Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire may have been snubbed at the box office, but luckily there’s another adventure to enjoy this year – albeit a very familiar one. Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD – a remaster of the 2013 Nintendo 3DS original, which was also known as Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon in the US – has arrived on Nintendo Switch looking better than ever, but almost completely unchanged in terms of its hilarious gameplay. which disturbs spirits. concerned. So it’s the best way to experience Luigi’s second foray into catching the cheeky Caspers, but it’s no longer the best entry into the series, as this Dark Moon-based adventure was subsequently overshadowed by Luigi’s Mansion 3 in 2019.
Here’s what our reviewer had to say in her 2013 review of the original:
That sentiment still holds, and Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD remains a fun ride that’s as creepy as it is silly, its dual-screen setup smoothly smoothed into a single panel and honed to a visual standard that falls just short of Luigi’s Mansion 3. The team at developer Tantalus, who were also responsible for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD in 2021, not only increased the resolution of this remaster, but also added noticeably more detailed textures, right down to the reflective shine on the suits. armor and threads on Luigi’s overalls. Additionally, the drastically improved lighting means that the spooky diorama of this Switch version was given enough depth that I didn’t really mourn the absence of the original’s stereoscopic 3D. (Though to be fair, I’m not sure I’ve even used stereoscopic 3D.)
It probably won’t win any Best Visual Design awards in 2024, but it’s night and day compared to the 2013 original. I remember Luigi’s Mansion 2 having a charismatic cast of characters and pleasantly creepy environments to explore, but it was a shock to return to the original 3DS 11 years after its launch, only to have my eyeballs attacked by sharp enough cheese-grating edges. However, Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD has been polished to a level that allows the playful nature of its phantom threats and its many magnificently crafted corridors to really shine on screen.
However, these enemies and environments are still the same as ten years ago. Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD has no additional ghosts to slay, levels to explore, or bosses to aim your Poltergust 5000 at. None of Luigi’s moves from Luigi’s Mansion 3, like his piston-powered suction shot or his ability to summon Gummi Bear Gooigi, have been retrofitted into this adventure, delivering a ghost-hunting and puzzle-solving experience that retains the clever level design of the 3DS original, but it noticeably lacks the expanded variety of interactions that the third installment in the series enjoyed.
However, it has dual controls similar to the third game. For whatever reason, the original didn’t support the use of the Circle Pad Pro, a bulky Nintendo 3DS peripheral that added a second stick to the system while making it more likely to rip a seam in your pants pocket. This meant that in Luigi’s Mansion 2 on the 3DS, taller brother Mario was stuck in one direction whenever you needed him to aim a flashlight or vacuum up a startled soul. That’s no longer the case in this remaster, which lets you rotate Luigi’s crosshairs with the right stick. This definitely feels a lot more flexible and intuitive, and while the difficulty curve here remains quite gentle – the goofy ghost enemies are more dorky than dark – I was relieved to find that the control system never frustrated me like it did in the original.
However, I wish more had been done with Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD’s multiplayer. Unlike Luigi’s Mansion 3, which allowed two people to play on the same system, Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD is strictly single player on console, whether you’re playing online or locally on a LAN. The multi-level multiplayer mode, Scarescraper (known as Thrill Tower in the original release) is still a lot of frantic, phantom brawls, but it’s the kind of fun I’d like to share with my kids without having to buy more switches and copies Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD for you to enjoy. Unfortunately, there is no split screen support available.
That said, I definitely had a good time in the dozen or so hours I spent with Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD. While I prefer the sprawling, simple structure of the third game’s hotel environment, I appreciate that the more split levels of Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD’s five distinct environments make it easier to narrow down your search for any lost collectibles after completing the main story. Plus, there are some fantastically fantastical moments that I’ve forgotten about in the ten years since I first played them, from the amazingly complex first boss fight with the oversized spider to falling down a long creepy staircase that later feels more like G- rated version of the climactic sequence from John Wick: Chapter 4.