MARS 2120 (v1.0.2)

A troubled human settlement on Mars becomes the hunting ground for Sgt. Anna “Thirteen” Charlotte, a soldier sent to uncover what has gone wrong behind the colony’s sealed corridors and hostile frontiers. MARS 2120 is a side-scrolling action metroidvania built around a familiar but effective fantasy: push into dangerous territory, find a new power, then return to previously unreachable routes armed with better options. Its science-fiction setting mixes industrial facilities, alien-feeling biomes, malfunctioning machines, and monsters that turn the colony’s promise of expansion into a survival nightmare. The tone is adventurous rather than relentlessly bleak, with an emphasis on momentum, discovery, and flashy fights.

Combat asks players to combine close-range strikes, ranged attacks, evasive movement, and special techniques instead of relying on a single weapon. Elemental abilities based on fire, ice, and electricity expand both Anna’s battle toolkit and her exploration options, opening paths while exposing enemy vulnerabilities. Progression comes through discovering equipment upgrades and skills scattered through the interconnected colony, encouraging map awareness and occasional backtracking in true genre fashion. Boss encounters raise the stakes with large robotic and monstrous opponents that reward learning attack patterns, adapting a loadout, and recognizing when a particular element offers an advantage.

What separates MARS 2120 from a straightforward retro throwback is its focus on melee combos within a futuristic exploration structure, drawing clear inspiration from Super Metroid, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, and Guacamelee! without abandoning its own Mars-colony identity. A strong range of accessibility settings lets players adjust game speed, subtitle appearance, color-blind visuals, map objective readability, and automatic audio-log playback, making its demanding action more approachable. Players who enjoy gradually mastering an interconnected map and turning new powers into shortcuts will find plenty to like here. Genre veterans should appreciate the combat-driven approach, while newcomers benefit from the unusually flexible tools for tailoring the challenge.