also acting as the Mind Screwdriver to the previous game and going deeper into just how horrible and depressing the series' setting is, to the point that the game ends in a nuclear apocalypse.
• Dark Shepherd: Richard, undoubtfully. He's perhaps one of the creepiest Dark Shepherds in gaming, not only because of his threatening speeches to the playable characters, but also because of the extremely horrifying background music that plays whenever he appears.
  Richard: There's a twist at the end. I doubt you'll like it. I don't think anyone will. Maybe you ought to get out before it's too late?
  Martin: I don't think so.
  (Spoiler: Martin dies. Well, obviously. What did you expect?)
• Dead All Along: The outro to "Casualties" reveals this to be the reason for Beard's strange appearances in the first game - he's being hallucinated as part of Jacket's coma dream. The real Beard had been killed before the events of the first game.
• Dead Man Walking: The playable mobster known as "The Henchman" senses he's not long for the world, and puts in his resignation from the mob.
• Death by Irony:
  • All of the fans but Tony kill the Henchman, a Russian mobster, in the outro cutscene to "Execution", this being their first kill on the Russian mafia. Later, all of the fans except Tony are killed by the Son during their raid at the Russian mafia's headquarters, after killing many other mobsters themselves.
  • Speaking of the cause of death, Mark dies by the Son whacking him with a golf club when his play style revolves around firearms, while Corey gets shot by the Son with a magnum when her special ability allows her to avoid bullets.
• Dem Bones: In the opening cutscene to Hard Mode, Pardo, Evan, Richter, and Beard are reduced to skeletons, referencing how they died.
• Demoted to Extra: Don Juan and Rasmus, the other two masked figures alongside Richard in the first game, only make an appearance here in the bonus level "The Abyss".
• Diabolus ex Machina: There's very little foreshadowing concerning the events that lead up to the nuclear war at the end of the game (even if the nature of the ending itself is foreshadowed), and it seems to be in the story for the sole purpose of ensuring that there won't be a Hotline Miami 3.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • Like the original masks for Jacket, each of the Fans comes with an useful skill at a reasonable cost:
    • Corey can dive-roll under bullets, but at the cost of split-second vulnerability at the end of it.
    • As well as carrying the same deadly punches and higher attack speed as the Tony mask from the first game, Tony can kill Thugs with melee attacks, and has a slightly larger window for killing charging Dogs. However, he can't pick up any weapons, has a longer kill animation for dogs if they aren't melee'd perfectly, and has to knock down Thugs first before killing them via execution. With the increased size of the levels in Hotline Miami 2, this generally results in having to bait out any enemies with guns, and it isn't very effective for racking up combos because of this.
    • The Swans can simultaneously melee and fire, Ash automatically picks up whatever gun he steps over, and only Alex can die. This comes with the restriction of slow melee executions, no melee swapping, and being a pain to learn and adjust to.
    • Mark starts with two MP5s and, while equipped, pressing the throw button makes him gradually arc the guns outwards for spraying rooms or 90° either side. This comes at the cost of him being unable to drop them until empty, only getting one reload, and (since they don't respawn for the map) getting no further bonuses afterwards.
  • The Son's various techniques recycle each dynamic of the fans except Alex and Ash's, either with a new addition (the Bodyguard technique, Corey's equivalent, makes him start the level with a katana) or restriction (Tony's equivalent, Dirty Hands, doesn't grant an increase in attack speed; and Mark's equivalent, Bloodline, restricts him from performing ground executions while carrying the MP5s). In general, the Son himself also has new executions at the cost of a slower melee attack speed.
  • Jake's Dallas mask also recycles Tony's dynamic with a new ability known as "Havoc", in which he carries nunchucks that temporarily increase his attack range and speed, while restricting him from looking around and moving once the ability ends.
• Dirty Cop: Asides from Manny Pardo, the security guard enemies are this, implied to be in on a 50 Blessings' operation to get Richter killed in a Prison Riot in "Release", and openly working with the Colombian Cartel at the bank the Son raids in "Blood Money", which is notably the only intentional case of two different enemy factions fighting the player in a level outside the Level Editor.
• Disney Villain Death: In "Apocalypse", the Son takes one too many drugs and has an intense Mushroom Samba, culminating in him walking off the roof of his new headquarters under the assumption that the Bifrost, the rainbow bridge of Norse myth, is there. In an earlier level, you can see his body covered by a cloth and the police having finished their autopsy on him.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: America gets involved in grueling island warfare in the Pacific against a military powerhouse, involving an attack on Hawaii and ending in an exploitative peace treaty caused by the nuking of a major city. Sound familiar?
• Downer Ending: Martin is accidentally killed on set, the Henchman gets killed by the Fans, the Fans get killed by The Son and the cops, Jake gets killed by either the Mafia or 50 Blessings, the Soldier is killed soon after being discharged from the army, The Son jumps off a skyscraper while tripping on hallucinogenics, Manny has a mental breakdown, Evan may - depending on player choice - never make up with his family, Jacket is put on death row, and Miami, Hawaii, and possibly the rest of the US is nuked by the Russians after 50 Blessings assassinates both the Russian and American presidents.
• Eagleland: Type 2. The comics show an American Pride Parade calling for the prevention of another "San Fran"(based on San Francisco being nuked by the Soviet Union in the outro to "Casualties"), who beat up a group of civilians on the accusation of being Russians. 50 Blessings, a neo-nationalist American organization returning from the first game, is also a prominent force.
• Early-Bird Cameo: During Evan's first level introduction part, you can spot all of the Fans without masks at the entrance of the courthouse, seemingly carrying support banners. The Biker is also present.
• Even Evil Has Standards: As explained in the comic book, while the Fans are doing their murders For the Evulz, they also consider Jacket a hero for targeting criminals and only target criminals for their killing sprees.
• "Everybody Dies" Ending: At the end of the game, Miami, Hawaii, and possibly the United States as a whole are destroyed by nukes launched by Russia, killing every protagonist who hadn't died earlier.
• Expy: The Soldier scenes are set in Hawaii during a fictional Soviet invasion, but the jungle warfare, weapons, outfits and vehicles evoke The Vietnam War, complete with more than one Apocalypse Now Shout-Out. Some fans have even mistaken the conflict for Vietnam at first glance.
• Face Death with Dignity: At the end of the game, Richard tells Richter that he's about to die and that there's nothing he can do about it. Richter then decides not to fight his impending death and just lets it happen.
  Richard: I'm glad you understand... Leaving this world is not as scary as it sounds.
• Fake Difficulty: A common complaint in reviews is that the more wide-open levels combined with the same unpredictable AI from the first game lead to quite a few cheap deaths, such as offscreen bullets and dogs that come out of nowhere at full speed before the player can even react.
  • Also, the console version of the game has an awful auto-aim system that sometimes, instead of targeting the enemy right in front of you, targets an enemy all the way on the other side of the level. And you depend on this aiming system since aiming with the analog sticks isn't good either.
• Fallen States of America: The version of the United States seen in the game is shown to be faring not too well against the Soviet Union during the Cold War, especially after the loss of Hawaii and the nuking of San Francisco.
• Famed In-Story: Ever since the events of the first game, Jacket has become infamous for his assaults on the Russian mafia and police. His criminal trial has a full audience, there's a movie being made about him, and he has misguided "fans" who try to be just like him.
• Firing One-Handed: Fatter playable characters such as Martin, Mark and Jake fire and reload shotguns and assault rifles with only one hand.
• Fission Mailed:
  • In "Final Cut", Martin will get "shot" by Rachael at the end of the precinct shootout scene. Instead of a restart prompt, Rachael will continue to pump lead into him, unaware that the prop gun appears to be real.
  • In Jake's second and final level, "Withdrawal" - dying on the final floor won't give you the restart prompt, but will show a cutscene of Russian mobsters interrogating and killing Jake instead.
• Five-Man Band: The Fans function as this to an extent.
  • Tony is the leader of the fans.
  • Alex appears to be the second-in-command, as she shows jealousy towards Tony for being the leader and is the second-most violent.
  • Ash is the smartest of the gang.
  • Mark is the strongest and angriest of the gang.
  • Corey is the heart as she's the only one to question their actions.
• For the Evulz: The Fans are only murdering gangsters and lowlifes to have fun.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Quite a bit with regards to the ending.
    • "There's a twist at the end. I doubt you'll like it. I don't think anyone will." This foreshadows not only Martin's accidental death at the end of the chapter, but the controversial Downer Ending of the game itself.
    • During the Henchman's dream sequence, it's noted on the radio that A Storm Is Coming to Miami. It's really nuclear fallout.
    • The game's box art. It depicts the nuking of San Francisco, with the Soldier in focus. Behind him are the Fans' animal-like Final Boss forms, with one of the Janitors at the top middle, the Colonel on left, and the Son on the right.
    • In "First Blood," Richter's mother talks about a dream where she, Richter and his father were on an island together peacefully, but there was something wrong in the air before something bad happened. At the end of the game, Richter and his mother are peacefully watching TV in Hawaii before the nukes come down.
    • The main menu appears to be Miami in the middle of being nuked.
    • When continuing the game, the screen flashes from the left of the screen, like an explosion. On the following screen, you can see something glowing to the left that is not the sun.
    • The appearance of Nuclear Throne cut-outs in '"Homicide" is oddly prophetic, considering what happens at the end of the game.
  • In the opening cutscene of "Dead Ahead", if you open the trunk of Pardo's car, you'll see that he's keeping a hostage inside it. While said hostage isn't present in the level itself, his corpse is later seen in the ending cutscene. Being the Miami Mutilator himself, Pardo killed him at some point between the opening cutscene and the beginning of the level.
    • Also, in the same cutscene, Pardo can be seen setting up a Frame-Up by planting the hostage's wallet in Alex's house.
  • There's a little detail worth noticing about the ending cutscene of "Death Wish". You may notice a body covered in a tarp when Pardo leaves the building. That's the Son.
• Foregone Conclusion: Richard invokes this in hard mode's intro. Asking the other characters (and the player) why they came back when they already know how this story is going to end.

G-M

• Gangsta Style: Just like in the first game, everyone holds pistols and SMGs sideways to distinguish them clearly in the game's top-view perspective, with the exception of fat playable characters like Mark and Jake.
• Genre Shift: The first game is a Psychological Thriller with a Sunshine Noir aesthetic and tone, with little context for the setting. This one is outright apocalyptic science fiction in a Darker and Edgier Alternate History.
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: The Gang Leader and his gang in "Subway". While every other level has some context or justification for why the playable character in question is killing a bunch of people, these guys only really exist to give Evan someone to fight before going to Richter's house.
• Going for the Big Scoop: Evan, the novelist, is trying to write a book on the Masked Maniac killings.
• Gone Horribly Right: 50 Blessings eventually achieves its goal of breaking the Russo-American coalition... which promptly results in Hawaii and Miami getting nuked by the Russians.
• Gorn: Overlapping with Bloodier and Gorier cited above, this game is bloodier, gorier and even more graphically violent than the first game, with the deaths being detailed enough to go on par with ultraviolent exploitation films like Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky or Cannibal Holocaust.
• Greater-Scope Villain: The founder of 50 Blessings, which forced multiple people into committing the mask killings, is implied to be the Colonel who commands Beard during his levels.
• Guide Dang It!: The "Box Full of Sharp Objects" achievement requires you to use all the weapons in the game. This includes weapons that are exclusive to one level and aren't immediately obvious, such as the skateboard in "No Mercy" and the acid canister in "Withdrawal".
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Inverted with Alex, who wields a chainsaw, and Ash, who uses guns that he picks from enemies.
• Head Crushing: Several of the playable characters can kill fallen enemies by crushing their heads underfoot. These characters include Mark, Manny Pardo, Jake, Martin Brown, whose stomp execution is faster than many of the other characters, and the Son, who grinds his foot into the remains of the enemy's head out of spite.
• He Knows Too Much: If you succeed in completing "Withdrawal", Jake gets executed by the 50 Blessings representative for guessing their actual motive.
• Hitbox Dissonance: Dogs. Their kill animation seems to trigger a bit too early, making it look like they teleported on you. Their AI has some weird blind spots, and while they can't notice you during them, your melee weapons tend to go right through them too.
• Hope Spot: The ending starts off with Richter, one of the most sympathetic characters, sitting with his mother in a Hawaii bungalow. It seems like, despite it all, he's earned his happy ending... and then nuclear bombs from Russia hit Miami and Hawaii, killing Richter and all the other surviving protagonists.
• Iaijutsu Practitioner: How The Son and some mooks (including Colombian Dodgers) wield their katana.
• Interface Screw: When you try to select the final level "Apocalypse" in stage select, the normal "Skip intro? Yes/No" prompt will change to "Don't do it! PLEASE STOP".
• Interface Spoiler: One of the achievements requires you to play all of Evan's levels without going lethal. However, when you beat the game, the achievement is not unlocked. This is because he's the player character of the Bonus Level, The Abyss.
• Jack the Ripoff:
  • The Fans are a gang of copycat killers out of Jacket, attempting to emulate the events of the first game for kicks.
  • The Miami Mutilator AKA Manny Pardo is revealed to be this, desperately wanting to be the center of attention.
• Just Before the End: Aside from the levels that take place prior to 1991, the game's story is set before the beginning of World War III. None of the characters in 1991 are in any real position to keep this from happening, a fact that Richard alludes to throughout his conversations.
• Katanas Are Just Better:
  • The Son can start with a Katana with the Bodyguard technique.
  • The Colombian variants of the Dodgers wield katanas.
• Kaizo Trap: Combined with Schmuck Bait. That girl who points a gun at you and tells you she'll shoot if you come any closer, at the end of an early level ? Yep, she'll do it.
• Kevlard:
  • The Thugs return from the first game. Normally they can only be killed by guns, but the sequel adds the ability for melee-only characters to knock them down and spend several seconds brutally beating them to death.
  • Averted with the Dodgers, a new type of enemy in this installment. They essentially serve as an inversion of the Thugs, being immune to gunfire and only killable with melee strikes. However, said immunity merely comes from the fact that they dodge any incoming bullets (hence their name), since they're not fat and die from a single melee hit like any normal enemy.
• Kingpin in His Gym: The Son is seen training with a punching bag at one point, showing that he's no slouch when it comes to violence.
• Laughing Mad: At the end of "Death Wish", The Son (who is high on drugs at the time) can be seen wiping his face and laughing after killing Ash, before he shoots Alex.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The "Bar of Broken Heroes" you can unlock at the end of the Subway scene is filled with the player characters from Wrong Number and the first game.
• Let's Split Up, Gang!: "Death Wish" features The Fans splitting up to handle different floors of a Mafiya-controlled high-rise. While they're able to clear each floor out, the Son shows up and kills or maims them each.
• Level Editor: Added about a year after the game was first released, in 2016.
• Level in Reverse: All levels in Hard Mode have their maps rotated 180 degrees, among other changes.
• Loony Fan: The Fans, who hold Misaimed Fandom for Jacket's acts and try to emulate his killings without knowing the whole context behind them.
• Lost in Character: Martin Brown, during a talk show appearance, starts talking about he loves to murder teens, like his character in the slasher film "Midnight Animal" He snaps and murders the talk show host, after which Richard appears and starts chastising him. At this point, he has put on the Pig Butcher's mask.
• Martial Pacifist: Evan. He's clearly against violence, but he still can kick ass.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The rooster-headed "Richard" appears in some way to each of the story's characters at different points. It's unclear if he's just caused by their personal connections to the player character from the first game, or represents something deeper in the psyche of all humans. Or maybe neither.
  • In the secret level "The Abyss", Richard and Don Juan show up and ramble at Ethan about how he wasn't supposed to be there - but they don't have the talking animation that the hallucinatory Richard has. Is it really the same Don Juan and Richard that spoke to Jacket in the first game, or are they just some junkies mistaking Evan for another mafia goon?
• Meaningful Background Event: When exiting the courtroom of Jacket's trial, you can see the unmasked Fans protesting in support of him and Biker looking on.
• Metafiction: Most of the main characters are allegories for different types of players from the first game:
  • The Fans represent, obviously, the players who idolised Jacket as a straight up hero and found all the violence cool and enjoyable without paying attention to the actual story.
  • Evan represents people who were too obsessed with the lore and story of the first game, while not enjoying the gameplay itself.
  • Jake represents the bigots who agreed with 50 Blessings' xenophobic mission.
  • Manny Pardo isn't as clear but some interpret him as representing the lackluster copycats of HLM that arose after the release of the game. He hopes to be able to measure to the Masked Murderers of 1989, but instead of Jacket's complicated and nuanced life, he is just doing it for fame and shits and giggles, and so he will just be forgotten.
  • Martin is the fanbase who played the game soley because of the gore and to be as shitty and violent as possible for their own amusement.
  • The Henchman is an allegory for the characters who downplayed the acts against the Russians. He is just a Punch-Clock Villain who legitimately wants to quit and doesn't seem to enjoy the violence of his job. His death is intentionally bloody ad undignified to pull a punch on the players, killing a mobster who they've grown fond off who they would have otherwise killed without blinking.
  • Beard represents players who played simply to unlock new weapons and masks to use in the levels, given that the player unlocks more and more violent weapons to use when they complete his levels.
  • Richter could represent the people who played the game not because they enjoyed it, but because they felt pressured to do so. The fact that his playstile is much more erratic and slightly frightned reflects how these players probably weren't very experienced with high speed-One-Hit-Point Wonder violent video games.
  • The Son, on the other hand, represents players who villified Jacket as a psychotic murderer. While it's true that the Russian mafia is composed of Punch Clock Villains, the higher ups weren't some sort of Benevolent Boss Lesser of Two Evils, but a violent family who profited of death and suffering. While the Father and the Grandfather were something of a Flat Character and the latter's death is a Kick the Dog moment for Jacket, the Son is an Ax-Crazy daddy's son who can't hope to compare to his father and eventually destroys for real the mafia in a drug fueled haze.
• Mind Screwdriver: Explains a lot about the first game, but also introduces a few Mind Screws of its own. It's a cactus game, after all.
• Mission-Pack Sequel: Wrong Number originally started off as a DLC to the first game focusing on Martin. Eventually, the developers decided that it became large enough to warrant becoming its own game and as such they stated that they added little to no changes gameplay-wise.
• Mood Whiplash: In addition to the low, brooding hum after most missions, it's rare for there not to be an arc filled with frenetic violence and energetic music, followed by an immediate turn to a gut-wrenching bad ending in the following cutscene.
• Mushroom Samba: The final level in the game, "Apocalypse", has you playing as the Son while he's overdosed on hallucinogenic drugs.
• Mysterious Stranger: Richard. He appears to almost every playable character in a most unexpected moment to give them a chance to make a Heel–Face Turn to save themselves from consequences, and then mysteriously disappears. Is he the Big Good? Is he the Big Bad? Is he just a messenger? Does he work on the government? Is he even real? Who knows! Yeah, he's that mysterious.
• Mythology Gag: A number of them referencing events from the first game, along with some irony:
  • "Death Wish" and "Apocalypse", which take place at the same time, have a few of these:
    • The Fans die in an area occupied by the Russian Mafia, much like a couple of the original masked vigilantes. Except for Tony, who meets his end at the hands of the "law".
    • Alex & Ash's encounter with the Son mirrors the unreliablility of Jacket and Biker's fight, with both sides having different tellings of how it went down.^{Note (Spoilers)}In Jacket's side, he killed Biker with a golf club, while Biker killed Jacket with his cleaver. Yet none of them were right. Or were they? Meanwhile, Alex & Ash died by being shot by the Son, but in the Son's mind, he killed them with a fireaxe, with his hallucination seeing the twins as a twin-headed monster.
    • The Son dies like his father: suicide, after encountering a masked character.
  • The Janitors tease one of the playable characters once more, about the events that have transpired.
  • Every playable character has a vehicle that they use to enter and leave at the start and end of a level. The exceptions are Evan, Beard and Richter, who can be considered the least malicious protagonists in the game. Of course, not that Richter had a choice: his original car got torched.
  • One of the pre-level tracks in Beard's storyline ("Rust") sounds a bit like the first game's after-level track, "Daisuke", likely as a nod to how Beard is the person Jacket meets in every after-level sequence of the game's first two parts (spanning through levels 1-8). Additionally, both tracks were made by El Huervo, who was the inspiration for Beard's appearance.

N-Z

• Nameless Narrative: Averted. Unlike the first game, which gives few names for its cast, Wrong Number has named characters such as Martin Brown and Manny Pardo.
• New Game Plus: Hard Mode, unlocked after beating every level for the first time, which includes a couple new events that shed a bit more light on the story.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: See Gone Horribly Right.
• Ninja Prop: Part of the Son's Mushroom Samba rampage in "Apocalypse" has his dialogue portrait suddenly open wide and inhale his overhead sprite to take him to the fight with Corey.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • Manny Pardo's character runs parallel with the real Manuel Pardo Jr.
  • The talk show host looks a lot like Ellen DeGeneres.
• No-Damage Run: Unbelievably, it's been done.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: The Henchman spares the life of a guy who arrived just after he killed everyone at a chop shop. The same guy calls the Fans in to kill him.
• Nuke 'em: San Francisco, Hawaii, and Miami are shown being nuked. The game implies the last one is due to 50 Blessings initiating a Nuclear Apocalypse with the Russians.
• Ominous Visual Glitch: The screen will flash with white noise, like a channel changing, when characters are going insane.
• One-Hit-Point Wonder: Lightened up a bit compared to the previous game. Small guns like pistols now take two shots to kill you, though they still kill normal enemies in one hit.
• One-Man Army: Every playable character except Alex and Ash. Pardo seems to be a Deconstruction of it: his behavior is seen as reckless by the rest of the police force, which only serves to highlight his characterization as a Rabid Cop.
• Only in Miami: Averted. Unlike the first game, you play some levels in Hawaii, and you see San Francisco get nuked.
• Painting the Medium: The game's pause screen is styled like that of a VHS player.
• Perfect Play A.I.: The enemy reaction times are practically instant, unlike in the first game. This rises the difficulty nicely, and speeds up the gameplay. However, because of this, melee enemies (Dogs and runners) can attack you the instant they/you walk past a corner they/you hide behind, resulting in some pretty cheap deaths.
• Photo Memento: During the Hawaiian conflict, Evan Wright takes a photo of Beard and Jacket, which Beard later gives to Jacket to keep as a memento after rescuing him from a power plant explosion at the end of the war, so Jacket could remember "who saved his life". A year later, Beard calls Jacket to tell him to make a copy of the photo for him, shortly before a nuke drops in San Francisco, where Beard was at the time. This photo was the object that Jacket threw into the wind at the end of his storyline in the first game, presumably when he believed that he managed to repay the favor to Beard and thus completed his Redemption Quest.
• Plot Tailored to the Party: "Death Wish", the Fans' last level, has each fan tackling a floor that's designed around their respective playstyles.
• Postmodernism: The game could easily be interpreted as a commentary on reactions to the first one and on the nature of sequels in general. Martin Brown and the Fans indulge in shallow repetitions of what happened in the first game. The Fans enjoy gratuituous violence and mayhem for its own sake. Evan Wright is obsessed with trying to make sense of the deliberately disjointed narrative of the first game. And so on.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: In Evan's first level, he breaks into the lair of a Russian mob boss named Petrov and confronts him in the sauna. Instead of simply dismissing him, Petrov notes his amusement that Evan got that far and agrees to answer two questions (Evan is smart enough to get straight to the point, asking Petrov if he thinks the "Mask Maniacs" were an organized group and why he believes they targeted the Russian mob). However, Petrov is still a mob boss, and so we can later see him and his bodyguard in the final floor death cutscene from "Withdrawal", where they execute Jake after their attempts to get information from him prove fruitless.
• Resourceful Rodent: Invoked by Richter Berg, the operative who wears a rat mask. In gameplay, he can pick up weapons from fallen enemies to use for himself. He also escapes prison by disguising himself as a member of the prison staff.
• Retraux: Like the first Hotline Miami, the game uses pixel graphics, but additionally employs VCR user interfaces and artifacts for pause screens and rewind/fast forward sequences.
• Ripped from the Headlines:
  • In-universe; Jacket's actions in the first game have resulted in a book and movie being made about him.
  • Manny Pardo is likely named after the real-life Miami spree killer Manuel Pardo Jr., who murdered nine people whom he believed to be drug smugglers in 1986.
• Say Your Prayers: The line that one prisoner in the yard suggests Richter to do.
• Scenery Gorn: When playing on hard mode, the background of the level selection screen shows ruins of Miami drawn in a rather sombre palette. In order to unlock the hard mode, the player has to finish the game on normal difficulty first, and the ending reveals that Hawaii and Miami were destroyed in a nuclear conflict between the USA and the Soviet Union.
• Sequel Escalation: Hotline Miami 2 has 14 playable characters, 5 new enemy factions (alongside a new type), a story with almost 10 more levels, more gore, new weapons, new locations and a Level Editor.
• Sequel Hook: Parodied and subverted, by means of Word of God — a stinger appears if you wait a minute after the credits end, showing a start screen for Hotline Miami 3. However, it's the wrong number, and it's been explicitly stated that it was only put there as a joke to anyone expecting a third game, despite the fact that this game's ending pretty much rules out any possibility of another game in the series.
• Serial Killer: One is present in Miami in the 1991 sections, called the "Miami Mutilator" for the gruesome way they kill their victims. Manny Pardo is investigating the killings when you first get to play as him. It's later revealed that Pardo is the Miami Mutilator himself, motivated by petty jealously over the fame that Jacket's actions in the first game got and a desire to get more attention than Jacket and The Fans' actions.
• Shoot the Shaggy Dog: The entire game. Nothing of importance is achieved, most of the characters end up killing one another, and the rest die when Miami and Hawaii are nuked off the map in response to something that happened off-screen.
• Show Within a Show: Midnight Animal, a movie based loosely on Jacket's actions from the first game.
• Simultaneous Arcs: The game switches between various characters and factions from level to level. The only act where this doesn't happen is the fifth one, "Intermission", which is dedicated solely to Richter's storyline.
• Snicket Warning Label: At the start of Final Cut, Richard warns Martin that there’s a pretty big twist at the end of the movie he’s taking part in and that he should get out before it’s too late. You can also interpret this as him warning the player about the ending of the game.
• Soundtrack Dissonance:
  • The main menu song, "Untitled" by The Green Kingdom, has a peaceful and slightly melancholic vibe, in contrast with the action that goes on in-game, which can make it sound rather weird at first. After beating the game, it's clear that the main menu depicts Miami getting nuked, and so the song takes on a whole different vibe.
  • The song that plays over the nuclear apocalypse at the end is the incredibly slow and peaceful (but lyrically fitting) "You Are The Blood" by Castanets.
• Sparing the Final Mook: The Henchman lets a random hooligan live at the end of a mission, since he's already accomplished his mission and has everything he needs. Unfortunately, said hooligan informs The Fans and they kill the Henchman later.
• Start of Darkness: Beard's storyline reveals where 50 Blessings got the idea of the masked killers from.
• Stout Strength: Fat playable characters such as Jake and Mark always wield weapons with only one hand, including assault rifles and shotguns.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • The Fans decide to rescue a damsel from gangsters, and after massacring the gangsters and speaking to the damsel. She's in a frenzy and refuses to leave with them. She says the gangsters were her friends and if you try to approach her, she will shoot you dead on the spot.
  • Meth is made from extremely flammable, potentially-explosive materials. Fire a gun into a meth lab (identifiable by the bottles and chemicals on the table) and it will explode, quite possibly killing you on the spot if you're too close.
• Swans A-Swimming: Invoked by Alex and Ash, who wear swan masks and fight as a duo, with Alex wielding a chainsaw and Ash using any firearms he picks across. As two brutal killers of mafiya mobsters and street gangs, the twins are inseparable.
• Take That!: The entire game is a mockery of video game sequel expectations, and expectations in general.
  • The closest analogues to Jacket from the first game, Martin Brown and the Fans, all get killed in the first half of the game (the Fans still have the most levels out of all the playable characters, though, at 5). Martin doesn't even make it past the first act.
  • The Fans attempt to rescue a girl in "Moving Up", similarly to Jacket saving the Girlfriend in "Decadence" from the first game, only for her to point a gun at them and tell them to leave for killing her brother and the rest of the gang in the building (whom she refers to as her "friends").
  • The New Game Plus mode, Hard Mode, has an opening cutscene where Richard admonishes the player characters and the player themselves for hoping there's any alternate ending.
    Richard: You all came back, huh? Why? You know how this ends, don't you?
  • Outside of expectations, a TV host who resembles Ellen Degeneres gets killed, and her head is left on her table, likely referencing the open secret of Degeneres' workplace bullying and harassment until an investigation in 2020 brought attention to it.
• Title Drop: For the sequel subtitle. The Henchman tries to call his ex-girlfriend, and instead gets "You have reached the wrong number".
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Evan. In fact, if you try to use a gun as him, he'll just empty it. And if you won't stop beating up the guard on the first level with Evan...
• Tonight, Someone Dies: The final level in each act is signified by blood pouring down in its opening screen. And in each of these act finales, at least one playable character ends up dying; the two exceptions are "Release" of Act 5, where Richter merely escapes from prison, and "Take Over" of Act 6, where The Son manages to destroy the Colombian Cartel without any problem (his death doesn't happen until the following and final level, "Apocalypse", which isn't included within the act).
• Too Dumb to Live: The policeman who interrogates you at the beginning of "Final Cut" unwisely turns his back to you when leaving:
  "He's not even looking... It's like he wants you to kill him."
• Tuckerization: Evan Wright is named after the writer of Generation Kill and Cocaine Cowboys, the latter of which was an inspiration for the series.
• Unusable Enemy Equipment:
  • Beards' levels stand out from the rest in that, while you get to wield a gun and a knife at the same time, you can't pick any weapons dropped by enemies, similarly to Biker in the first game. In the case of the gun (which you choose at the beginning of each level), you have to look for ammo boxes to refill it once it runs out of ammo.
  • Dodgers are mainly distinguished from other enemy types in that they tend to use weapons that are specific to a playable character (e.g. the Gang variants use Alex's chainsaw, and the Colombian variants the Son's katana), as well as weapons of unusual wielding such as dual pistols (as in the Military variants' case). Regardless of the character you're playing as, you can't pick any of their weapons once you kill them.
• Video Game Flamethrowers Suck: Averted. Beard's flamethrower, which is unlocked after completing "Casualties" for the first time, can kill even Thugs in one shot and reach almost a screen away. As a downside, however, it can't fire through glass, and rewards less points per kill (400 vs. 600 (800 in the case of Thugs) from gun kills).
• Vomiting Cop: At one of the crime scenes Pardo visits, an officer is seen puking his guts out outside the building where the victim's body lies.
• Willfully Weak: Evan, obviously. He even swings a baseball bat slower in order to not damage his enemy's internal organs.
• Wham Episode: The fourth level, "Final Cut". While the other previous levels seem pretty simple based on what we saw in the first game, this level features the game's first appearance of Richard, and establishes that Anyone Can Die.
• White Gangbangers: One of the enemy factions is a low-level street gang made up exclusively of white (or at least light-skinned) men.
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The credits are a variant of this, showing what everyone who made it out alive throughout the game is doing in their last moments before nuclear bombs land on Miami and Hawaii.
• You Bastard!:
  • Creator Dennis Wedin said that the Fans, who murder in the same way as Jacket for fun, were meant to be a mockery towards fans of the first game who wanted the sequel to be exactly the same.
  • The staged rape scene in the prologue level is potentially another potshot at players - you won't question gorily murdering 5 people, but will be upset when asked to perpetrate an alternate form of violence.
    • Speaking of the Midnight Animal storyline, Martin Brown claims he only relishes his imaginary violence, because it's all just a film — only fictional. Richard questions if this is really the answer.
  • One of the playable characters, Pardo, is revealed to be a serial killer murdering complete innocents for no discernible reason.

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You all came back, didn't you? Why?

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