Watch Dogs 2: 10 Massive Improvements Over The First Game
2. Actual Social Commentary
Watch Dogs achieved social commentary on par with your average Year 10 Media Studies essay, summarising with "Phones can be bad idk". Watch Dogs 2 bothers to unpack bigger ideas to do with race, class, and the value of big data over human lives.
A returning theme is Marcus's criminal record, and the fact that he is often seen as a lesser member of the community due to his race, despite the fact that he's smarter than about 95% of the population.
There are also big ideas in play about the roles of social media within an election (ring any bells?), how new-age corporations can hide malicious intent behind friendly branding, and the positive and negative effects of anarchy vs. techno-fascism.
It's genuinely surprising not just how many important themes Watch Dogs 2 deals with, but how many real life events it managed to refer to, before they even happened. A lot of people have pointed out the similarities between Watch Dogs 2 and GTA V, but I'd go as far as to say that the former does a better job of exploring complex themes, and doesn't just namecheck and heckle such things for comedic effect.