Hands On: Chivalry 2 Is A Multiplayer Game You Do Not Want To Sleep On

Within the first few minutes of Chivalry 2, you're thrown into a boot camp and taught the basics. Whilst this is happening, you're being shouted at by your trainer as he pushes you forward through each tutorial. It's a jarring start and one that surprised us. Not because it was anything jaw-dropping, but purely through the tone it was conveying. Everything felt very tongue-in-cheek, as if we were being ushered through a Starship Troopers-esque training montage - but set in medieval times. There's a cheekiness to Chivalry 2, and one that ultimately works to elevate the game.

If you're unaware of what Chivalry 2 is, imagine the concept of Battlefield, but instead of military action, you're engaging in large scale melee battles that would give Game of Thrones a run for its money. You'll charge into battle, complete objectives, and lop off a lot of limbs. It's bloody, frantic, and a hell of a lot of fun.

But aside from how easy it is to pick up and enjoy, it's also surprisingly complex. The introduction teaches you a variety of mechanics that demonstrate it's not just aimless thrashing around and hoping for the best. You can set up combos by moving the camera left to right. How this works is you aim to catch an opponent off guard and quickly cause a ton of damage. It's hard to pull off at first, but within a few matches you'll be heading straight into the battlefield like Aragorn from Lord of the Rings.

The matches play out in a variety of ways, too. The most common is objective based games, which play similarly to Star Wars Battlefront. You'll be pushing forward through the map as an attacker, or defending the position as a defender. You'll push battling rams, go for capture points, and end with a climactic battle against the enemy team's Duke. It's constantly changing up the objectives, and as a result, forces you to change the way you play. While it still has simple team deathmatch modes for fun, it's the objective ones that really shine.

As we mentioned before, there's a comical side to Chivalry 2 - one perhaps that has been hidden from a lot of the promotional material. You'll be charging into battle and throwing your war cry around left, right and centre. These range from a simple scream to pretty expletive comments. It adds some hilarity to the battle, as does chopping off players' limbs and seeing them hobble around with one arm. It's a sense of dark humour we weren't really expecting, but it adds a lot of personality to the game.

Over the course of the game's lifespan, the team has confirmed it's committed to delivering more than double the content already available. From the chunk we've played, we've already hit a few repeat maps and encountered with a weird visual glitch which gave us coloured flashing lights on the screen. But outside of these small issues, Chivalry 2 is looking to be another staple of our multiplayer gaming library. With games such as Knockout City and this, multiplayer is thriving this year with some unique experiences - stepping away from the traditional Fortnite and Call of Duty: Warzone. We're pretty happy with that.

Have you checked out Chivalry 2? Let us know in the comments below.