From the development team that brought us a return to peak 2D Sonic with Sonic Mania, comes Penny's Big Breakaway, an original IP and an attempt to test their skills in 3D platforming.
Well for a first attempt, this is pretty good once you adapt to the limited control scheme. There's no camera movement and the shoulder and face buttons do the same things. Playing on a Switch controller for example, you can jump with B or R, attack with your yo-yo with Y or the Right Stick, and pseudo spin dash on the yo-yo with A or ZR. The yo-yo attack can offer a spin attack or a dash if you double tap the button and that's all the stuff you get. Working with a fixed camera can be difficult at first, especially when you're trying to dash in a direction but it's clear the team here understood what they wanted first and foremost - momentum.
I'll be honest and say I picked up the game because I knew it was from the Sonic Mania devs and when I saw it in the Nintendo Direct, I wanted to see how they handled a momentum based platformer. Well the answer is really, really well actually! Once you get used to how the camera works and how the level design works, you'll be dashing and riding the yo-yo down slopes at a brisk pace. The levels incorporate plenty of ramps so when you do gather a good bit of momentum you can really feel the height difference when launching off those ramps. It's incredible stuff and done with a level of control over Penny that I haven't felt from a momentum based 3D platformer like this since the Sonic Adventure days.
Nearly everything compliments the core design theme of momentum well. Every level's main objective is reaching the end goal. There's 3 hidden honeycomb-like objects that you can usually find just off the beaten path or in a higher path reached by maintaining a good bit of speed. There's also side objectives from the citizens of the worlds but even these are usually designed with keeping you moving forward in mind as they tend to require you to collect objects or deliver an object through a platforming challenge. The only thing I personally didn't like that much was the annoying penguins who hunt you down every level, slowing you down if they grab onto you and capturing you if enough of them grab you at once. It's a pressure I don't think a game like this needs in the majority of its levels.
On the boss battle front, these are fine and do the job they need to. There's one really inventive one that stood out which I won't spoil. The final boss has the annoying two phases and if you die in the second phase you have to do all of the first phase thing that I've grown to dislike more and more as I've gotten older. Like I've proven I can do the first phase fine, just let me do the phase I keep dying on please. But yeah, otherwise bosses are mostly enjoyable here and provide a break from the platforming.
I wasn't a huge fan of the character designs when I first saw them, they didn't appeal to my aesthetic tastes but over time they did grow on me a little bit. The artistic design of the levels, especially the colour choices, really make the levels pop. And the soundtrack is very good here too, which is to be expected when Tee Lopes is involved, that man really knows how to do catchy music.
There's a light story to the game too, involving Penny being accused of breaking the law or something, it's fine for giving a background on what's happening but it's not something that really held my attention, few platformer stories do that for me however so it's not a big point against the game. There's plenty of extras as incentives to collect everything and stuff to do, time attack modes and the like to keep you playing, so all in all a very complete platformer package.
On the technical side of things the Switch version did have a couple of issues I experienced. There were two or three occasions where I clipped through the level and got stuck in some geometry, thankfully restarting from the last checkpoint is quick and easy to do if you do find yourself stuck. The Switch version also runs at a locked 30fps which is fine for me personally. There is a 60fps patch on the way at the time of writing but as long as I have a solid framerate I find 30fps to be perfectly ok to play with. Some of the backgrounds do get a bit fuzzy, particularly when there's a lot happening which seems to be a design choice as I've seen it in footage of the game running on other platforms but it's not something I particularly like. Minor issues aside, the game is fluid and responsive which are the two most important aspects of a platformer in my opinion.
All in all it's a great 3D platformer from a relatively new development studio. They managed to nail momentum based movement in a 3D environment - something that many devs struggle with to this day - to bring a fun and charming platformer. There's room for improvement here and there but Penny's Big Breakaway leaves me excited to see how Evening Star builds upon this.
Well for a first attempt, this is pretty good once you adapt to the limited control scheme. There's no camera movement and the shoulder and face buttons do the same things. Playing on a Switch controller for example, you can jump with B or R, attack with your yo-yo with Y or the Right Stick, and pseudo spin dash on the yo-yo with A or ZR. The yo-yo attack can offer a spin attack or a dash if you double tap the button and that's all the stuff you get. Working with a fixed camera can be difficult at first, especially when you're trying to dash in a direction but it's clear the team here understood what they wanted first and foremost - momentum.
I'll be honest and say I picked up the game because I knew it was from the Sonic Mania devs and when I saw it in the Nintendo Direct, I wanted to see how they handled a momentum based platformer. Well the answer is really, really well actually! Once you get used to how the camera works and how the level design works, you'll be dashing and riding the yo-yo down slopes at a brisk pace. The levels incorporate plenty of ramps so when you do gather a good bit of momentum you can really feel the height difference when launching off those ramps. It's incredible stuff and done with a level of control over Penny that I haven't felt from a momentum based 3D platformer like this since the Sonic Adventure days.
Nearly everything compliments the core design theme of momentum well. Every level's main objective is reaching the end goal. There's 3 hidden honeycomb-like objects that you can usually find just off the beaten path or in a higher path reached by maintaining a good bit of speed. There's also side objectives from the citizens of the worlds but even these are usually designed with keeping you moving forward in mind as they tend to require you to collect objects or deliver an object through a platforming challenge. The only thing I personally didn't like that much was the annoying penguins who hunt you down every level, slowing you down if they grab onto you and capturing you if enough of them grab you at once. It's a pressure I don't think a game like this needs in the majority of its levels.
On the boss battle front, these are fine and do the job they need to. There's one really inventive one that stood out which I won't spoil. The final boss has the annoying two phases and if you die in the second phase you have to do all of the first phase thing that I've grown to dislike more and more as I've gotten older. Like I've proven I can do the first phase fine, just let me do the phase I keep dying on please. But yeah, otherwise bosses are mostly enjoyable here and provide a break from the platforming.
I wasn't a huge fan of the character designs when I first saw them, they didn't appeal to my aesthetic tastes but over time they did grow on me a little bit. The artistic design of the levels, especially the colour choices, really make the levels pop. And the soundtrack is very good here too, which is to be expected when Tee Lopes is involved, that man really knows how to do catchy music.
There's a light story to the game too, involving Penny being accused of breaking the law or something, it's fine for giving a background on what's happening but it's not something that really held my attention, few platformer stories do that for me however so it's not a big point against the game. There's plenty of extras as incentives to collect everything and stuff to do, time attack modes and the like to keep you playing, so all in all a very complete platformer package.
On the technical side of things the Switch version did have a couple of issues I experienced. There were two or three occasions where I clipped through the level and got stuck in some geometry, thankfully restarting from the last checkpoint is quick and easy to do if you do find yourself stuck. The Switch version also runs at a locked 30fps which is fine for me personally. There is a 60fps patch on the way at the time of writing but as long as I have a solid framerate I find 30fps to be perfectly ok to play with. Some of the backgrounds do get a bit fuzzy, particularly when there's a lot happening which seems to be a design choice as I've seen it in footage of the game running on other platforms but it's not something I particularly like. Minor issues aside, the game is fluid and responsive which are the two most important aspects of a platformer in my opinion.
All in all it's a great 3D platformer from a relatively new development studio. They managed to nail momentum based movement in a 3D environment - something that many devs struggle with to this day - to bring a fun and charming platformer. There's room for improvement here and there but Penny's Big Breakaway leaves me excited to see how Evening Star builds upon this.