It will have a strategic and combat difficulty level like the first one did, but what is affected by each is really different now. And there is no longer any platforming difficulty level. It's less about raw damage being dealt to you in the new one, and more about making the damage more difficult to dodge unless you're skilled. Though I imagine we'll do some tuning on that to make sure it really fits, but the only reason we're changing that in general is because the balance of the new game is so different from the first one. Your character is not such a damage sponge as before, for instance, and more emphasis is placed on dodging (and dodging, on average and lower difficulty levels, is also more reasonable to do).
In short, it's closer to other Metroidvania or Megaman tiles, or Zelda, etc.
So basically, less of beating an area or boss simply by being able to take a billion hits and not die, then.
That's one problem I always have with some of the Metroidvania games, is that you can get waaaaayyyyyyyy too much health, and enemy damage does not scale well (or at all). Original Metroid game, once you had just one energy tank and the Varia, you were basically invincible; the only thing that was a threat at that point was maybe Kraid, and the Metroids themselves. Even more ridiculous once you got the screw attack. I love this type of game, but that particular balance issue seems frequent with them.
So, about the dodging bit there.... does that mean that the difficulty level will be what determines the enemy patterns this time, instead of world/area/whatever level like the first? Or maybe a mix of both?