Tails of Iron 2: Whiskers of Winter is Odd Bug Studio’s sequel to its 2021 dark fantasy action game, Tails of Iron. This follow-up fleshes out its spellbinding world filled with anthropomorphic animals with new locations, characters and foes while polishing up the gameplay and adding elemental magical abilities for new protagonist Arlo to utilise. While not all of the game’s challenges are quite as engaging as the majority of the experience, Tails of Iron 2: Whiskers of Winter is an excellent followup to the first game which expands the compelling world that Odd Bug Studio has created.

Following the events of the first Tails of Iron, the game now follows Arlo, a young rat who is the son of the Warden of the Wastes, leader of Winter’s Edge Keep in the northern edges of the Ratdom. After Winter’s Edge is attacked by an invading army of bats known as the Dark Wings, Arlo’s father is murdered and Winter’s Edge is razed to the ground. As the new Warden of the Wastes, Arlo must recruit new allies and rebuild Winter’s Edge in order to mount a counter-offensive against the Dark Wings.

It isn’t the most complex of plots, but the theatrical fantasy politicking and worldbuilding is granted a significant amount of gravitas by Doug Cockle’s narration, while the actual interaction between characters plays out in little emoji speech bubbles and sound effects. Fittingly, considering Cockle’s pedigree as the voice of Geralt of Rivia in the Witcher games, his gravelly intonations give just the right amount of grit and severity that Tails of Iron 2 needs, evoking the epic tone of the likes of The Witcher or A Song of Ice and Fire in this world of rats, frogs, owls and bats.

The setting is further brought to life with the game’s beautiful painterly art style, evoking a medieval tapestry in motion. From the sunlight filtering through the trees in the Golden Forest to the gloomy illumination permeating the bogs of the Rift, it injects a lot of life and personality into Tails of Iron 2’s world and makes it a gorgeous place to explore.

Tails of Iron 2 builds on the strong foundation of its predecessor without messing too much with what worked. As with the first game, it is a 2D action game where you explore different areas of the Ratdom to complete quests for your allies, hunt vicious monsters and forage for materials to upgrade your gear. While the game has the Souls-like tag on Steam for some reason, I don’t think the Dark Souls series is the best comparison, considering the game lacks a levelling system or stamina mechanic. Indeed, considering your main method of getting stronger is crafting better gear and preparing for tough fights by bringing in the right traps and equipment, my personal point of comparison was more Monster Hunter than Dark Souls.

The main new addition to your arsenal in Tails of Iron 2 is elemental magical spells. The ability to shoot fireballs or stun foes with lightning bolts was a neat feature. However, these spells took a bit too much time to recharge to be more than a once-or-twice-a-fight kind of resource. While you can’t exactly roleplay as a rat mage as a result, being able to supplement your attacks with a well-timed magical stun to get in some healing or free hits always feels satisfying.

The combat isn’t exactly flawless, mind; once you’ve unlocked ranged attacks and all of your magical spells, the combat doesn’t really evolve much after that point. While there is something to be said about keeping the gameplay simple, Arlo’s move set is essentially limited to light attack or charged attack with either his one- or two-handed weapon, along with limited ranged weapons and very limited spells. It would have been nice to at least supplement your attacks with different combos or grenades, or just be able to use magical abilities more often so that they felt like a more integral part of Arlo’s moveset. You can bring traps, but you can only store one of each element, making them essentially single-use items that don’t have much utility in some of the late-game, multi-stage boss fights.

A not-insubstantial number of late-game enemies can also teleport, usually just as I am about to hit them with minimal lead-up or warning in order to maximise the annoyance of fighting them. I get that the idea is to focus on attacking while they’re in the middle of an attack animation during which they cannot also teleport, but that felt too risky most of the time. I just wish all of these enemies would focus more on actually engaging me in combat rather than frequently flying or teleporting away from me to draw out the fight.

In addition to the main quest, the game has a decent amount of side content. In addition to finding lost items for townsfolk and hunting bonus bosses for rare materials, the player can invest funds and resources into rebuilding Winter’s Edge. While a lot of the keep upgrades are mandatory for progression, the upgrade costs are less onerous than they were in the first game, and I generally acquired the necessary materials by playing through the story missions without having to grind very much. While the sidequests certainly became pretty formulaic before long, there aren’t so many of them that they overstay their welcome, and the rewards were generally pretty useful.