Review: LUIGI'S MANSION 2 HD is a Fun HD Port

A couple of weeks ago, Nintendo launched Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD. This is a “visually enhanced in HD” version of the 3DS game for the Nintendo Switch. You get to take on the role of Luigi as he is tasked by Professor E. Gadd to help reclaim his home from a variety of ghosts.

Nintendo was kind enough to supply me with a digital code for the purposes of this review, but all thoughts below are my own. If you would like to play it, you can purchase your own copy from your favorite vendors including GameStop (affiliate link) and the Humble Store (affiliate link).

Explore multiple haunted mansions with Luigi and his ghost-hunting Poltergust 5000

Progress through diverse missions to retrieve the missing shards of the Dark Moon scattered across several distinct haunted mansions, each with their own puzzles to solve and ghosts to capture. Go for a high rating by using your superpowered ghost-hunting tool, the Poltergust 5000, to suck up ghosts (and window curtains) and blow air to search every nook and cranny of the chilling-yet-charming mansions. This spooky fun adventure, originally released for the Nintendo 3DS™ system, is now visually enhanced in HD on the Nintendo Switch™ system.

Friendly ghosts turned fiendish—sounds like a job for Luigi!

The Dark Moon that hangs over Evershade Valley seems to have a calming effect on the ghosts that reside there. The quirky Professor E. Gadd has been studying the friendly spirits. But when the Dark Moon suddenly breaks apart and falls into the valley below, the once-friendly ghosts become hostile. Luigi must stumble into action and summon his courage to restore the Dark Moon to its rightful place in the sky.

Before doing this review, I think it’s important to disclose that I did not play the original 3DS version. Therefore, I will not be discussing a lot of the improvements but rather from a perspective of someone new to the game.

Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD is a solid game. The gameplay is similar to Luigi’s Mansion 3 (my only prior experience with the series) and so it feels familiar. My daughter who has poured countless hours into Luigi’s Mansion 3 was able to pick up Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD no problem and proceeded to blaze a trail that I still haven’t caught up to.

The story and gameplay are fun even though I do struggle with aiming for some reason and the characters are goofy as you’d expect. Luigi’s almost always scared, but he does still help his friends in their time of need which is great.

Graphically, I believe that Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD does achieve its goal of bringing the 3DS title to HD for the Nintendo Switch. It looks really good. Do not expect to see the same quality as Luigi’s Mansion 3 and you will probably enjoy it.

Another thing I do really like is how clever you have to be at times to solve puzzles. Particularly when dealing with spider webs. Sometimes you have to use the Poltergust 5000 to pull a hanging uvula-like web structure while others you grab a wad and set it on fire.

There are also times when you have to suck up the corner of a rug to find what you’re looking for. I know these elements sound very basic, but I think they are very well implemented and I enjoyed their inclusion.

Honestly, my biggest complaint is that the development team appears to have done a remastered port without including any quality of life upgrades. There’s one in particular that I would have loved. Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD does not have any way to save the game except upon completion of a mission.

These missions vary in time with some taking me less than 10 minutes to some taking over 20 minutes with no real way of knowing how long each one will take. If I start a mission and something comes up, I have to tell my family to not play the Switch until I can get back to it (a situation my daughter did get into) or I have to be okay with starting the mission over.

I really wish they had just implemented the same save system as Luigi’s Mansion 3 where it saves after you enter a new room. That was such a nice save system. I would also have accepted it if they had implemented a system where you can save part way through a mission from the start menu or something.

Another aspect I’m not a big fan of is how much treasure you have to get to unlock upgrades for the Poltergust 5000. So often it feels like I get so little treasure and so it takes seemingly forever to unlock upgrades. I just wish it felt less grindy.

Sadly, I don’t have friends who have Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD so I did not try out the ScareScraper. If I do check it out in the future, I’ll update this review.

At the end of the day, Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD is fun. It’s a solid HD port that I would recommend to friends and family. The game could have truly been elevated with a slight tweak to the save system, but it’s still fun to play. It’s a bit of a shame that the original game probably won’t be ported to the Switch so we can’t get a trilogy collection.