I will instantly purchase any high quality looking 3D platformer. It's in my blood. I love these kinds of games.

When I started playing Penny's Big Breakaway, I was not immediately impressed. The controls felt a little wacky and Penny herself, when zoomed in during cutscenes, looks like a rejected muppet. Basically, weird vibes.

But the more I played, the better the controls felt and suddenly everything clicked. I started absolutely ZOOMING through levels effortlessly and it felt amazing. The yo-yo abilities really come together to ensure I was able to traverse large areas quickly and in style.

The game feels like it's made for speedrunning since there's a permanent timer at the bottom of the screen. Even the level design goes along with this. There are so many shortcuts and cool ways to navigate the levels. It's rad.

Oh and the soundtrack is a mixed bag, but when it's good, it's REAL GOOD. Got some ps1/dreamcast vibes from a few tracks. The one in the space book levels was especially great.

Penny's Big Breakaway didn't wow me with it's presentation or it's story (although it's simple, clean and colourful graphics grew on me). But that doesn't matter. It's a game that's really fun to play from start to finish. And for that I'm extremely grateful. If you're in the mood for a very mechanical 3D platformer that's clearable in less than 10 hours, you really can't do much better than Penny's Big Breakaway.

easy as piss but i dont fucking care honestly

kirby is possibly the cutest series out there in a lot of aspects and this game isnt exempt from this reputation

the art direction is the main thing that lures you in and makes the experience just that entertaining

the whole world is made up of materials that I could feel the texture of through the screen and it also creates beautiful foreground and background action and interesting platforming (and puns to boot)

per se the game is made to be the chillest stuff ever in the universe mixing ambient or somehow soothing music and gameplay where you can't die so you just fucking walk around until the end of the game

the bosses were a bit of a tedium but overall I liked the direction these battles took even though again you cant die AT LEAST YOU CAN BE IN THE SAME SCREEN WITH META KNIGHT my sweet baby i love you so much

anyway if you want a game that is incredibly difficult and tests your skills get the fuck out of my way but for people who want a sweet and relaxing experience and also love kribri . hey there~

cant believe this game fucking invented yarn

also side note since i didnt know what the fuck yarn meant (i mean i had a very good idea about what it meant but anyway i wanted to double check ok i have anxiety) i found out that yes . it means thread but it also can be used figuratively as long story or tale which is the format in which this game narrates its story and its also in the title so the title would mean kirby's epic long story . wow english is such a weird language and i cant fucking believe they PUT ANOTHER FUCKING TAILORING PUN IN THE DAMN TITLE KRIBRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Penny’s Big Breakaway, to me, feels like a holy conglomerate of Super Mario Odyssey, Pizza Tower, and Sonic Mania. To anyone even remotely familiar with any of these games, this is a huge note of endearment. It hits the nail on the head with how it prioritizes the momentum based flow that Sonic Mania and Pizza Tower mastered, the “maintaining your speed while weaving around to find secrets without losing your combo” of Pizza Tower, and the open-feeling level structure and more nuanced moveset of Mario Odyssey. It exceeded my already lofty expectations in spectacular fashion that, while lacking the polish and finishing touches to be placed in the unabashed masterpiece department, offers moment-to-moment gameplay of such high caliber that its all too easy to ignore its few shortcomings.

Similar to 90% of people interested in this game, my own interest stems from the development team being the same as Sonic Mania’s. Let me lay out something really quickly: Sonic Mania is one of the definitive, tangible examples of proof we have that beings of divine ordinance do, in fact, exist. Everything from the game’s presentation to how its levels are constructed to take advantage of your momentum-based toolkits feels so meticulously and lovingly sculpted. Its one of my all time favorite games, period, and as someone who grew up playing the Genesis era of Sonic games I can’t even begin to describe how satisfying it was to see a group who was not only able to capture that magic again, but surpass it.

So naturally, I was stoked for Penny’s Big Breakaway. I had absolutely no reservations about picking it up just from the names attached to the work. To my complete lack of surprise, they hit it out of the park again with another immensely satisfying gameplay experience that scratches an itch that many other games aren’t really trying to hit on.

This is a 3D platformer, yes, but I think limiting it to that is honestly deceptive towards where it’s true strengths lie. In actuality, Penny’s Big Breakway is the Momentum based experience, with all of the moves and your arsenal and the winding paths wanting to take advantage of the fact that you rarely ever need to slow down. I will note that there’s absolutely a learning curve here, a bit more harsh than most modern platformers which have begun to gravitate towards more simple control schemes, but once it ‘clicks’…it really clicks. You realize that everything in Penny’s arsenal flows into every other move in her arsenal and then, before you know it, you’re chaining together longer and longer unbreaking combos and completely demolishing stages in record time. At times, you even feel “smarter” than the game, especially on repeat visits to stages where you start discovering shortcuts and how to get through that part that gave you trouble more efficiently. But the truth is that all of these “I’m so smart” moments are baked into the game’s design philosophy of making a level that initially feels very disjointed and confusing into something with a very clear, connected flow. It’s great stuff.

Also of note is that it’s a great example of a platformer that retains its consistency in quality from start to finish. There’s no fall-off with some of the later stages which a few of my favorite platformers have fallen victim to in the past and, in fact, I would go as far as to say that the later levels of PBB are where the game really shines.

The game’s shortcomings are relegated pretty strictly to things that all fit under the umbrella of “it maybe needed a couple more months in the oven”. The fixed camera (a bold choice for a modern 3D platformer btw, but it works) can cause some issues sometimes and leads to a few risky jumps that really shouldn’t be that risky. Collision with certain objects and platforms is just super janky and lead to more than my fair share of completely unjust deaths, including a few instances where I just straight up fell through the bottom of the map for no reason. Presentation wise I think the game flip-flops from being charmingly inviting and whimsical to…sort of ugly (but it’s clear that this is more of a budget issue and it doesn’t impact gameplay so I don’t care much). Honestly my biggest little nitpick that’s not technical is that there’s so many little dudes all over the map who are constantly saying things to you, and I want to stop and hear what they have to say but I also really don’t want to stop my zen mode constantly to let a textbox finish. It’s a really minor detail but it was a genuinely conflicting issue for me.

Thankfully, a patch can resolve most of these technical issues and they don’t really detract from how great the game is overall. Platformers have been killing it recently and I really want to continue communicating the message that “yes, we want more games like this. please.” Super excited to see what this talented team has in store for their next project!

i've never played another game published by Private Division - but my wife LOVED Kerbal Space Program, so i was a little afraid when i saw their name on this after KSP 2's botched early-access release. and i should have been! this game is really neat, but it just wasn't ready. going fast while platforming in Penny's Big Breakaway (atm) is to get stuck on a slope, or get stuck in a platform, or just completely overshoot it and fall into the abyss. it's frustrating!!!!!! even without its bugs, i think its control system will filter out a lot of players. it's not that immediately satisfying, it requires a certain level of understanding to be rewarding and i love games like that! i love when they make me learn things! i just don't always know if performing well in-game is even that rewarding. maybe i just have bad depth-perception? regardless, i hope Evening Star make more 3D platformers cuz this is a really cool one. insanely gorgeous to the eyes and ears, but not as fulfilling to my soul. fully willing to accept that as a skill-issue tho.

Penny's Big Breakaway is a good game I can say this. Like I enjoy zooming through levels and chain combos so you can rack up a ton of points. From the team of Sonic Mania comes a well-polished game that plays like smooth butter. However, the game suffers from bugs and glitches that can ruin the experience and/or fun some. Like, I got that emotional high when I racked up huge combos only to either be stuck in on some platform's edge/slope because Penny is in a falling animation, or straight up fall through the floor and break the combo; it's just a headache, is all. Regardless, ripping this game open is fun to truly become an expert at the movement for reaching that skill ceiling is satisfying and I love it.

If you love the game, then that's awesome. Just didn't really connect with me compared to other platformers like Pizza Tower.

Viewtiful Joe is as remarkable now looking backwards as it was in 2003 looking forwards. In 2003, it felt like a bizarre comic book beat em up, a spiritual successor of sorts to Comix Zone with a wackier heart and much more fleshed out mechanics and replayability. 20 years later, Viewtiful Joe feels like equal parts a premonition and a diversion. Director Hideki Kamiya previously redefined the action genre with the 2001 masterpiece Devil May Cry, but with this successor he seems to switch gears entirely to a 2D beat-em-up that lacks the obvious elegance that Devil May Cry had. Looking ahead to 2009's Bayonetta, though, and it becomes incredibly clear just what a step forward Viewtiful Joe was for him not just in terms of mechanical polish, but in terms of the overall refinement of the packages he set out to deliver as a game director.

The most obvious evolution from Devil May Cry actually exists outside of both its aesthetics and its combat mechanics: The Ranking System. Devil May Cry would score you during combat based solely on your moment-to-moment performance, with a hotbar that changed as you played. If you were using a lot of moves and avoiding damage, your letter grade increased. If you were doing poorly or playing it safe, it would stay low. Individual battles did not award rankings, and only at the end of the stage were you given a cumulative score based on playtime, items used, deaths suffered, and so on. Viewtiful Joe evolves this system beautifully, with every individual encounter awarding you a score for three separate factors: your time taken to complete the encounter, the damage you took during it, and how many points you got for dishing out damage and using your abilities. This makes every section of a stage much more thrilling. Devil May Cry, being a Resident Evil-like, often re-filled rooms full of enemies and had you do the same encounter multiple times based on your traversal. Viewtiful Joe, to put it bluntly, doesn't fuck around. It has set battles, set puzzles, set setpieces, and that's it. If you're an experienced player, you know going in exactly what you're up against and how to accomplish those tasks. Devil May Cry frequently tasked the player with tricky platforming and then punished them with repeated battles if they were a hair off on their jumps. Because Devil May Cry only grades the player at the end of chapters, a single flubbed jump could mean multiple additional minutes of playtime and many more opportunities for taking damage. Viewtiful Joe deals no such spades, you simply play the level and move forward until it's complete. Even the tricky platforming and annoying sequences in this game (and there are many!) are challenges in their own right, and not challenges that punish you with tedious repeat challenges if you fail them. Unless you die. And you will.

Viewtiful Joe remains as agonizingly difficult in 2023 as it was in 2003. Most enemies are pretty simple, but the game delights in throwing combinations of annoying enemies and boss fights at you, as well as surrounding you with environmental hazards at pretty much all times. It doesn't take a whole lot of damage for Joe to die, and the game's cruelest trick by far is its Lives systems. If you run out of lives, you're knocked back to the last checkpoint. Period. Lives are rare to find in-game and cost a good chunk of change in the shop to purchase, and you can't just hop into the shop willy-nilly. If you make it to the end of a stage and get stuck on the final section and lose your last two lives, sorry chump. Replay the whole stage. It's not entirely unforgiving however - the game lets you keep all of the V-Points you earned during your failed attempt, meaning you can head into the shop and buy new abilities or extra lives before setting out into the meat grinder again. Devilishly, the game doesn't allow you to save before boss fights - Only at the start of a stage and at the mid-chapter checkpoint. And boss fights are BRUTAL in Viewtiful Joe, often long slugfests that demand practical perfection from its players. And the mandatory boss rush at the end of the game? May well be the most difficult mandatory boss rush in the history of video games. Wind Waker this ain't.

Mechanically, Viewtiful Joe is splendid. The VFX system only has a few tricks, but they're all good ones. Slow-Mo is your bread and butter, and its constant use here was clearly the primary mechanical inspiration for Bayonetta. It's another instance of the game feeling like a premonition for the action game masterpieces that Kamiya followed it up with, and while the rest of the VFX powers aren't nearly as fun to use, they're no slouches in the utility department. Mach Speed allows you to move at twice the speed you normally would, and attacking enemies in this state causes little Viewtiful Joe clones to appear and attack other elements onscreen, destroying background objects to spawn health items or even damaging other enemies or minibosses. Do this long enough and Joe will catch fire, setting every enemy he attacks on fire and also making him immune to fire damage. I thought this was a pretty cute but meaningless detail until it suddenly became necessary for beating one of the final bosses, a brilliant deployment of a mechanic that had up until then been only subtly encouraged. Zoom is probably the least effective move for traversal, only being useful for solving a few late-game puzzles, but it's devastating in combat, allowing for some incredibly damaging techniques. All in all, Joe feels pretty mechanically fleshed out. He's no Bayonetta or Gene, or even Devil May Cry 1 Dante, but the 2D perspective and short length of the game mean he doesn't have to be. He feels deep and rewarding enough to master that the avid player who wants to earn Rainbow V's on every stage can feel awesomely powerful by putting in the time and effort to learn him.

It's not all rainbow colored roses, though. Due to its 2D perspective, Viewtiful Joe suffers harder than most action games do to the age old problem of the camera. The camera is often fairly zoomed in on the action, so whenever you're moving to an area that isn't currently onscreen there's a pretty high likelihood that an enemy is preparing (or currently using) an attack that you just cannot see. I lost track of the amount of times I got absolutely demolished by attacks that I could not have possibly dodged because a bomb was about to explode somewhere on a ledge below my character that I dropped onto without knowing anything was there. And in a game this unforgiving, that kind of damage adds up. It leads to the game feeling even more frustrating than the developers intended, and it can seriously wear you down. In that regard, I would probably call it Kamiya's most difficult game.

I would also call it his worst. But that's saying a lot, because Viewtiful Joe is still better than most modern action games. I'd put it a hair above 2023's Hi-Fi Rush, even. Kamiya's understanding of the action genre and the variety of challenges tasked to the player makes it a constantly engaging and rewarding playthrough, at least when it's not beating the tar out of you. In 2023 it's just as good a game as it is fascinating a document of the progression of the action game genre during a period where it was probably at its experimental peak. Coming only 2 years after Devil May Cry and 2 years before Resident Evil 4 and God Hand, it's very easy to lose track of Viewtiful Joe amidst all the other action classics of the time. But a middle step is still an important step, and there's more than enough buried in here to make it worth playing for any fan of action games.

Viewtiful Joe is a constant balancing act. It's mostly a fun, creative beat em up. The mechanics of slowing and speeding up time are unique and well executed for combat and platforming. Add this on top of creative presentation, and the first three stages are a tightly paced and fun time. But unfortunately, a lot of the game's tough-but-fair gameplay can get dragged down by some obnoxious design choices that really start to crop up the further into the game you get. Sometimes enemies will hit you from off screen. Sometimes you need to make blind jumps. Sometimes you have to fight the same enemy with way too much health over and over. Sometimes the boss you're fighting has an annoying pattern that they use over and over. Not to mention the completely needless boss rush stage, which is capped off by a pretty terrible fight. It's unfortunate, because it takes what could have been a fantastic game down to just a good one.