The Ascent on Switch 2: a city and a second contract

Your employer has collapsed, your district is in danger, and the way out involves a gun and some replacement body parts. The Ascent Ultimate Edition brings that unpleasant working day to Switch 2 on 3 December in the UK. Neon Giant's cyberpunk action RPG gives you a whole corporate city to explore alone or with up to three friends, with three DLC packs included. Its most inviting detail is smaller than the skyline: you can choose whether to aim your weapon low or high.

That extra choice gives the shooting a useful wrinkle. Alongside switching weapons and equipping gadgets, you have cover and destructible surroundings to consider. There's character development to spend time on between firefights, too, with skill points and cyberware shaping your worker as you progress. The Switch 2 edition adds Joy-Con 2 mouse controls to that mixture, as well as local GameShare. For a newcomer, this is an opportunity to begin with both the original adventure and its follow-up contract in one purchase.

Down among the machinery

The Ascent Group owns the worker you play and everyone else in your district. Its arcology is a city that reaches upwards through layers of industry, housing and wealth, populated by creatures from across the galaxy. When the corporation suddenly shuts down, your immediate job is to survive and investigate the collapse. It's an effective starting point for an action RPG: the institution controlling daily life disappears, leaving your character to find a route through the consequences with weapons, equipment and allies.

Veles gives that journey an unusually strong sense of scale. The official press images place narrow walkways and human-sized figures against immense machinery and densely stacked buildings. There are slums and luxury districts to explore, loot to find and characters to meet along the way. The contrast between those places is part of the attraction. You spend the adventure at street level, close enough to deal with the people living inside a structure whose upper reaches can fill the background.

The combat combines aiming, cover and equipment choices with the longer business of developing a character. Level-ups supply skill points, while augmentations and cyberware offer further ways to configure your fighter. That gives the edition two clear pleasures to offer: immediate shooting and a build to keep adjusting as the story moves on. Nintendo's confirmation of mouse controls is particularly welcome for anyone who likes pointing at targets. The final Switch 2 frame rate and resolution remain unconfirmed, so those are details to check before buying.

A second contract comes included

Cyber Heist is the substantial continuation inside the bundle. It follows the main story, with former employer Kira offering a secret job in another arcology owned by the Malhorst-Gelb Group. New technology is the prize, and other interested parties are after it. The expansion adds main and side missions, new enemies and characters including Ontario and Zell. It also introduces melee weapons, including the Rock Crusher and Guillotine, giving this otherwise gun-heavy adventure another way to fight at close quarters.

The expansion opens after completing the base campaign. Its existing co-op rules allow friends to join when the host has finished that campaign, even if the guests haven't reached the same point. For a group considering the complete adventure, that makes Cyber Heist a useful destination after the initial story. It has its own setting and contract to pursue, rather than simply adding more equipment to the opening hours. The Ultimate Edition puts that continuation alongside the original game from the outset.

The CyberSec and Cyber Warrior packs add equipment and appearance options. CyberSec brings a grenade launcher, burst rifle and cluster grenade, plus armour and animated weapon skins. Cyber Warrior supplies two weapons, a tactical mine, seven armour pieces and three skins, with a samurai-inspired look. Its existing unlock structure distributes equipment through story progress and vendors. Together, the packs offer more choices for outfitting your worker, while Cyber Heist supplies the extra story. Those are different reasons to value the contents of the bundle.

Bring company to Veles

The full adventure supports solo play or a group of up to four. Nintendo also lists local GameShare for the Switch 2 release, allowing friends to receive the shared software for a session. That shared copy lasts only while the session is running. If you're comparing forthcoming co-op adventures, our look at Shrek 2 Remastered's local and online party offers a lighter alternative. The Ascent's company outing involves guns, cybernetic upgrades and an adult cyberpunk setting.

The digital-only Switch 2 edition arrives with the Legacy Patch improvements incorporated. Neon Giant's announced work covers localisation, HDR support and fixes involving co-op teleporting, encounters, saves and progression. The December release is therefore a particularly convenient starting point for Nintendo players: the main story, the later heist and the equipment packs arrive together. Choose it for the combination of shooting and character building, and for a city whose vast industrial spaces surround a much smaller, very heavily armed worker.