Habroxia 2 Review (NS, PS Vita)

Barry Johnson’s Lillymo Games surprised fans with a sequel for their retro-style shoot’em up game Habroxia. The second game with their new partner Colin Moriarty that provides a story to the game. I am a fan of the shoot’em up genre and enjoyed the first game. Lillymo Games have become the best retro-style shoot’em up Developers. Habroxia 2 has become my new favorite retro-styled shoot’em up. It starts off by presenting a story setup with starpilot Sabrina in search of her lost father during a mission out in the galaxy. Story is simple and cool like the old retro-style story setups back in the day. A simple story setup in the start and final story told at the end. After the intro story and tutorial the adventure begins.

All the great gameplay mechanics from the first game has been tweaked and improved. If you are having a tough time the ship upgrades will help out. Replay levels to get more money for ship upgrades or try a different level branch first. All bonus objectives and money during a fail mission stay with you like the first game which is great. New retro chip tune music is great and more secondary weapons to unlock.

There is more sense of an adventure with the intro story and the amazing retro-style overview map of the galaxy to select levels. There are levels that contain branching areas that will lead to a new level. Branch level for example 2-b or 2-c. Bosses to beat at each level that few provide a challenge. After the basic levels there will be unique bosses at the end of the branches to fight that provide a better challenge. This brings more replay value then the first game to enjoy with more levels, Boss Rush modes and new-game plus. Improvements to the gameplay include twin stick shooting now available unlike the first title. Secondary weapons have been tweak as well as the power-ups don’t stack no more unlike the first game that made it op.

Fans that enjoy the first game should not miss this sequel. Habroxia 2 has great new tweaks and controls that improve gameplay from the firs installment. It’s a great entry for new fans to enjoy the shoot’em up genre as well. There is more variety of enemy attack patterns and bosses to defeat. End credits took me 4 hours to beat the story mode with all branching areas and close to all objectives done. Completing all objectives, Boss Rush modes and new game plus will provide more replay value to enjoy. Lillymo Games have released a worthy sequel. This review was mainly play in handheld mode on the Nintendo Switch and plays as well on TV mode. Bought PS Vita version on its store and cross-buy with PS4 version. I played the first couple of levels on it. It plays as well too with a slight stutters on the beginning of levels. Overall it runs well, collecting trophies on the go is great and looks amazing on the OG PS Vita Oled screen with the color popping out more on the retro graphics. Time to go beat it on PS Vita now.

*Nintendo Switch Review Code provided by Publisher*