Metroidvania is a weird term to me.
It’s supposed to be this combination of Metroid and Castlevania, meaning games that are similar to either of these two fall under the term “Metroidvania”. Both these games have similarities, like the large, interconnected map and needing certain items and abilities to proceed, so I understand why the term exists.
However, I feel that most games under this umbrella term lean into the Castlevania side rather than Metroid. This due to the clear focus on melee combat, fantasy settings, and (relatively) more accessible secret areas. Metroid, by comparison, has a greater emphasis on long range combat and distancing, a sci-fi theme with suitable creatures to match, and secrets that are both extremely rewarding and incredibly frustrating to locate.
While I enjoy both games, I’ve always preferred Metroid. The feeling of isolation on an alien planet works well with the way the world is designed, with many areas (especially in Metroid Prime) feeling like they have a distinct history to them. I also enjoy the lack of a leveling system that most Igarashi-led Castlevania games had, since its absence eliminates the need to grind levels. Your abilities and weapons are the sole way to proceed, and you are only held back by your ability to master them.
I have enjoyed other Metroidvania games over the years, like Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse and Ori and the Blind Forest, which are great games in their own right. However, almost none of them have anything even close to Metroid. With Nintendo’s apparent lack of interest in the series (unless we get a new game announcement or update on Prime 4 at E3, which feels unlikely), I was not sure if we would ever get another game like it.
Then I played Axiom Verge. And in doing so, I found exactly what I was looking for.
Axiom Verge was developed by Thomas Happ and is especially notable for being a one-man project. He developed the game, wrote the script, and made the music for the game. The fact that each of these aspects is great and works well together is a testament to his skill as a developer, and I feel it is worth taking about each on its own.
Story
The story begins with a short cutscene showing our main character, Trace, and his lab partner performing some sort of experiment in a lab. Something appears to go wrong during the test, and the lab explodes, with Trace’s fate unclear. The game proper starts immediately after, with our main character waking up from a strange device in Sudra, an alien world where the game takes place. He hears the voice of Elsenova, a member of a race of alien machines known as Rusalki. Elsenova tells Trace to grab the Axiom Disrupter (the main gun you will be using) and asks for help restarting facilities to repair her and her allies.
After progressing a bit further into the game, Elsenova reveals that the Sudrans (people who lived on Sudra) and Rusalki were destroyed by Athetos, who unleashed a pathogen to kill the planet’s population and trapped the Rusalki using the Breach Attractor. Elsenova requests Trace’s help to kill Athetos in return for helping him return home. Trace agrees, seeing no other option.
There are other details about the plot, but I believe they are best experienced blind. As much as I would enjoy talking about how certain details are explained, I think the worldbuilding feels organic and genuinely interesting as you get further on, so I do not want to spoil the experience for new players.
There is also quite a bit of optional lore to read in the form of the data files you find all over Sudra, which can be translated using the game’s passcode tool. These files are a great bit of additional worldbuilding, working to flesh out the Sudrans who died of the pathogen, your Rusalki allies, and the main villain as well. They are well worth tracking down if you want more information about Sudra.
Even with allies who talk to you, Axiom Verge still nails that feeling of isolation that permeates Metroid games, though I feel this is more a result of the presentation of the game.
Presentation
You could probably guess this from how much I gushed about Metroid, but I really enjoy sci-fi settings in fiction. Since the setting does not have to be bound to Earth, it gives the creators of these stories free license to make whatever kind of world they want and any type of society that inhabits that world. By effectively removing most humans from the setting, there is great potential to craft a truly special world, and Axiom Verge really runs with this freedom.
Sudra immediately feels alien from the moment you go to obtain your gun, with the strange red bubbles forming your first real obstacles and the background art giving off the impression of being trapped underground in a long-abandoned lab. Really, the background art does wonders for making each area feel unique. From the large crystalline structures in Kur to the pink, almost intestine-like pillars that dominate Indi, all the areas in Axiom Verge feel completely distinct from one another while still feeling like part of the same planet.
The game’s soundtrack is also great for this same reason. While it is not my favorite soundtrack from this style of game, it is still good at setting atmosphere for the area you are in. The main theme of Eribu, the starting area, feels distorted and alien while managing to be strangely catchy. The boss themes also create a good sense of urgency and are fantastic songs.
The presentation is great, and you really get a fond appreciation for it since you need to explore most of it over the course of the story.
Gameplay
While the story and presentation are excellent, it is Axiom Verge’s take on the Metroid formula that makes this game stand apart. In some ways, I believe it even improves upon its predecessor.
1. Guns
You explore the planet with only your Axiom Disruptor to protect you, which you can fire in eight directions (up, down, left, right, and in-between). You also can lock Trace in place with the L button, which allows you to freely aim and fire without moving. This feature is a godsend and makes dealing with certain enemies and bosses much more manageable.
The Axiom Disruptor itself can fire many different types of ammo. One of the main collectibles in this game are the many different guns, and I was honestly surprised by how well-balanced they are. Each gun is useful, while not feeling like it can immediately shred bosses mindlessly. A good deal of these guns are quite well hidden too, with some of the best ones being in particularly devious late game areas (The Distortion Field is so good). Some are close range, some are long range, some go through walls, some feel like melee attacks, etc.
2. Abilities
You do have separate abilities that also assist you in exploring Sudra, the most notable of which is the Address Disruptor. This item allows you to corrupt enemies, which drastically changes their attack patterns and properties. You must make creative use of this ability to find secret areas with new guns, health upgrades, gun upgrades, or notes.
This includes using an enemy’s corrupted laser to break open blocks on the ceiling, having an enemy fly across the screen to spawn a line of blocks you can grapple across, corrupting enemies to have them move and break blocks that you cannot ordinarily, and much more I do not want to spoil here. Almost all the secrets are creatively hidden and fun to locate, though some are too clever for their own good. Most of these difficult ones are linked to the passcode tool that I mentioned earlier.
The way it works is that you enter a code that you get from a file or the environment, and when you enter and activate it, it will cause a path to open in a certain room. Some of these codes are easy enough to find, but one annoying code that stands out requires you to go to the final area of the game, find a file that mentions a weapon’s name, go back to the FIRST area of the game, go left of where you start the game and enter the name of the weapon. This opens a path to the Flamethrower. While I get why this weapon is hard to obtain (it is insanely powerful and trivializes the final boss), I do not know if I ever would have found this on my own.
3. World Design
The world itself is built like other Metroid games before it, where you are only able to explore some of the map until you find a new gun, upgrade, or ability that allows you to explore further. There are a few moments where it can be difficult to figure out where to go next, but the way the world is built means you will not get stumped for too long. The game is good about making sure to limit your options after getting a new ability so that you must go to a new area to progress.
The abilities you get are neat too, since they feel useful while also feeling different from the abilities you get in other Metroidvanias (the Remote Drone and Lab Coat are particularly fun ones). Using new abilities to find new areas is practically Metroid’s main appeal and learning the ins and outs of these new powerups is extremely rewarding and satisfying. There is a surprising amount of flow to chaining the abilities together once you have all them all, which makes backtracking to fill the map and find collectibles really fun.
There are also a few hidden areas in the game, which are notable for the fact that their locations are randomly generated at the start of the game. The game spawns in five of these secret locations, with one of them being much harder than the others and contains one of three extremely powerful guns. While these areas are difficult to find, they thankfully are not required to beat for 100% completion, which I appreciate (though you really should track them down if you can, the upgrades are worth it).
4. Bosses
Axiom Verge also has some good boss fights as well, which manage to feel like interesting challenges while technically having limited attack patterns. These patterns tend to get faster and more erratic as you drain their health, meaning you must be more alert or change your strategy as the fight progresses. All the boss fights in this game are enjoyable and fair, except for Ukhu.
This boss can only be damaged when it opens its mouth, which it never does for very long and only does so while attacking. This means you will almost always take damage while damaging Ukhu, even if you use piercing attacks like the Inertial Pulse. When this boss starts speeding up, avoiding damage becomes nearly impossible, especially if he uses his stab attack frequently.
Admittedly, my dislike of Ukhu may just be down to fact that I am bad at it (even on subsequent playthroughs I die to this thing), but it still feels like you need to be much faster and more alert for this boss than even the final bosses. There is apparently a strategy to corrupt the enemies it spawns and use the resulting explosion to kill boss quickly, but in my experience trying to time that shot was difficult. I may just need more practice, but regardless of how you deal with Ukhu, he is honestly not that bad once you get used to his attacks. Just make sure you have a few health upgrades.
Conclusion
Axiom Verge is everything I wanted from a Metroid game and more, and it still impresses me how good this game is when it was only made by one person. It feels like its own game despite the clear influence, and it has a surprisingly engaging story with unforgettable visuals. While completing the game may end up requiring the use of a guide and Ukhu still sucks, those aspects do not detract from the amount of fun I had exploring the world and mastering the guns and abilities. If you love Metroid and need something to scratch that itch, Axiom Verge is the game you are looking for.
Final Score:
9/10
Buy the game here.
Images taken from the Axiom Verge steam page, Axiom verge wiki, and Cyberspaceandtime.com.