{"id":1344,"date":"2025-03-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-13T01:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.isshicare.com\/?p=1344"},"modified":"2025-03-13T18:22:10","modified_gmt":"2025-03-13T18:22:10","slug":"beyond-the-ice-palace-2-review-most-delayed-video-game-sequel-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.isshicare.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/13\/beyond-the-ice-palace-2-review-most-delayed-video-game-sequel-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond The Ice Palace 2 review \u2013 most delayed video game sequel ever"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\"Beyond\t<\/div>
Beyond The Ice Palace 2 – it wasn’t worth the wait (PQube)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After 37 years, a sequel to Commodore 64<\/a> title Beyond The Ice Palace finally arrives, but what is the game and why has the follow-up taken so long?<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re wondering what Beyond The Ice Palace 1 was then don\u2019t worry, you\u2019re not going to be the only one. We did a double take when we first heard about this sequel, because not only is the original nearly four decades old but even at the time it was not regarded as a particularly good game. It wasn\u2019t a notable sales success either and seemed destined to be almost instantly forgotten. And yet here we are.<\/p>\n

The name Beyond The Ice Palace is a meta reference to the 8-bit computer conversions of Ghosts \u2018N Goblins<\/a>, by British publisher Elite, which were heavily truncated and, on the Commodore 64 and other formats, ended abruptly with an ice level instead of including everything from the original arcade game.<\/p>\n

At the time, Elite supposedly pitched a Ghosts \u2018N Goblins sequel to Capcom but when they were told no, they released Beyond The Ice Palace as a blatant knock-off, with a generic barbarian character and none of the cartoonish charm of the original. Surprisingly, Elite is still around today<\/a>, making mobile games of various 8-bit British games, but they don\u2019t seem to be involved in this at all. Which makes the whole situation even stranger.<\/p>\n

If we had to guess, we imagine what\u2019s happened here is that French developer Storybird Studio completed the game and realised it didn\u2019t really have much of a hook (or maybe they just couldn\u2019t think of a name) and then found out that the Beyond The Ice Palace licence was available and that promoting this as the most belated sequel ever would help to get it noticed. Which we guess worked, because here we are reviewing it.<\/p>\n

It certainly has little in common with Beyond The Ice Palace (or Ghosts \u2018N Goblins) in terms of gameplay and the only real connection, which would\u2019ve been very easy to add late in the process, is that the McGuffin you\u2019re after is shards of a sacred arrow. Storybird also got British composer Allister Brimble, who was active in the 8-bit era, to do the music – although it was actually David Whittaker who worked on the original game.<\/p>\n

The game\u2019s much more obvious inspiration is Castlevania, with some sections looking almost identical to iconic locations from Konami\u2019s increasingly neglected franchise. Nevertheless, it is not a Metroidvania, as it\u2019s linear, with no backtracking, and with only a small number of additional abilities to acquire. But not all Castlevania games are Metroidvanias and Beyond The Ice Palace 2 clearly venerates Super Castlevania 4<\/a> on the SNES above all others.<\/p>\n

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