Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Gaming
  3. News

Axiom Verge 2 brings classic Metroidvania action to Nintendo Switch in 2020

Gabe Gurwin
By
1 of 6
Axiom Verge 2
Axiom Verge 2
Axiom Verge 2
Axiom Verge 2
Axiom Verge 2
Axiom Verge 2

Tom Happ’s Axiom Verge is a wonderfully designed love letter to the classic Metroid games of the NES and SNES generations, with atmospheric science-fiction environments and plenty of power-ups and abilities to use. If you’ve already played through the original and discovered every secret, you’ll be happy to know a full sequel, Axiom Verge 2, is coming to Nintendo Switch next year.

Appearing at the end of Nintendo’s Indie World Showcase presentation on December 10, Happ explained that he has been working on Axiom Verge 2 for the last four years, and he offered a sneak peek at gameplay for eagle-eyed fans to sift through.

Related Videos

“You are not in control. You are not yourself. You belong to us now,” text reads at the beginning of the teaser.

Related

We see the protagonist materialize in a region filled with snow-covered mountains, jumping across treacherous obstacles and battling enemies with special moves and an ice pick weapon. They soon dive into the darker, spookier areas fans of the first game might be more familiar with, and briefly turn into a spider creature before disappearing.

You may think you already know the world of Axiom Verge. Think again.

Discover the origins of the @AxiomVerge universe in #AxiomVerge2 coming to #NintendoSwitch in 2020! #IndieWorld pic.twitter.com/XZqvgcEwKn

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) December 10, 2019

Axiom Verge helped to fill a void left by the notable absence of the classic Metroid games over the last decade, with Metroid: Samus Returns only recently rectifying that on 3DS. Happ’s blending of mysterious environments with tried-and-true exploration and platforming gameplay made the game arguably more acclaimed than any Metroid game in recent memory, including Samus Returns. With its pixel-art style, it’s a perfect fit for the Nintendo Switch. The first game is already available to play on the system right now.

Axiom Verge 2 will release for Nintendo Switch in autumn 2020. No other platforms have been announced thus far, but the previous game released for everything from PlayStation 4 to Linux, so we would be surprised if the sequel doesn’t follow suit.

It was far from the only game announcement made during the Indie World Showcase, too. Nintendo also used the video presentation to announce Sports Story, a sequel to Golf Story with more variety but the same classic role-playing elements that fans loved in the original. Also, if you’ve been waiting to play Dauntless on Switch, you can do so for free today.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon might be the new Okami
Cheshire and Cereza look out at a forest landscape in Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon.

I’ve played a ridiculous number of games in my lifetime, so it takes a special kind of experience to permanently stick in my mind. That’s the case with Okami, a 2006 adventure game that has had no real peers up until this point. Drawing inspiration from The Legend of Zelda series, Okami stands out in a crowded genre for its lovable wolf protagonist, memorable cel-shaded art style, and a wholly unique combat system that involves painting to slash enemies. For nearly two decades, I’ve been searching for an adventure game that can even approach its creative spirit and the way it gleefully plays with a well-trodden formula.

To my utter surprise and delight, Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon might be that game.

Read more
Metroid Prime 4: Release date prediction, trailers, gameplay, and more
Samus holding cube in Metroid Dread.

One of Nintendo's lesser-known yet still beloved franchises is Metroid -- a series that originally began on the NES, putting us in the shoes of bounty hunter Samus Aran. Now, over 35 years later, fans are eagerly awaiting the next entry in the series, Metroid Prime 4, which has been in the works for several years.

The Prime series takes the formula introduced in the 2D games and turns it into a 3D, first-person adventure that still very much feels like Metroid, despite the perspective shift.

Read more
Bringing VR’s best Star Wars game to PlayStation VR2 was a no-brainer, devs say
star wars tales from the galaxys edge psvr2 interview ilmxlab starwarstalesee screenshot c 3po and r2 d2

When ILMxLAB learned about the PlayStation VR2, Director Jose Perez III thought it was a "no-brainer" for the studio to bring the Oculus Quest game Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge to the new headset.
"We're always looking at how we can push the fidelity of the work that we're doing," Perez III tells Digital Trends in an interview. "PlayStation VR2 is ridiculously powerful; we got really excited about what we could bring to that. We started talking with our friends at Sony because we had a great relationship with them for Vader Immortal, and it was really a no-brainer. Then, you put the headset on, you start feeling the haptics, and you start seeing what you can do with the visual fidelity and lighting, and it's like, 'Oh, this is awesome!'"
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge - Enhanced Edition | Official Trailer | PS VR2
PlayStation VR2's launch and its first wave of games are nearly upon us, and Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge Enhanced Edition is one of those titles. This is a make-or-break time for VR, which is still struggling to move into the mainstream but could become more popular if Sony's headset can offer a compelling and accessible virtual reality experience. Ahead of its release, Digital Trends spoke to Director Jose Perez III and Producer Harvey Whitney from ILMxLAB to learn about the process of crafting one of these critical "no-brainer" launch games and PlayStation VR2 will ultimately stand when it comes to the future of VR gaming.
The power of PlayStation VR2
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge was originally released for Meta Quest VR headsets in November 2020. It's set on the planet of Batuu, which people also explore at Dinsey parks, and follows a Droid Technician who gets caught in the middle of a grander fight against the First Order after crash-landing on the planet. At the time, it was meant with decent reviews and only got better as its story was completed and expanded with the Last Call DLC.
After getting the "Enhanced Edition" of the game for PlayStation VR2 greenlit, ILMxLAB actually had to go and make it. As the team was dealing with new hardware for the first time, producer Harvey Whitney thought it was good that the team's first project on PlayStation VR2 was an enhanced version of an existing game.
"Early on, knowing that we already had the content that was created for the original, that changes things quite a bit," Whitney tells Digital Trends. "We're not redeveloping the story and coming up with all of that. We just had that opportunity to work as a team and ask, 'What do we really push here, and where are the changes that we want to make, and what we can do to really take advantage of this hardware?'"

The VR space is full of different headsets with unique specs, with the much higher specs of the PS VR2 standing out. The PlayStation VR2 sports some impressive specs compared to its VR peers, displaying content in a 4000x2030 HDR format at a 90Hz or 120Hz frame rate. Plus, games have the PS5's power, spatial, and brand new Sense controllers to take advantage of, rather than the 2013 console and 2010 motion controls that limited the original PlayStation VR.
PlayStation VR2 supports Roomscale, Sitting, and Standing play styles, which added more complexity as Tales from the Galaxy's Edge supports all three. Thankfully, Perez III that bringing Tales from the Galaxy's Edge to PlayStation VR2 was relatively manageable because of how impressive the system's specs were.
"A lot of the development processes are similar [to other VR platforms]," Perez III says. "We're still working inside of Unreal, and we're doing a lot of those same processes. But we don't have to look at performance quite as much as we do on some of the other devices, so we're able to open up a lot of things or not be as concerned about certain things. That comes with better hardware."
Better hardware, better games
Looking at the biggest games of the PlayStation VR2 launch window lineup, the visuals of titles like Horizon Call of the Mountain and the VR modes of Resident Evil Village and Gran Turismo 7 are impressive. In our discussion, Whitney also made it quite clear that one of the real advantages of working on this remaster was not having to worry about strict limitations on the visuals or even the audio. "We got lucky in the sense that there's a lot more to PlayStation VR2 that we hadn't had previously," Whitney says. "We could really push the graphics and make it shine. But then there were also some other things that came into play. We totally redid the audio, it sounds amazing."

Read more