About a month or so ago I reviewed a re-release of Aero the Acro-Bat, a 16-bit 2D mascot platformer.  I rented the game back in the day and honestly didn’t like it very much.  But I was glad to be able to review it again because I’m always willing to give a game a second chance.  Unfortunately, since I didn’t like the game when I first played it, I never bothered with the sequels and spinoffs so I never got a chance to see how they may have improved.  So I’m glad I got a chance to try Aero the Acro-Bat 2.  In the game, Aero finds a magician’s box that transports him to all sorts of different worlds and it’s up to him to save the day again in new environments.  I believe this re-release is still the SNES version, and it’s available on all current consoles but reviewed on Switch here.

I’m happy to say that Aero 2 does improve on a few things.  Gone are the unclear goals of the first game, now each level is just a point A to point B affair.  Unfortunately that does have the side effect of making it a bit more of a generic 16-bit mascot platformer.  Luckily the play control is a bit improved, too.  Your drill move is now more of a double jump and easier to perform.  Another button is designated to drill straight down.  You still collect items in the levels like food for points, stars for throwing, letters to open a bonus stage, as well as power-ups like temporary flight and invincibility, etc.

Unfortunately the big problem I had with this sequel is it’s way too hard!  I don’t know how anyone back in the day could get past the second world.  Luckily this port fixes a lot of that with save states, a gallery where you can view the instructions and see passwords to skip levels, and cheats where you can give yourself infinite lives and health, among other things.  So if the game gets too hard for you, you can do that.  I’m hoping I get to review the spinoff game: Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel, as well as the GBA re-release of the first game later this year!

Kid Factor:

Aero the Acro-Bat 2 is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Fantasy Violence.  You can spin into enemies and they just fly away when hit, and Aero has all sorts of Looney Tunes style animations when he gets hurt.  Reading skill is helpful for some of the text, and younger gamers may find this one too difficult.

Tags: Game Reviews