Vectorman 2

Vectorman is back, and this time he's heading straight to the Mega Drive. He's no longer that lonely computer exile — now he's a platformer that takes all those doodles and color from the original and crams them into a cartridge. The result? Something between what you knew and what might surprise you.

It's a classic action platformer with one goal: shoot your way through the level and reach the end. Our drawn hero fights robots, pollution, and all those things the gaming industry thought were cool in the '90s. The graphics rely on alternating front and side views, which was pretty rare back then — the levels aren't just rows of identical blocks, but environments with a hint of variety.

Playing is straightforward: you shoot, you jump, you collect power-ups. The controls behave honestly, with no tuning hiccups — when you want to jump, you jump; when you want to fire, you fire. The problem comes with the platformer itself not being all that ambitious. It's no Sonic with its speed sections, nor Castlevania with its atmosphere — it's a means to an end, a path from point A to point B, full of enemies. Sometimes that's enough, sometimes it's not. The difficulty swings between easy stretches and moments where the game seems unsure what gaming habits the player should have.

Vectorman 2 was supposed to prove that vectors and pixels could be the foundation for anything. That my little blue guy on the computer could live in any corner of the screen. It partly succeeded, but the era when that was wow has passed. Today it's interesting more as a trip into '90s aesthetics than as a return to revolutionary mechanics.

Who should play Vectorman 2? Mega Drive collectors, retro action fans who aren't too bothered about wasting time. It's not a masterpiece, but it's not a lost Friday either — it's an honest platformer with its own look, doing what it's supposed to do, and moving on. Whether in a browser or emulator, you'll play a relatively easy, visually interesting game that won't charm you, but won't bore you either.