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Golden Axe II is a sequel to the original Golden Axe and is a side-scrolling fighting game released for Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. The game was published in the second Christmas day of 1991 and appeared for three other platforms, Wii, Xbox 360 and PlayStation in the last years.Boris Vallejo, a well-known fantasy artist known for creating Conan the Cimmerian, was also the creator of Golden Axe II.

There are three playable characters in Golden Axe II. There are actually the same players as in the first game, Ax Battler, Tyris Flare and Gilius Thunderhead. Their mission is now to defeat the new evil clan led by Dark Guld. They have to claim the Golden Axe again, after doing so in the first game from the villain called Death Adder. There are seven levels in this game, six on them being side-scrolling. The last one is a simple battle against the main antagonist, Dark Guld.

The gameplay is very similar to the one in the first game. The player can control the same three characters, each one having its own strengths, weaknesses, weapons and spells. Though the characters were mainly the same as in the first game, the “back attack” was improved. Enemies could also be thrown in every direction using the D-pad, so you could hit other enemies with them.

The magic system, which was very important in the first game, was totally overhauled in the second one. In the first game the players could have only used their whole magic power when casting spells, but in the second game they could have just release the magic spells button when the meter has reached the wanted level. The spells for two of the players were changed as well. Ax Battler can in the second game cast with wind magic and Gilius Thunderbird can use rock magic instead of lightning. Tyris Flare retained her fire spell.

Golden Axe II featured two types of game modes. “The Duel” was the one where players encountered enemies in the middle of an arena in a tournament-style battle. Winning and going through the next round is always putting in front of the player a more difficult enemy. The “Normal” mode is where the player follows the story and retains the Golden Axe.

The first game was popular, but the second one was split between two main opinions. One of them stated the game was a rehash of the original one, while the other considered the game was better than the original release. The graphics of the sequel were drastically improved. Many people were disappointed with the lack of any new character or the lack of technique improvements.