Anodyne 2: Return to Dust is a game that defies classification, but if I had to make an effort to describe it, I’d call it a combination of The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages, Super Mario 64, and Jade Cocoon. Then again, you never know when it’ll decide to be something else entirely, diving headlong into a different genre and experience that you had no reason to expect based on what came prior, but that’s polished and unexpectedly enjoyable nevertheless. Anodyne 2 leans heavily into Playstation 1 nostalgia and succeeds in spades, creating something that looks and feels genuinely reminiscent of that era of games. It’s also a 2D puzzle game that feels like a briskly paced, Game Boy Color-era Zelda title. There are even whiffs of a collectathon, and more platforming and exploration than you might expect. Basically, Anodyne 2: Return to Dust is whatever it wants to be at any given moment, consistently preying on your expectations to jolt you with something completely unexpected. This is an intimate game at heart containing numerous stories, some of which can be found inside of other stories and on top of fourth wall breaks that provide insight into the development process, and while it can sometimes veer into word salad, there’s enough coherent storytelling present to keep everything afloat.

Anodyne 2 is a standalone story but references the first game in some ways

I never got around to playing the first Anodyne. For some reason, I always thought that it was a simplistic indie Zelda clone, and details about its supposedly divisive writing never reached my ears. I’m not sure why. As such, I went into Anodyne 2 expecting a fairly simplistic homage to PS1-era games that also has 2D sections, only to be met with a game that slowly delves into the pros and cons of blind allegiance to an unknowable god-like entity. I wouldn’t call this a subtle take on religion, with the game abandoning the pretense and all but stating which factions are “good” and “bad” by the time you reach its true ending, but the journey is soaked in a dreamlike, meandering quality that helps it to avoid coming across as needlessly preachy or heavy-handed. It’s also largely standalone, introducing a new world and new characters that don’t require any knowledge of the first game to understand (or more likely, not understand—the early parts are alien and overwhelming). However, you can explore an extra area that supposedly explains how Anodyne 2‘s world came into being after completing the story, and this area name-drops characters from the first game without explaining who they are. I can’t imagine that knowledge filling in many blanks, but it’s extra confusing for first-time players.

You play as Nova, a Nano Cleaner born to fight a pathogen known as “Nano Dust” that causes anger, perversion, and ultimately death in those it infects. You serve on behalf of a deity known as The Center, but you don’t serve it directly. Instead, you’re given your mission and guidance from motherly figures known as Palisade and C Psalmist (the latter of which occasionally recites religious literature that’s uncomfortably similar to certain psalms in the real-world Old Testament). They have different ideas about what’s best for Nova, but they’re both ultimately looking out for her, and it doesn’t take long before it begins to feel like a kind of family.

Nova cleans Dust from those afflicted by it by using her ability to shoot sparks, which allows her to shrink down and enter specific characters and objects, shifting the world from PS1-era 3D to overhead 2D. The goal is generally to find and destroy a big Dust crystal thing, but not all places you can enter in 2D are dungeons with Dust at the end. And those that are don’t always have boss fights at the end. Sometimes, you’ll enter a 2D area and meet new characters inside of other characters, and it’s even possible to shrink down even further (at which point the visuals degrade and start to look like ZX Spectrum sprites) and meet an additional character or two. Not all characters at these smaller levels are preoccupied with the conflict between The Center and those who embrace the freedom and vibrancy Dust affords, with many having their own problems to fret about. Anodyne 2 ends up telling a lot of unrelated stories as a result. Personally, I love finding little stories while exploring that suggest that life goes on outside of a game’s central conflict, and while the side characters don’t have much to do in the story once you’ve resolved their Dust issues, many are memorable for one reason or another.

Anodyne 2: Return to Dust also breaks the fourth wall a lot to the point where the developers feel like invisible companions. Midway through the main story, collectible coins are introduced that can be used to unlock test levels and terminals that provide interesting facts about the development of different areas, and there are even some NPCs who exist to shatter your expectations. Going into detail would spoil some truly special moments, but suffice it to say that there are occasions where you’ll be wondering if Anodyne 2 glitched out on you, only to find yourself playing an entirely different game all of a sudden. A serious effort was put into keeping you on your toes, and this keeps everything fresh. You can also unlock some writing that’s literally word salad, and I’m not wholly certain what its purpose is. These senseless strings of words don’t appear to have any underlying meaning outside of being crazy. It’s disconcerting to stumble across, but random enough that it quickly loses its impact.

The gameplay in Anodyne 2 does whatever it wants, whenever it wants

Anodyne 2 is unafraid to switch up its gameplay mechanics, but its Playstation 1-inspired 3D platformer and Zelda-inspired 2D puzzle game modes are the two “main” gameplay styles. In 3D, you have a double jump and the ability to float, and you have to use these abilities to reach characters and items hidden off the beaten path. 3D areas tend to be large, but you’re given the ability to transform into a car and quickly reach anywhere you’re going. You won’t be doing anything particularly exciting in 3D, but exploring the world for secrets can be immensely rewarding; on multiple occasions, I found myself wondering if what I was doing was an exploit or intentional trick (for example, the ability to walk up some slopes), only to reach the top and find collectible coins or an item that increased Nova’s health. You’re rewarded for breaking the game however you can manage.

That brings us to the Zelda-inspired 2D sections. Whether you’re dropped into a short dungeon full of puzzles or an overworld that you have to explore for specific items, this gameplay is very similar to that found in Link’s Awakening/Oracle of Ages. The biggest difference is that your weapon is a vacuum that allows you to suck up enemies and shoot them at other enemies. Your vacuum interacts with different enemies and objects in interesting ways, with many dungeons functioning a bit like Breath of the Wild‘s shrines by revolving around a specific application. Sometimes you’re shooting blocks at pink goo to make bridges, while other times you’re using enemy patterns to trick them into defeating each other. At several points, the puzzles are absolutely brilliant, striking a perfect balance between complexity and length.

That’s to say that Anodyne 2‘s pacing is fantastic. It took me around 12 hours to collect everything (except for the collectible coins, which I still collected most of) and reach both endings—both of which spit you out before the final choice so that you can see the other ending—and it feels like more happened in those 12 hours than in most 60-100 hour games. The underlying goal is to collect cards that allow The Center’s Dust-collecting machine to expand its capacity, and these cards can be found in chests and at the end of Dust cleaning session dungeons. Early on, you have a hint dolphin telling you where to look for cards you may have missed, while after that you’ll have access to an item that’s even more accurate, so looking for these cards never feels like an impossible task. Even better, reaching certain card thresholds results in cutscenes that progress the plot, and collecting cards requires visiting all sorts of bizarre worlds. While item collection in other games feels like a chore, Anodyne 2 uses it as an excuse to explore new areas and find entertaining things. None of this wears out its welcome since you linger in these areas for just long enough to grab their card/s.

It’s the little touches that have me falling head over heels for Anodyne 2

2D puzzle sequences can be tricky at times and require thinking outside of the box, but I only got stuck for more than a few minutes on three occasions. Two of those were simply creative puzzles that stretched the mechanics beyond where I thought they could go, while the third time I found myself stuck was the result of a dungeon not leading to Dust. Instead, I climbed my way through the dungeon, only to reach a second dungeon-exiting teleporter. A natural video game assumption is that both teleporters exit out to the same point, which would mean that I had missed a crucial room or puzzle, but using the second teleporter actually led to a higher area in the 3D world that corresponded to the 2D areas. After some 3D platforming to an even higher point, I was able to use Nova’s spark to re-enter a different version of the 2D dungeon and beat it.

Those smaller moments of unpredictability really add up into something special, and the ways that these are set up are nothing short of wonderful. Sparking characters to enter their 2D dungeons results in the same flavor dialogue all throughout the game, or at least that’s the case until one doesn’t. Finishing dungeons results in a white screen where the character you’re dealing with reflects on what Dust did to them, but sometimes they don’t for reasons that make perfect sense. Seemingly throwaway lines come back into focus hours and hours after fading into memory for a satisfying payoff.

There are so many great moments that I’m loath to elaborate on any meaningfully enough to spoil them, but there’s one point where the pre-dungeon minigame (which requires pressing directions to block color-coded crystals from pushing you back as you run toward them) becomes downright impossible. Amid your frantic attempts to keep up, you’re unlikely to notice that Nova is running through them without penalty, and this is just the beginning of what’s arguably the craziest sequence in the entire game. These are the kinds of moments that make a game truly memorable, and I’m unlikely to forget all of the sudden changes to Anodyne 2‘s mechanics, visuals, and rules. Between the pacing and unpredictability, there’s virtually no downtime outside of that you make for yourself while climbing up mountains and exploring aimlessly.

Expect a nostalgic visual style and unapologetically unique soundtrack

I may not have experience with the original Anodyne, but I do have tons of experience with older game consoles and handhelds. Despite all of the brilliant games that can be found on the Super Nintendo, the original Playstation is the console that I have the most nostalgia for; I’m especially fond of jaggies and blocky textures, which is a taste acquired after years of using a Playstation 1 emulator that fails to hide these things as well as the original console, and as a connoisseur of such things, I can confidently state that Anodyne 2 nails the aesthetic. Text boxes and menus are sharp and modern, but the 3D art is vintage PS1. The 2D art, meanwhile, evokes the Game Boy Color/Advance era by being wildly colorful (with that era’s vibrant colors being designed to work around its lack of backlights), and the amount of effort put into making each area completely distinct is stunning. Anodyne 2‘s soundtrack is similarly great. I’m not fond of all of it, to be perfectly honest, with several tracks that you’ll be hearing a lot of intentionally bordering on cacophony, but the tracks with strong melodies are really strong, and I can’t help but respect the individuality that shines through even when notes are clashing. You won’t hear the best tracks until later in the game, but they’re worth the wait.

Story: 2/3 Gameplay: 3/3 Visuals: 2/2 Music: 2/2 ★★★★★★★★★☆ – 9/10
*Click here and scroll to the bottom for a detailed explanation of what these numbers mean

Anodyne 2: Return to Dust Review Screenshots

*A Steam key was provided for the purpose of this Anodyne 2: Return to Dust review

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