Blood Omen 2 is the fourth game in the Legacy of Kain series and the second in the Blood Omen arc of the series. Blood Omen 2 is the sequel to Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, following Kain's story in the centuries after the Collapse of the Pillars. Chronologically, the game is set in an era between the events of Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain and Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver in the altered timeline created by Soul Reaver 2's final Paradoxes. In a notable departure from Blood Omen's two-dimensional hack-and-slash gameplay, Blood Omen 2 was in the Action-Adventure genre, similar to the games of the Soul Reaver arc. It was developed by Crystal Dynamics and published by Eidos Interactive and was released on the PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube, and Microsoft Windows throughout 2002.