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Those A.N.M.Cs in the Akropolis weren’t just escaping the shelter. It was a little demonstration... like they were saying: “Hello, we’re baaaack.”
Kyle Madigan

A sequel to Parasite Eve (which was itself a sequel to the novel of the same name), also appearing on the PlayStation. This game features an interface closer to Resident Evil, being more of a Survival Horror game with RPG Elements than vice-versa like the first game.

It is September 2000, almost three years after the New York incident. Since that time, Aya Brea has left the NYPD and joined the FBI's Mitochondrial Investigation and Suppression Team in Los Angeles, an organization dedicated to destroying the mutants dubbed "Neo-Mitochondrial Creatures" (NMCs) spawned in the wake of Eve's rampage. On Sept. 4, the Akropolis Tower in downtown LA comes under massive attack by NMCs, and Aya is sent in to support the Los Angeles Police Department as they move to secure the building, only to find a larger conspiracy brewing that leads to the isolated desert town of Dryfield, Nevada...

It has a sequel on the Playstation Portable titled The 3rd Birthday.

It can also be found on the PlayStation Network.


This game provides examples of:

  • Advancing Boss of Doom: Glutton, a large boss fought in the Shelter's garbage incinerator, keeps slowly and implacably moving closer and closer, leaving you with less and less room to run away from it.
  • A.K.A.-47: Like the previous game, largely averted. Though no brand names are used, almost all the weapons in the game have the correct model number. There are some exceptions, such as Rupert's "Mongoose" .44 magnum, and the "Grenade Pistol" which is actually an HK69 grenade launcher.
  • Alas, Poor Villain: In-universe. Aya may have some somber reflections on some of the boss monsters after she's defeated them, including the garbage monster and the living power generator.
  • Aliens in Cardiff: While the intro chapter is in downtown Los Angeles, the bulk of the game takes place in a tiny desert town called Dryfield in the middle of the Mojave Desert in Nevada.
  • Anti-Frustration Features: Near the end your ally from MIST will bring all your non-shelter boxes to you. Which helps if you left a gun or useful item in one before the Point of No Return.
  • Apocalyptic Log: A few are found, in particular one left by a researcher over a couple of days describing the evil Dr. Bowman who eventually turned into an ANMC. The second-to-last entry is of her writing about how she let him out of his cage because he wouldn't stop complaining, and noting that he's now over nine feet tall. The final entry is by someone else, noting how the researcher was (unsurprisingly) eaten by Bowman.
  • A Taste of Power: In the Akropolis Tower, you can obtain a Tactical Vest, an MP5A5, and a Grenade Pistol from fallen SWAT officers. However, these items are returned to the LAPD after the mission is over, and it'll be quite a while before you see them again in the game.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Dryfield is attacked by a giant NMC called the Burner near the end of Disc 1, also the first stage of the final boss. You also run into a giant-sized version of a Brain Stinger.
  • Awesome, but Impractical:
    • The Golems. All the research and effort that goes into their biological modifications and flashy laser weaponry is shown to be ultimately pointless as they are utterly wrecked by good ol' fashion infantry with good ol' fashioned guns.
    • Several weapons and attachments for the M4A1 are a lot more trouble than they are worth. A good example would be the M203 attachment. Grenades are powerful, but they are also rare, so you are more inclined to save them for bosses. The attachment also takes up a slot that could be occupied by something more useful, such as the Hammer.
  • Badass Army: The Marines prove to be one when they take out dozens of Golems. They even let Aya use some of their equipment.
  • Bag of Spilling: Justified. Aya doesn't want to live forever, but her mitochondria maintain her body at twenty; this freaks her out so much that she can't use her powers effectively without a damned good excuse - like being caught in another mitochondria-based conspiracy. And her hard-earned guns and armor? Justifiable as being considered police property and therefore returned to her old precinct after she left. Also, if you opt to take any equipment from the dead SWAT team members in the prologue (namely, you can obtain a tactical vest, an MP5A5, and a grenade launcher), these items will be lost when Aya returns to MIST HQ. Also justified because Aya's internal monologue said she was only going to "borrow" the items, and Pierce remarks in the garage that they were returned to the LAPD after the incident.
  • Barbie Doll Anatomy: Close-up analysis of the "Stranger" NMCs indicates that nipples may just be considered a disadvantageous evolutionary feature. This may, of course, be due to the fact that the "Suckler" NMCs detonate their own craniums as a self-defense mechanism, making breastfeeding quite the chore.
  • BFG: The Hypervelocity Rail Cannon (an unlockable weapon).
  • BFS: The unlockable Gunblade as well, which operates in the same fashion from its original game and is possibly stronger than the Hypervelocity Rail Cannon when loaded with R. Slug ammo.
  • Body Armor as Hit Points: Equipping armor may grant you some passive bonuses, and some have more attachment slots than others, but the main function of it is to raise your total HP or MP.
  • Body Horror: All of the ANMC's, which have strange mechanical protrusions and look horrifyingly like human beings. The "failed" monsters in the Shelter take the cake, though.
  • Bolivian Army Ending: Averted. When Aya encounters an army of Golems outside the shelter, it looks like she's screwed, but then the U.S. Marines show up to save the day and they slaughter the Golems with little effort.
  • Boring, but Practical:
    • Of all the cool weaponry you can get in the game, they're either too expensive/unavailable until later in the game or Awesome, but Impractical. Pistols are probably the best weapon to keep with you throughout the game. It's due to the fact that the game's critical hit are absurdly high with single shot weapons (including the paltry P08) and you get infinite basic pistol ammo in the form of random ammo boxes. Many strategies recommend you use nothing but pistols in the harder modes solely because of this fact.
    • The M4A1 is available early in the game (can be bought after completing the Akropolis prologue) and it can see you through to the end. It fires in either 3-round bursts or single shot, but its real value comes in the sheer number of attachments it can equip. These range from rifle clip holders to extend your magazine size, an M9 bayonet, a "Pyke" flamethrower, an M203 underslung grenade launcher, a "Hammer" electrical shocker, and even a "Javelin" laser! Holy crap!
  • Brown Note: There are several "Madness Speakers" in the Particular Area of the shelter. They emit a terrible noise that drains your MP. The speakers are all located right outside Eve's room, and they were meant to suppress her abilities.
  • Button Mashing: Used to wiggle out of an enemy's grip or to shake off the effect of paralysis.
  • Cast from Hit Points: The Berserker status increases Aya's weapon power and levels up her parasite powers, but at the cost of chipping away at her HP. There's even an item that lets you inflict this on yourself.
  • The Cavalry: The US military eventually intervenes, somewhat more competently than in the first game this time.
  • Contemplate Our Navels: Aya shows a clear philosophical streak in this game, particularly pondering the nature and value of life, and the place of humans in the world.
  • Continuity Nod: The cut scene of Aya recalling events from the first game has her shooting at targets on the firing range; all the targets are monsters she encountered from the previous game. The last target that Aya shoots, a girl, is undoubtedly a nod to the True Final Boss of the original Parasite Eve and her way of "putting her out of her horrific misery" like before. Poor Aya...
    • The Mongoose .44 has a rare ammunition type of mass-produced versions of the mitochondria-infused bullets Maeda gave Aya towards the bad ending of the first game.
  • Deconstruction: Of what happens to all the monsters that cause Random Encounters in a game; examining some posters at HQ in the beginning reveals that the creatures that Eve mutated in New York broke out of the Navy's quarantine zone and began multiplying while spreading across the United States. This led to many organizations being created to exterminate the "Neo-Mitochondrion Creatures", which were eventually unified under the FBI's banner as the Mitochondrion Investigation and Suppression Team.
  • Corrupt Cop: Eric Baldwin is in on the conspiracy in Dryfield and is taking kickbacks from the organization behind the ANMC project. In the True Ending, it's also stated that the FBI ended up arresting several of its own officials and even some MIST agents as the true scope of the conspiracy became known.
  • Depleted Phlebotinum Shells: They return as a New Game Plus bonus (or a Bad Ending crutch) in 2.
  • Door to Before: A few of them, including a very big one leading back to Dryfield from the underground shelter's sewer tunnel. In fact, it's so close that it's a wonder that you had to drive to the shelter in the first place; it's basically right underneath Dryfield.
  • Down in the Dumps: Aya needs to escape a sterilization room in the shelter by leaping into a dust chute into the underground dump. Almost immediately afterwards she's attacked by a giant vacuum-suction-mouthed garbage monster that formed in the trash heap and wants to add her to its stomach.
  • Elemental Powers: Aya's mitochondrial powers are here organized in four groups each named after the four classical elements. Unlike more fantasy based spells, they are justifiably energy based, being centered around the four fundamental forces as related to their classical element category; fire is centered around combustion and weak nuclear force (ie; nuclear explosions), wind is centered around offensive electromagnetic usage that clashes with biological functions, water is centered around the more harmonic microdynamics of energy that governs the body, and earth focuses on the magnetics of electromagnetic force and strong nuclear force (ie; nuclear fusion) that bolsters and supports Aya.
  • Escort Mission:
    • Kyle Madigan is one of those few escortees that can actually hold his own in a firefight (and often comes with some sort of overpowered firearm or another to offset being unable to heal).
    • This trope also comes into effect when you have to escape the secret underground lab with Eve. While no enemies are present, Eve will start to cough from the gas filling the room and lose HP.
  • Everything Fades: Like in the first game, enemies melt into a pile of goo when slain. The few times where a monster doesn't melt means it ain't quite dead and Aya knows this from past experience. Averted with the Golem mooks where their bodies remain on the screen after you kill them and they still remain there even if you leave and return.
  • Extremely Short Timespan: After fighting through the Akropolis, Aya's adventures in Dryfield and the underground shelter last about 24 hours, going by the day/night cycle. The entire game from beginning to end occurs from September 4 to 7, 2000.
  • Fake Difficulty: Square tried to make II more like the Resident Evil games, but with worse camera angles and an absolute lack of a quick, 180-degree turn. Many cheap shots and deaths will ensue.
  • Fanservice: The Shower Scene. It's incredibly blatant, obvious cheesecake and, oddly enough, one of the most well-remembered parts of the game.
  • Fight Woosh: A quick inversion of colors, accompanied by a heartbeat sound effect.
  • Flavor Text: A striking amount of it, and you usually have to examine a background object several times to see it all. Many of Aya's inner thoughts are discovered this way, as well as background information on herself and others.
  • Functional Magic: Aya's parasite energies in this game are based around Fire, Wind, Water, and Earth.
  • Fun with Acronyms: Mitochondrion Investigation and Suppression Team, AKA MIST.
  • Gameplay and Story Integration: In the lengthy cut scene that takes place before the Final Battle. Aya winds up being shot in the arm and when you regain control of her, her remaining HP has been lowered to reflect her gunshot wound.
  • Ghost Town: Dryfield is completely devoid of residents except for Gary Douglas and his dog Flint. He says that everyone else either got killed by the monsters or got out of dodge fast.
  • Glass Cannon: Aya is defintely weaker in defense compared to the first game due to the new armor and HP mechanics (it will be rare that Aya's HP ever hits 300) and she can die in just a few hits if you aren't careful. However, Aya has access to a lot of powerful guns if you know where to look and unlocking the 3rd abilities in each of Aya's parasite powers will make her even stronger.
  • Global Currency: Bounty Points (BP) are used primarily by the FBI's MIST unit, which gives them more goodies according to the number of monsters they kill (tracked by special contact lenses). However, they're also applicable to Dryfield's landlord Gary Douglas (justified, as the FBI said they would reimburse him for allowing Aya to use BP to buy stuff from his Wall of Weapons), the Neo-Ark Armory (A Chekhov's Gun lampshaded by Aya when her contact lens registers on the machine - Her boss is part of the conspiracy!), and soldiers operating out of the back of Army supply trucks (handwavable for the same reason as Douglas, since they're with the military).
  • Goggles Do Something Unusual: The Hunter Goggles makes Aya immune to Blind status when equipped.
  • Greater-Scope Villain: The mysterious organization behind the Neo Ark project is responsible for the number of kidnappings and transformation of humans into ANMCs. Who are they is unknown and by the time Ava arrives at the Shelter however, there are no signs of life except for the mutants wandering around the base and only GOLEM No.9 is left to accomplish the task of unleashing the organization's ultimate creation.
  • Guide Dang It!: About one-fifth of the gameplay. Of course, after a few repeat playthroughs, you'll be too strong to care.
    • A particularly nasty one is the four-part riddle you find scrawled in spots in Dryfield. One is written in glowing ink and can only be viewed if you don't turn on the lights in a dark cellar. One is written in a corner in a dusty antechamber before a boss fight, and immediately after that boss fight, it's night out and you can't read that riddle fragment ever again.
    • Many of the unlockable items require a very high score whenever you complete the game, but what the game doesn't tell you that A) NOT using the items you find and hoarding them instead gives points, B) playing on a harder mode like Bounty Mode gives you a bonus multiplier to your overall score and C) triggering certain events in the game gives you bonus points too.
    • During the Akropolis section, there's a door in the chapel that is quite easy to miss. If you do miss it, you miss the series of events that allow you to get a keycard that will open an armory door in the Shelter. You don't need it, but it makes the Shelter levels a lot easier.
  • Hailfire Peaks: There are a number of different artificial environments right next to each other, including a jungle and a desert.
  • Hard Mode Perks: Bounty Mode replaces a lot of enemies with the Golems while a few other groups of enemies are replaced with their stronger counterparts. Beating the Golems not only nets you a lot of Bounty and Experience Points, but you'll get a lot more rare items to boot. Of course, the risks are greater since Golems can appear as early as the Akropolis Tower and you don't have much gear to work with at the start.
  • Harder Than Hard: Nightmare Mode, which combines Bounty Mode (stronger enemies in place of standard enemy spawns) and Scavenge Mode (items are harder to find/obtain, as well as being expensive to buy). The mode also reduces Aya's attack power and her base HP starts at 50 instead of 100. Beating the game on Nightmare gives you a 10x point multiplier for your next New Game Plus.
  • Heart Container: Protein Capsules boosts your maximum HP by 5. This is the only way to permanently boost your HP without relying on armor for the boost when worn.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: Number Nine is eaten by the very giant monster he was breeding, after finishing his Just Between You and Me speech and getting shot by Kyle.
  • Hyperspace Arsenal: Zig-zagged: In battle, Aya does not have access to her entire inventory, just what she has equipped to her belt pouches on her body armor, which is fair. However, one item still takes up the same amount of slots whether it's a can of coca-cola, a bunch of bullets, or a grenade launcher.
  • Infinity +1 Sword: The Hypervelocity Gun and Gunblade. They can do 4 digit damage when 3 is often overdoing it.
  • Infinity -1 Sword: The Mongoose, M249, and the MM1. The AS12 with R.slug rounds can match them. These can take down the Elite Mook golems in seconds.
  • Inventory Management Puzzle: Twenty items max, limited external storage besides, and you can only use stuff that you've loaded onto your current armor beforehand in battle. At least key items no longer counting towards this total helps buffer needing to carry around multiple ammo types.
  • Inner Monologue: Examining objects multiple times often reveals quite a lot of Aya's inner thoughts, some of which are actually pretty insightful.
  • Interface Screw: Comes in two flavors. Confusion will randomly alter your directional controls and Darkness lowers the brightness on the screen while also preventing lock-on to enemies.
  • Invisible President: The President is either viewed from behind his seat, or obscured by the Holy Backlight from the Oval Office's window.
  • It Can Think: The "stringer" ANMC we first meet is the mutated Dr. Bowman, and it talks. We never really find out how sentient the other ANMCs are or aren't; a bit of lore states that their individual minds are being suppressed by an implant that was supposed to be removed but never actually was.
  • The Juggernaut: The Burner ANMC steps on some of the anti-tank land mines that Gary Douglas set up on its attack on Dryfield. They don't even slow it down.
  • Just Eat Him: The garbage monster's vacuum mouth attack is an instant game over if Aya gets too close.
  • Justified Tutorial: The game begins with Aya practicing at the shooting range at MIST Headquarters while the intro recaps the events of the first game. You can actually opt to skip the tutorial since the first thing Pierce asks is if you've had enough.
  • Last Chance Hit Point: If you get the scenario where Flint the dog dies, Mr. Douglas gives you access to one of his cars, which contains an armor called the Chicken Plate, which has this ability.
  • Late to the Tragedy: By the time Aya reaches the Shelter, the place has been a deserted, monster-infested wreck for at least a week beforehand.
  • Lethal Joke Weapon: The Flares, which normally do very little damage to enemies and it also stuns them. However, certain enemies like bats have 1 HP, making the Flares an excellent choice to use to clear them all out without wasting bullets.
  • Magikarp Power: The P08 is the lowest priced gun of all the weapons, but it's weak, slow, and has a small clip. Yet if you keep it in your inventory to the point when Aya can explore Dryfield's underground, checking the gun rack in the game room a few times will net Aya the "Snail Magazine". When used on the P08 its strength and magazine size increase and it has an absurdly high critical hit rate.
  • Masquerade: The U.S. government has covered up the events of the previous game by blaming it as an act of bioterrorism with a newly developed virus committed by Dr. Hans Klaup . Meanwhile, in the present, the FBI also covers up any NMC incidents by labeling them as operations to stop criminal gangs, terrorist cells, or simply using the good old Gas Leak Cover-Up. Aya herself even lampshades that it's much easier to introduce herself as an "FBI agent" instead of a MIST operative. It also helps that NMCs melt upon death, which makes covering things up a lot easier. However, the coverup is not perfect, since there were quite a few witnesses to the New York incident, and there are people in the U.S. that have encountered NMCs firsthand. In the ending, the White House covers up the satellite strike on the Dryfield nuke shelter as the work of a cult accidentally detonating a nuclear device before they could use it. And in the True Ending, it's stated that Rupert and Jodie will eventually declassify all the NMC documents and release them to the public.
  • Mana Burn: The Final Boss has an interesting variation where they first give you MP... and then they set them on fire. This wipes out your MP completely and inflicts the Silence status effect.
  • Metal Slime: The Bounty and Nightmare Modes turn the Golems and other Elite Mooks into scripted versions of these, without the running away part.
  • Monogender Monsters: For some reason, all the Strangers we see are female, either in human form or out of it.
  • Moon Logic Puzzle: The only way to return to Dryfield is blocked by a gate that requires knowledge of Japanese calender phraseology to open.
  • More Dakka: The 100-bullet full-auto pistol (among less readily available conventional machine guns)...
  • Multiple Endings: The game has three of them, depending on a few actions that you took. The standard ending has the President talking to his aide about what to do with the mess at the facility (this is all done in pure text behind a black screen) and the game cuts to credits after the army medics found both Aya and Eve. The better ending expands upon the previous scene and adds more details to the plot without a black screen. The best ending shows even more details of the plot and shows that Aya adopted Eve as her sister. A year later, they go to a museum where they encounter a man who is presumed to be Kyle.
  • Mysterious Waif: The Eve, Aya's clone, who doesn't talk until near the end. Aya ends up adopting her as a sister afterward.
  • Mythology Gag: The targets that Aya is shooting at in the intro are illustrations of the monsters of the first game.
  • Nebulous Evil Organisation: Whatever organization was behind the ANMC project and the construction of the Neo-Ark is never clearly explained. Mr. Douglas tells us "a large corporation" bought out the underground shelter, which is the closest thing we get. This is actually lampshaded by Aya in her narration in the True Ending:
    Aya: "However, all information regarding the organization running the shelter has been classified. Nothing was ever explained, and we were slapped with a gag order."
  • New Game Plus: Done more extravagantly in the sequel where you can literally buy back your powers from the previous cleared game (seriously, they're little blood vials with the mitochondria tied to each power), get stronger guns early, or play on different modes that change Aya's statistics and/or enemies.
  • Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: The Golems, cyborg zombie Super-Soldier Elite Mooks with ape-like qualities, some types of which have optical stealth, ninja-esque speeds, the ability to cause Status Effects, lay sneak attacks, some have grenade launchers and others have light-saber-esque weapon. The US Army makes quick work of them, though, as soon as they are caught in broad daylight.
  • No Body Left Behind: The monsters all melt when they die, but the cyborg Golems do not. Not even if you change rooms and come back later, which is especially surprising for a Playstation game. This is not just a gameplay convention, either; in the Dust Chute, after seemingly defeating the Glutton, Aya knows it isn't dead because its body hasn't melted.
  • Noob Cave: The shooting range in the MIST HQ, although you can skip it entirely if you wish. Tackling all the challenges and scoring high will net you some nifty items. The highest leveled challenge will cause damage to Aya but the challenge is automatically stopped if her HP gets too low with Pierce commenting "Now if this were real, you'd be dead."
  • "Not So Different" Remark: No. 9 uses this trope the first two times he and Aya run into each other, largely as a means of taunting her.
    No.9: I'm a Hunter, jus' like you.
  • Nuke 'em: Even though the soldiers were actually quite successful in containing the threat, the President still decides (albeit hesitantly) to go ahead with it, while his troops are still on site.
    General: "They'll be buried in Arlington. Proud heroes of the country."
    • However, it later turns out the general must have been overruled. Apparently nobody died from the satellite strike, as the soldiers onsite received orders to evacuate before the blast occurred. They return after the blast to rescue Aya and Eve.
  • Older Than They Look: Aya is chronologically 28, but still looks like she's in her early twenties.
  • Permanently Missable Content:
    • Some items can't be found if you progress too far, mostly the Akropolis stuff, since it's the one place you can never backtrack to. Most notably is a keycard that opens the armoury in the shelter, in this case you also miss all items there, especially a new shotgun.
    • If Flint (the dog) dies, not only will you miss the good ending, you also have to say goodbye to a lot of useful stuff that otherwise becomes available in Dryfield. Like a new machine pistol, a new vest or the ofuda (for which you must save Pierce which is easy to screw up), and even more stuff near the end.
    • There's also a weird case of a clue being lost forever. Four mysterious riddles are written throughout Dryfield, each giving you a number and telling you where the next clue is (the prize is the safe combination with a rare item in it). One of these four riddles, though, is in a very easy-to-miss spot (a window looking out on the desert) which is right before a local boss fight, after which it becomes night and you can't see the riddle anymore.
  • Product Placement: Aya can drink cans of Coca-Cola to recover her HP and MP. A magnet (in the shape of a Coke bottle cap) is needed for a puzzle. Prominent Coke vending machines are placed throughout the game as well. Strikingly, these have been kept for the PSN rerelease.
  • Random Encounters: Averted unlike the first game; there is a set number of enemies to fight. When areas on your map are highlighted red, that means an enemy is going to be there. These highlighted areas trigger based on event flags as the game progresses.
  • Rare Candy: Protein Capsules, which recovers all HP and boosts max HP by 5. Lipstick increases maximum MP by 1.
  • Redshirt Army: The SWAT Team at the beginning of the game in the Akropolis Tower. Almost the entire team is dead when Aya enters. A handful of survivors also get taken out by the Neo-Mitochondrion Creatures in short order, except for one guy who is a traitor.
  • Regenerating Mana: The Monk Robe is the only armor in the entire game that can let your MP regenerate during combat via being hit by enemy attacks.
  • Replay Mode: The game features Replay Mode as one of the choice of the New Game Plus selections. It's the plain one without any addition apart from post-game items to be used for the player from the beginning.
  • Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: They may not have been fanatic or right-wing, but Douglas does mention the shelter out in the desert was once owned by a militia group before being bought out by a large corporation.
  • Scenery Porn: For the time in which it was made, Parasite Eve 2's backgrounds are amazingly detailed. They were all pre-rendered and still-shots were used as the backgrounds, similar to how most Resident Evil games worked, but with much more work put into them. These places look like places where people worked, ate and lived; a lot of thought went into them and thus it brings a lot of verisimilitude.
    • Most bits of scenery can also be examined, prodding several different lines of description from Aya. That is easily more detail than most old-school adventure games have.
  • Semper Fi: U.S. Marines join the fight at the shelter late in the game.
  • Shooting Gallery: The target range in MIST HQ, which also acts as a short tutorial on fighting.
  • Shout-Out:
    • In Dryfield's bar, you can find a pinball machine themed after Einhänder, an early Playstation Shoot 'Em Up by Square.
    • Another is the "Gunblade" from Final Fantasy VIII, which is an unlockable weapon.
    • Aya's battle stance when wielding the "Gunblade" is somehow a right-handed, girly version of the famous Gatotsu technique (except here she slashes the blade)
    • A completely different game series gets a nod in one of the Escort Missions: try going through the wrong door enough times with Kyle in tow and he'll warn that you might be eaten by a Grue.
    • Aya lampshades her boss' nickname being taken from "Hal" the psycho computer from 2001. It turns out to be quite meaningful when he's revealed to be The Mole. Similarly, you encounter an ANMC who used to be a scientist named Bowman. The other scientists he was rooming with are named Poole, Kaminsky, Kimball, and Hunter, the names of the crew of the Discovery.
    • There's a Shout Out to Wizards of the Coast in the Game Room in the well. If prompted long enough, Aya will comment that Pierce keeps going on about "Whotsee" (WOTC obviously being the company's acronym) and "Caves & Creatures".
    • Aya named her car Carrie.
    • Cloud and Aeris from Final Fantasy VII are name-dropped, appearing as an computer antivirus and a magazine with a clue on how to enter the files of a computer in the Shelter.
    • A chaser monster must be fought as alive and undead. This is a call back to the behemoth king of Final Fantasy VI, which must be fought twice as alive and undead.
    • Looking at a mirror in her room will cause Aya to reference Casablanca and Indiana Jones.
    • In their first encounter, No.9 attacks Aya with a machete while wearing what looks like a hockey mask.
    • Let's not forget the Highlander reference.
    • In the ending, the White House covers up the satellite strike on Dryfield by calling it an accidental explosion of a nuclear device by a cult. This is very similar to the cover story in Metal Gear Solid that Secretary Houseman was planning to use to cover up the planned nuclear bombing of Shadow Moses (that a terrorist group accidentally detonated a nuclear device) until Snake and Campbell foiled his plan.
    • Dryfield itself comes across as an extended one to Tremors. An isolated town in Nevada beset by monsters, Aya finds the corpse of a man who died of dehydration on top of a water tower and receives help from a Crazy-Prepared Gun Nut who has a very prominent Wall of Weapons and a truck that looks very similar to the one Val and Earl drive.
    • Eve is a lab-grown clone whose psychic powers are used to operate remote weapons, much like Ple Two. She's also a little blonde girl wearing black and red to draw attention to it.
  • Shower Scene: The scene before the Burner boss fight shows Aya taking a shower until she feels the ground shake. Naturally, the camera cuts away quickly when Aya's privates could be seen.
  • Shown Their Work:
    • The descriptions of the weapons and armor in the game are quite accurate. For instance, the PASGT vest that Gary Douglas sells in his trailer is described as "armor currently in use by the military." This is true; the PASGT was used by the U.S. Armed Forces from the 1990s to the mid-2000s. The Ringer's solution blood substitute item, which fully recovers all HP & MP, is a real blood substitute fluid.
    • Late in the game, a scene in the White House is shown to take place on Sept. 6, 2000, 6:37 PM. Then we cut to a scene with Aya taking place on the same day at 3:52 PM. No, it's not chronologically out of order; the times are taking into account the 3 hour difference between Eastern Standard Time in Washington D.C. and Pacific Standard Time in Nevada.
    • The Hypervelocity Gun is stated by the President to be a leftover project from the SDI program. The system itself is a orbital kinetic strike platform, and this is reflected when it bombards the nuclear shelter. The damage from its shots does not resemble a conventional explosion, but is a very clean surgical strike through the bunker, which is what a tungsten rod dropped from orbit would do.
    • The 9mm Hydra rounds are described as hollow point bullets that are designed to damage soft tissue. This is all but certain to be a reference to the Hydra-Shok line of jacketed hollow point rounds produced by Federal Premium Ammunition.
    • Based on the inventory graphics, the 9mm Spartan bullets appear to be based on a fairly obscure attempt to develop bullets with both good armor penetration capabilities and high damage to soft tissue, and by extension, little risk of over-penetration. These were developed under the names Tres Haute Vitesse (French for "very high velocity") and later Monad.
    • Jodie mentions how Pierce once accidentally loaded 9mm ammunition in a gun that is chambered for .38 rounds. The common 9x19 mm cartridges are actually very close in dimensions and appearance to some types of .38 handgun ammunition, so this is a very plausible (even tragically so) mistake for a novice firearm user to make.
  • Spoiler Opening: The opening cinematic shows parts of the Cut Scene where the US military storms the Ark facility and easily dispatches the Elite Mooks that you've had difficulty killing upon their release, not to mention the big Kill Sat scene just before the final bosses. The intro even spoils the identity of Eve long before you even see the girl at all.
  • Suspicious Video-Game Generosity: After falling into the Dust Chute in the shelter, there is both an infinite ammo box of 9mm Parabellum rounds and one of the very few boxes of 9mm Hydra rounds in the game available. Better stock up for the Glutton boss fight.
  • Swiss-Army Weapon: The basic assault rifle can have a number of different attachments that give it different functions, including a grenade launcher, a bayonet, a flamethrower and a laser! Truth in Television for the M4A1 rifle, which is very customizable.
  • Tank Controls: In a major departure from the original game's analog controls, 2 uses the Resident Evil standard.
  • Team Killer: Aya can perform this when a grenade launcher-equipped GOLEM enemy "aims" at her with its laser sight, locks on when the laser sight disappears and Aya quickly moves to the side and the grenades hit the other GOLEM(s) instead, which is a very invaluable method of chipping away those nasty GOLEM enemies' health, especially on Bounty and Nightmare difficulties.
  • Toilet Humor: With actual toilets in fact. Look at enough of them and Aya will say she needs to get out more.
  • Too Awesome to Use: Ringer's Solution (full HP and MP recovery) and Belt Pouches (boosts armor attachment slots by 1). Scavenger Mode forces you to do this to yourself since items are either too hard to find or too expensive to buy.
  • Universal Ammo: Unlike the first game, averted this time. Most of the guns use ammo appropriate for them. The guns that can share ammo are guns that would take the same ammunition in real life, such as pistols and submachine guns using 9mm rounds. This is also lampshaded with Jodie who mentions how Pierce once tried to load a weapon with 9mm rounds when it actually uses .38 rounds and the results were not pretty. This is also due to Pierce not knowing how to handle firearms due to his Does Not Like Guns nature.
  • The Unreveal: Even if you dig through every piece of information in the game and get the best ending, very little is revealed about the organization which constructed Neo Ark or what happened to them since.
  • Video Game Cruelty Potential: The fight against the Burner boss has two outcomes with two different rewards. Beat it and Douglas gives you the Hydra, a fully automatic submachine gun that can hold a whopping 100 rounds. Take too long to kill the boss and it'll flee, leaving you with less EXP and BP earned while Douglas gives you the Chicken Plate, an armor that gives a hefty extra 100 HP, regenerates HP after every fight, and can protect Aya from a fatal blow by leaving her at one HP. However, getting the Chicken Plate means that Flint, Douglas's dog, dies due to being crushed by the fleeing boss. If you want the Chicken Plate, you have to intentionally do little to no damage to the boss, even if it means getting the dog killed in the end.
  • Voluntary Shapeshifting: Strangers can mimic their original human form, but only for a short time.
  • Wall of Weapons: Dryfield's only inhabitant is an old man who's surrounded much of the town with booby traps and has a miniature arsenal in his shed. He becomes your main weapon vendor for the first half of the game.
  • Was Once a Man: Most of the monsters in the first game are mutated animals. Most of the monsters in this game, however, are mutated humans. Some of them, like the young woman in the Akropolis Tower's cafĂ©, even mutate right in front of you.
  • Wham Line: After Aya defeats No. 9 for a second time in Dryfield, he remarks how Aya has some sort of connection to Eve. Aya is completely startled by the revelation, wondering how someone knows of her and Eve from 3 years ago. Aya's powers go out of control as she inadvertently burns up No. 9 while she passes out. Afterwards, Aya has a dream of a little girl who looks like her that is wandering around in some sort of laboratory. This nearly mirrors Aya's visions of Maya in the first game and she later wonders if Eve has come back again.
  • "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The True Ending has one, shedding light on all the members of the MIST office and what they're up to now, and even includes what Maeda is up to now.
  • You Are Number 6: The Big Bad is a Gunblade-slinging rooftop-hopping ape-like zombie cyborg supersoldier called Number Nine.


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