Spelunky 2 Review -- Cave Story

There was a moment a few weeks ago where I had my best Spelunky 2 run ever. I was trying to unlock the third shortcut which required me to carry an item from the first level all the way to the end of level 4-4. By chance, I had acquired a number of great items, the compass, spike shoes, Kapala, and a four-leaf clover. I had made it to the second level of the Tide Pool, level 4-2, saw the exit, and promptly misjudged the distance I had to fall, stunning myself, dropping the crucial item I was carrying, and letting physics carry the item over the edge into the waters where the Great Humphead was eagerly waiting to eat me and end that run. That’s Spelunky 2 in a nutshell, a rouge-like where a single mistake, miscalculation, or distraction will inevitably completely ruin a run. And it is also the sequel to one of the best rouge-likes I have ever played.

Start reading reviews of the original Spelunky and you will start to see the same word repeated: perfection. There are many who regard Spelunky, released in 2008 (and later updated to HD in 2012), as a perfect game. Players controlled Guy Spelunky (or one of a handful of unlockable characters), a cave explorer armed with a whip, a handful of bombs, and some ropes as he explored randomly generated cave systems. While players could reach the “final” level with some practice, the game held a bevy of mysteries, some which required pulling off truly obscure and daunting feats. Spelunky was a quintessential 2-D platforming rouge-like; players always started at the same point, dying would send them back to the start, and because each level was randomly generated, no two runs were the same. And while the game did not feature many upgrades or improvements that could be useful on subsequent runs, at its core, Spelunky was a game about learning and knowledge. Players needed to learn how each trap and enemy operated, and progressing deeper required learning more about new traps and enemies, and discovering how to overcome those obstacles.
So how do you follow such a highly regarded and praised game? In interviews, Derek Yu, the game’s creator, stated that he kept coming up with new ideas while working on his book covering the first game’s development. As such, he envisioned a sequel that was an extension of the first game. Spelunky 2 does not attempt to reinvent the wheel or experiment too wildly, it instead builds on the experience of its predecessor, updating and refining many of the things that made Spelunky standout. Like its predecessor, the premise of Spelunky 2 is very straightforward -- players choose a character and then set out to progress from one level to the next, delving deeper and deeper into the randomly generated cave system, collecting treasure, fighting enemies, and eventually (hopefully) becoming rich. That’s not to say that Spelunky 2 does not deserve to be called a sequel. The levels are bigger and more detailed, there are new items to collect and enemies to encounter, and there are plenty of new secrets to uncover. Spelunky 2 is not an unexpected surprise like the original game, nor is it a revolutionary or new experience, it is simply an updated take on the Spelunky experience. At the same time, it also shuffles that experience enough that longtime fans cannot simply breeze through the game relying on their old muscle memory.

Levels in Spelunky 2 follow roughly the same format, players start at the top and work their way down to the exit which leads to the next level. Along the way, there are gems and gold to collect, occasional shops to visit, hidden chambers, and a horde of dangerous adversaries and thematic traps to impede or extinguish your progress. If I had to give one description to define Spelunky 2 it would be that the game is brutally fair. The game lays out its rules clearly and then challenges players to achieve perfection (or as near as possible). Fall short, make a mistake, or choose poorly, and the game will punish you. Arrow traps will always fire if something is in front of them; cavemen will always spot you from the same distance and charge at the same speed; explosions will launch things and getting hit by an object with momentum will stun and hurt you. Mastery of Spelunky 2 comes down to learning how to anticipate and evade dangers while balancing the run-ending risks against potential rewards.
Unlike many other rouge-likes, runs and levels in Spelunky 2 are surprisingly short. Even ignoring how easy it is to die, I would estimate I spend three minutes or less on most levels. This might sound surprising given the heavy pressure the game places on players to take it slow and gradually learn how to survive, both through its limited resources and punishing difficulty fairness, but the game juxtaposes this pressure against an insta-kill mechanic if players spend too much time in a level. After around five minutes in a level, a specter will appear that will unrelentingly chase players and kill them if they come in contact with it. It is challenging to balance urgency and caution, but Spelunky 2 deftly strikes that balance. In a number of ways, the specter perfectly encapsulates the learning process in Spelunky 2. When you start playing, the specter will make frequent appearances and pressure you to reach the exit, often resulting in hurried decisions and deaths. But as you invest more time into the game and build up your knowledge, that experience will pay off and it will become an uncommon visitor, even on the later, more challenging levels. Or maybe I just got faster at dying.

For the most part, every stage is comprised of four levels of increasing difficulty. The levels in a stage are designed around specific themes, and reaching a new stage requires learning about the latest dangers and finding ways to survive. For example, the first level is a cave system occupied by primitive cavemen with simplistic spikes and traps built into totems. The spikes in the Tide Pool are comprised of bright red coral and the ornate lion statues hide spike traps. Although there are some basic enemies that appear in nearly every stage, foes like bats and spider, most enemies also vary from stage to stage, with later levels introducing more durable and dangerous foes. The aforementioned cavemen are replaced by more challenging enemies like the impervious Pangxie or deadly Yetis the deeper into the caves your expedition progresses. Another thing that differentiates Spelunky 2 from many other rouge-likes is that, apart from a handful of shortcuts that allow players to skip some of the earlier stages, there are no unlockables to make subsequent runs easier. The only unlockables are characters and they all play the same. There are no characters who move faster, jump higher, or start with more resources. Players start every run with four hearts, a whip, and a handful of bombs and ropes. Making it deeper into the caves of Spelunky 2 comes down to developing the skills to progress farther and learning how to avoid making costly mistakes. While I understand that this aspect of the game might be unappealing to some players, it helps to maintain the game’s rules and Spelunky 2’s identity as a game with a strict adherence to those rules. For instance, fall too far and you take damage and get stunned; Fall beyond a certain distance, and you will die; there are no exceptions.

While Spelunky 2 is a great experience on its own, the game also allows players to team up with up to three friends for four player expeditions. While the original Spelunky offered couch co-op, Spelunky 2 also allows players to team up online. In co-op, only one player needs to reach the exit to pull all surviving players through to the next level. Additionally, if someone dies, they are not permanently dead for the remainder of that run, as a dead teammate can be revived on the next level by finding and cracking open a coffin. While this might make it sound like the Spelunky 2 experience is significantly easier with friends, the trade-off is that co-op expeditions cannot use shortcuts and must be completed from start to finish in a single run. Another trade-off comes with money and items. While players pool their money, making it easier to amass a surplus to spend in shops, the effects of items are not shared, and items on a player who dies are lost unless another teammate can collect them. As much fun as I have had with Spelunky 2, I have had more fun playing with friends, laughing over the untimely mistakes and the stupid ways we manage to die and end runs.

I usually try to beat a game before writing a review, and although I have seen the credits, I still have a long way to go before I can say I beat Spelunky 2. As players progress through Spelunky 2, they fill the game’s journal with entries on the enemies encountered, stages visited, and items uncovered. There are still a number of spots waiting to be filled in my journal, and like the original game, there are a wealth of mysteries to solve in Spelunky 2. These range from secret areas and chambers, to secret bosses, to rooms full of seemingly identical items with no use, to entire secret stages I have yet to uncover. I am sure I will eventually rely on the internet to discover which puzzles I am missing, but for now, I am loving the exploration and unknowns as I strive to improve. Can I say I have beaten Spelunky 2? Yes, but there is still so much more to do before I consider myself done with this game.
Spelunky 2 is an exceptional game that I recommend wholeheartedly, while also acknowledging it is not for everyone. For starters, there isn’t much of a story, so anyone looking for a rich narrative experience will leave disappointed. The game is also challenging, players will fail a lot, and it takes time to develop the skills to achieve success. If you are a gamer who does not enjoy that type of experience, it is unlikely that you will enjoy Spelunky 2 -- and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But if you want a game that you can sink time into, both to master the game and to unravel a wealth of mysteries, Spelunky 2 will not disappoint.
All images owned by Mossmouth.