Salamander 2 generally abandons the weirdness in the Life Force versions, and so it uses the standard power-up system in the arcade Salamander. There are six stages like the first game.
Releases:
- Salamander Deluxe Pack Plus: A compilation on PlayStation and Sega Saturn, with Salamander and Life Force.
- Salamander Portable: A compilation on PlayStation Portable.
- Gradius Originsnote : A compilation that includes Salamander 2 and
brings it to the West after 29 years of being Japan-only alongside its unreleased international variant, Life Force 2 as a hidden bonus game. It was released on August 7, 2025 for Microsoft Windows via Steam, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S. The same compilation also introduces this game's sequel, Salamander III.
This work provides examples of:
- Art Evolution: Compared to the original Salamander, this is a much more colorful game, pasted with vivid purple, blue, yellow and such. It's only comparatively darker than TwinBee. Additionally, the iconic Vic Viper, while still distinguishable by its blue color palette and twin-nose design, looks much different, using teal instead of white for the body color and having a much sharper and more aerodynamic-looking nose than its other incarnations.
- Bait-and-Switch Boss: Near the end of stage 1, a big Brain Golem appears in front of the player, seemingly building up to a boss battle... only to get Eaten Alive moments later by the actual boss: a giant snake-like creature. You can destroy the Brain Golem yourself for a big point bonus, but requires all the firepower you can get up to this point and precise positioning.
- Battleship Raid: Stage 4 pits the player against a series of large warships which can't entirely fit on the screen, culminating in a loop around a particularly big and heavily-armed one.
- Company Cross-References: The player 2 spaceship is named Super Cobra, which is the name of the upgraded version of Scramble.
- Musical Nod:
- The second loop switches some music to remixes of the original Salamander music. The first level theme becomes Salamander's "Power of Anger", for example.
- Stage 1's theme "Silvery Wings Again" has a brief section lifted from Gradius III 's "Departure From Space"
- Pre-Rendered Graphics: Most graphics use computer-rendered arts, which are obvious for the dragon creature that appears in the first stage.
- See You in Hell: It's the last line of the final boss after defeat. "I'll take you to hell with me!"
- Sound Test: Salamander Deluxe Pack Plus adds access to the sountrack from separate menu, including tracks unused in the arcade version. You can also see the track names.
- Translation Nod: Salamander Deluxe Pack Plus adds an option to change the title graphics to "Life Force 2", based on the English title. The change is limited to the title screen, as this doesn't actually introduce Life Force systems to the game; only the difficulty gets harder.
- Womb Level: Stages 1 and 3 both take place inside of strange fleshy tunnels The latter in particular gives an impression of being a gargantuan alien creature's body, complete with what seems to be a heart as the boss.
- Zero-Effort Boss: Averted. Unlike most other Gradius final bosses, Doom is actually a difficult final boss.
