Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder Review

Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder (Cave Digger 2 henceforth for the sake of brevity) is a VR mining game in which you have to delve deep into the mines and gather ores to delve deeper and unlock more upgrades.

The story of Cave Digger 2 is told through sets of comic books that you can find at the end of each expedition. Although it's relatively simple, the way the story was told was enjoyable — finding the comics and reading them was a unique way to experience a narrative. That said, realistically, Cave Digger 2 doesn't revolve much around its narrative, and it has more focus on its gameplay aspects and loop.

Starting the game, you'll wake up in the middle of a mine and go through a quick tutorial that teaches you everything you'll be doing throughout your adventure: mining, grabbing the ore from the ground, fighting, mining a bit more, and then cashing in for profit; a pretty straightforward system. You first start with a pickaxe that you can swing with one hand (I opted to do it with both because of immersion) to gather the ore, but you will slowly work your way up to having several upgrades to help you out throughout your mining, including a sledgehammer, shovel, dynamite, and more. Essentially, Cave Digger 2 follows this gameplay loop, and it can either be its charming aspect or its greatest downfall, depending on how you feel about this sort of title.

The gameplay loop is straightforward, as delving into the mines (which are randomly generated, and thus you'll be able to do endlessly), mining, and fighting are all relatively simple tasks that I recognise others that are more intolerant to these sorts of jobs might see as a chore. I, personally, found Cave Digger 2 to be a surprisingly relaxing title, as I would find myself just passively mining away and engaging in shooting fights with bugs every once in a while, but the difficulty was never too steep to cause any form of stress. This monotonous gameplay is an enjoyable task, as you slowly use your money to unlock upgrades that assist you in the expeditions, and you can open a total of four new areas to explore. Oftentimes, they can get a bit solitary, as mining away for hours on end and taking all of the jobs might be a bit arduous, especially once harder rock comes into play, and you have to mine with more potent, slower tools, like the sledgehammer.

One thing I did appreciate about the game is the way the backpack automatically replaces the lowest-priced ore for the more expensive ones. Although, the backpack's size was a tad disappointing, as it often filled in the first of three levels and managed to discourage me from mining for gold because I could find other, more expensive minerals instead of breaking my back trying to mine through walls and walls of gold. 

Whenever you don't want to delve into the mines, you can try your hand at exploring the new overworld hub that Cave Digger 2 implemented, with a sort of open area that you can explore for treasure. After delving into several expeditions, I found a map leading to a treasure chest with a scribble that looked suspiciously like a penis... This is very in line with Cave Digger 2's raw sense of humour, shocking me with unexpected profanity at one point. Although I'm not often a fan of this form of comedy, Cave Digger 2 never takes it too far, and I thoroughly appreciated that.

The combat is very fun and relatively simple, as Cave Digger 2 never managed to become frustrating due to its difficulty and ruining what I took as a relaxing experience. The caves are plagued by an infestation of bugs, each with their own unique attacks and skills that will try to foil your mining plans, but they're relatively simple to dispatch when you're equipped with a 6-shot electric revolver. Although the game failed to mention this early, which nearly gave me a panic attack the first time I ran out of ammo in my clip, ammunition is infinite, and all you'll have to do is reload. Engaging in shooting fights against enemies was fun, but having the gun to shoot down ores was exhilarating and a great form of target practice to keep you ready for any enemy. I feared that the combat would become tedious, but it remained fun, even after facing a boss at the end of one of my expeditions.

All of that said, Cave Digger 2 can get a bit lonely and arduous when tackling it alone, so you can play co-op with a friend or online with other VR users to make the job a bit less tedious. Splitting the jobs or both members doing it together can immensely speed up the process and make it a far more bearable task... if you can find a server to play on. I don't know if it's because of my location (being in South America) or if I am incredibly unfortunate, but finding an open session felt almost as impossible as splitting a diamond. Despite routinely checking for a fellow miner to play with, I was unable to find a proper session to join and try the multiplayer. So, if you're looking to try out Cave Digger 2 for its co-op opportunities, you might find more success by inviting a friend to accompany you on expeditions. I can only imagine, however, that this title will be pretty fantastic when played online with others, as splitting the jobs or mining with a buddy will make for some fun time.

Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder is a great title for those that don't mind monotonous and repetitive tasks. Although mining can be fun for the first couple of hours, the repetitive nature of these tasks can become tedious for those with less tolerance for this sort of gameplay. Although co-op sessions might be a great way to solve this, I was unable to test this feature to give my verdict on it properly.