Improves on many aspects of the first Overlord but lacks a bit of it's predecessor's charm.
The basics of the game-play remain the same: Controlling 4 different types of minions and having them do the hard work, your overlord sometimes joining in with his spells and weapon of choice. Now your minions won't charge into water on mass, resulting in mass death, one might fall in and drown but the rest will stop. As well as being a little bit smarter, they are also tougher and if you want to keep a certain minion, who might have a special set of armour for example, you can revive him for a cost of that type of minion essence.
As you go through the land, you and your minions get stronger as you pick up equipment and fight your way through, leaving a trail of evil. The controls are simple enough to get used to and it works well most of the time, allowing you to adjust and deal with any situation. The game keeps things fresh by making each land look so different, having creatures unique to that that requires differing tactics, the bosses require thought to defeat. If you get it wrong and die, which should be fairly rare, you can retry from a very recent point with all your minions in that section returned, even the ones that recently died. The game even throws in mounts and naval combat, two decent idea's that could have been used more then it was. You will also pick up mistresses and items for the forge, eventually being able to buy furnishings from the ladies and combined with the more detailed minion homes, it will lead to an impressive looking dark tower.
The story is pretty good, not a heartbreaking epic but one that provides a few surprises, links everything up nicely and makes good use of it's characters. The voice-overs fit each character superbly and those characters stand out from each other, providing their share of laughs and memorable moments, from the major ones like your advisor Gnarl to minor characters relevant only to that one section.
Things have improved from the first game but there are problems. The graphics looked a little dated though are by no means horrible while sometimes the camera angle can be rather dodgy late in the game. One bug means you have to be careful not to transport two items to the tower very close together or it won't count the second, which in the case of the blue hive means having to load up two saves back or else be unable to continue the story. The lock on system often doesn't work in a helpful way and can be frustrating try to lock onto something you need, minions and gold get stuck in the terrain, sometimes when you have a big hoard, minions can wander off quite some distance and take awhile to come back, or vanishes and has to be re-summoned. There is also two sections, in the first half of the game, which requires moving one minion using the right stick, the problem is it can call for precision that is rather difficult to pull off and can lead to an hour or two of real frustration.
Some of the flaws can lead to frustration and the gameplay is unable to make grinding, for gold or for minion essence, fun despite the shortcuts. Overall, despite these problems, it is a good, solid game with a sense of humour and characters that make it really rather fun.