Flesh & Blood does an admirable job capturing the feel of the Saw franchise, but that's about it.
The game follows the storyline of the films, fitting snugly between Saw II and III, picking up where the first Saw game left off. For the majority of the game, you play as Michael Tapp, the son of Danny Glover's character from the movies. Michael is, shockingly enough, caught in one of Jigsaw's trademark mazes, fighting for his life and escape. Though there are a few respectable twists in the game, the story isn't all that thrilling or even important. And even if it were, you would have a hard time keeping up, since the game assumes you know each and every bit character from the movies from heart. Fresh faces are introduced with little to no exposition, leaving many players in the dark.
Since Saw II is a puzzle game at heart, gameplay mostly involves you solving a variety of diabolical (or downright dull) puzzles. This is perhaps where Flesh & Blood shines the most, though one might not call it a shine but rather a faint shimmer. There are a few genuinely hard or inventive puzzles that manage to capture and aptly portray the essence of the film series. Unfortunately, these puzzles are repeated ad nauseam and coupled with other, more uninspired and clichéd ones.
The silver lining to be found with the puzzles is that no matter how boring or excessively punitive they may be, at least they keep you from the combat portion of the game. Combat is a quick time event, meaning you need to press the corresponding buttons in order to successfully wield a baseball bat and pummel someone to death with it. Though combat of this nature never feels truly satisfying, Heavy Rain taught us that it can be done without completely ruining the experience. Apparently the guys at Zombie missed that lesson, since combat is easily the worst, most offending part about Saw II. At the same time it is incredibly boring, aggravatingly finicky and sucks out what little suspension the game manages to build up.
Graphically, the game isn't as insulting, though it's far from gorgeous, or even good-looking. Levels have that appropriately grimy look to them that one would expect from a Saw product, though they are fairly repetitious and exceedingly dark. The animations aren't any better, with most characters coming off as automatons rather than actual human beings.
The audio on the other hand hits the right notes fairly consistently. Most of the voice cast deliver their lines with appropriate energy and expertise, with only a few really hamming it up. The soundtrack is sparse and as one would expect, "Hello Zepp" (Saw's theme) plays often. Sound effects are less exhilarating and end up being re-used a lot, but they work well enough.
Despite everything Flesh & Blood does wrong (and there's plenty, trust me), one can almost see what it could have been, given enough time and money. It really does capture the overall feel of the franchise, which might even be enough for some hardcore fans to overlook the other issues. Sadly for the rest of us, Saw II is an obvious budget title (though fully priced), released to cash in on the release of Saw 3D, with terrible gameplay and uninspired execution. Also, having to have to play through the entire game again (once was bad enough) to experience both endings is extremely cheap, considering the only changes to the story are at the very end.