I’ve played a few second games in long running franchises. Ones that often go radically different and in some cases like Final Fantasy and Zelda, much for the worse. Now reading this you can tell I’m referring to 8 bit games on Nintendo consoles. Well today I looked at the second game of the Metroid series that moved from 8 bit home console to 8 bit handheld.

As mentioned, Metroid 2 is a game for the Nintendo Gameboy, and those of you with Nintendo Switch online can play it on its Gameboy player, which I did for this review. I had the cartridge as a child but… eh battery is probably dead even if I could find a Gameboy to play it.

Set after the events of the first Metroid game (and thus its remake Zero Mission which is the version you should play… and all the Prime games… assuming Prime 4 is also set before this). It has been decided that the Metroids are too dangerous to be left alive. So Samus is sent out to exterminate the lot of them.

The game is considerably more linear than the original Metroid. There isn’t really any backtracking as progress is locked not by your equipment but by how many Metroids you have exterminated in that location. For those that played Zero Mission… or decided to hurt themselves by playing the original (look it screwed me over by never dropping missiles at the end and that left me very sour) You would remember that Metroids are only killable by freezing them then firing missiles… well good news and bad news. Bad news is the Metroids have been evolving, growing into new stages past what was revealed to be their Larval form and as you progress through the game you find bigger stronger stages in their development. Good news is none of these require the ice beam so just missile away. You find your first Alpha Metroid almost immediately and take it out without much difficulty.

As you progress deeper down you encounter large batches of acid that prevent you going further. These recede when you kill all the Metroids in that location. You can find some power ups, a few Energy tanks, plenty of missiles, some beam upgrades and a few movement enhancements, but you won’t ever find yourself having to go back to a previous location to find a power up. It is very linear.

Because Samus’ sprite is notably larger this time due to the limitations of the Gameboy, and the backgrounds being a lot more… samey looking, it’s much easier to get lost even in these enclosed areas as you’re not quite sure what part of that map you’re on. So be grateful this isn’t a game with backtracking then.

Like all 2d Metroid games you get better endings the faster you complete the game, and I don’t recall there being an item tracker when I finished it so the speed is your only real challenge.

It’s interesting how going forward in the franchise this game would turn out to be quite pivotal. In Fusion we discover the world was home to the horrific X Parasites, and the Chozo, an advanced race of bird-like aliens who raised Samus in fact created Metroids to wipe them out. This would go on to explain artificial constructs deep into the planet. It also adds a small chill to the game thinking of how a potential greater threat was hiding and the very thing you were wiping out was what was holding them back, something remakes would add post credit scenes to reveal.

While the game is nothing compared to the heights Super got to, it is a considerable improvement over the first game. While losing out on the Metroidvania backtracking and exploration of power up acquisition, it functions a lot better mechanically than the clunky original and wont mess up a good run by just bad rng at the end…. YES I’M STILL BITTER. You still get the dark exploration of an alien world though. Compared to later games, yeah it seems a bit clunky too, but more approachable than the original, plus going forward, turned out to be vital.

Rating: 🎮🎮🎮