The planet is split up into four distinct biomes, each of which is essentially its own stage, and they’re further broken down into individual zones with teleporters that link up with each other and your ship. There are a hundred to find, but you don’t need to track down every last one to max out your health and stamina – another much-appreciated touch. You’ll also need to keep an eye out for alien alloys (which act as skill points) and these funky edible orange blobs that make your explorer more durable. That said, you do need to get your hands dirty – enemies drop a few crafting currencies. You’re just as likely to punt a critter or slap it until it explodes as you are to take aim.
You could beat Journey to the Savage Planet without adding any damage boosts or reload-speed buffs to your gun, which I dig. Many of the aliens won’t even attack you on sight, and those who do aren’t particularly taxing. There’s shooting, to be sure, but gunplay isn’t the focus outside of a few boss battles. You can’t take more than a few steps on this world without some strange creature or just-conspicuous-enough collectible drawing your eye. It makes such great use of horizontal and vertical space, especially once you unlock jump-jets and a grapple beam. This is a leaner, less combative, unabashedly jovial rendition of the GameCube classic. If anything, I’d point to Metroid Prime as a point of comparison. There’s an inherent joy to your character’s mobility, even while backtracking. Journey to the Savage Planet strikes this ideal balance between being open-ended and teeming with possibilities but not overwhelming. I never got tired of her brutally honest commentary while I was out adventuring, but if you do, there’s a setting for that.Ībove all, this game is designed for people who enjoy mentally mapping out 3D spaces, hunting down fairly-placed hidden items, and using their ever-growing lay of the land to sniff out shortcuts. You’ll see this stuff whenever you teleport back to base to sift through spam emails or deposit materials used for ability upgrades, but it isn’t forced on you. The story is mainly told through silly live-action videos and even cheesier commercials that play on your ship, the latter of which are a highlight – think Paul Verhoeven’s greatest hits.
It’s a story-driven action-exploration game.Īs a highly disposable employee of Kindred, the fourth-best interstellar exploration company, you’ll survey Planet ARY-26 – a potential new site for humankind – with a scanner and a humble laser pistol. This isn’t trying to be No Man’s Sky or any number of other crafting-centric sci-fi games that might’ve popped up in your Steam recommendations.
Journey to the Savage Planet will look familiar on the surface, and it is – but not necessarily in the way you’d expect. Journey to the Savage Planet (PC, PS4, Xbox One) It did the trick and then some.Īs I write this review, I’m seriously considering starting up a third playthrough. I came in with little to no expectations – heck, I could barely get the name right – and really just hoped for a decent little game to break me out of a post-holiday-break malaise. It’s presumptuous to make this call so early into 2020, but here goes: Journey to the Savage Planet stands a very real chance of being one of my most pleasant surprises in video games this year. A surprisingly easygoing collectible-filled adventure
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