Psychonauts

The Good
Tim Schafer. One of my gaming industry heroes, and the famous creator/co-creator of games like Day of The Tentacle, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango. When Psychonauts was released, discerning gamers everywhere proclaimed it a masterpiece.

Well, it is. This is a wildly imaginative, hugely varied, very entertaining romp disguised as a platformer. You play Raz, a boy with psychic powers who sneaks into a "psychic summer camp". You get merit badges throughout the game which give you special psychic powers like Telekinesis, Levitation, etc. I won't give away anymore, but the areas in the game are essentially the minds of very quirky individuals, and the developers play this concept to the hilt. I think that this is the only game I've played where every area requires a different type of gameplay. Unlike most games that introduce some core gameplay principles at the beginning and then just crank up the difficulty as you go along, Psychonaut's levels are all very unique, and very well done, despite the variety. You might be playing a wargame by recruiting and moving pieces on a giant board, or you might be rolling and floating Sonic-style inside a disco inferno. It has to be played to be believed.

There's also tons of stuff to do if you like collect-a-thons, and believe me, if you want to collect everything, you'd better have some skills and patience.

The Bad
Well, most all of the bad aspects come from the way this game was ported to the PS2. For one, framerate issues. Some people might find it less obnoxious than I do, but the framerate in the PS2 version tends to fluctuate wildly. The game is still highly playable, but really there's no excuse for this kind of thing in a professional product.

Loading times in the PS2 version are also sub-par. This is not unusual for these kinds of ports, but it's still annoying.

Also, the way the game handles save files is not PS2 optimized. You have to create a 1500KB profile save file that contains 5 save slots. The problem is, you can only use these save slots for the game you're in. If you start a new game, you have to create another massive 5-slot profile. The problem with this is that you never need more than 1 slot, as the game is mostly linear, and does autosaves anyway. Which means that if you live in a three-gamer household like me, there will have to be three massive save files on your memory card, and all each person will ever use will be 1/5 of their save slots. Given that games like Ratchet and Clank can support up to six totally separate game files in a 350KB file, this limitation is a bit silly, and feels like the the porters just used the PC-style save system with no modification.

To be fair to the original developers, an external porting house did the conversion, but this is still the least desirable version of this great game.

The Bottom Line
Psychonauts is truly a great game, and every serious gamer should definitely play it. But unfortunately, for the best experience, you should certainly go with the XBOX or PC versions.

The Good
Psychonauts is the craziest, most deranged and one of the funniest games I have ever played. You take control of Raz (short for Razputin), a kid who’s run away from his circus family to sneak into Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp for psychic kids to become a member of the famed Psychonauts. The cast of characters be they your fellow camp psychics, the teachers, or the many people running round inside people’s minds that you'll bump into - all are fantastical or horrendously stereotypical and most are hilarious. There’s Bobby Zilch, the camp bully or Dogan, an extremely short chap who wears a foil hat because he blew someone’s head up “well, once kinda,” you don’t want to see what happens when he gets cornered by squirrels. Much of the story or happenings are bordering on insanity.

Your first task is a basic training level, Coach Oleander sucks you into his mind and barks orders and 'encouragement' as you leap crevices, get blown up and run for cover from machine gun fire, all to the sound of a WWII bombing campaign, vintage style projections of falling bombs light up the walls as you clamber up camo-netting, you’ll catch up with plenty of your fellow students as you go. Each level, or mind, that you enter is heavily themed. One of the most surreal is a twisting mess of suburban roads, hedges and identikit houses (gravity changes to which ever way happens to be down for each section), cartoon 'spies’, shifty chaps with high coat collars, red eyes and fedoras are busy going about their undercover business. At one section, they claim to be the road crew "We are the road crew", “We work on the roads", “My back is killing me”. You’ll need an item to get through each section to prove you’re one of them. Another involves matching a theatre play with the right set and mood (good or bad) - sounds kind of run of the mill, but like much in this game its unexpected and bonkers. Not to mention Lungfishopolis.

Between the story, which is mainly told through humorous cut scenes (I laughed out load many times, there’s always something hilarious, even if it's just the perfectly executed reaction on a characters face), the action is of a uniformly platforming style but with vastly different tasks to perform, huge boss battles are common and are, traditionally, at the end of each level.

Raz acquires psi powers such as levitation - a ball of energy you can bounce on and turn into a balloon type thing to float down slowly and ride up drafts, invisibility and telekinesis, to name but a few, as he gains ranks, the powers also increase as you go. There's plenty to collect, each mind is populated with figments - 2D sketches of stuff, usually crazy looking stuff, that are either just lying about the place or floating through the air, collecting 'em helps you gain those ranks, there's also mental cobwebs that can be cleared with the mental cobweb duster (available at the camp store) these can be redeemed for psi-cards (which you’ll see bobbing about from time to time) combine enough psi-cards with a psi-core (also available at the camp store) and you gain an entire rank. Smashing stuff can yield positive mental health, aggressive psychic energy (used for psi-blasts) and arrowheads, the camp currency is arrowheads as Whispering Rock was founded on an ancient Indian burial ground. There’s also emotional baggage, wailing suitcases and purses and the like which you’ll need to find the corresponding tag to clear, clear them all and you can access primal memories from Raz’s journal, which appear to be concept art for the game, and hopping vaults, punch these and you get a memory reel (comic strip style story board). Memory reels and cut scenes can also both be accessed from Raz’s journal for each level.

The camp consists of several different areas that you can travel freely between in-between missions, if you decide to take some time out to collect arrowheads, visit the camp store or just explore.

The music and voice acting are superb, spot on voice acting for the characters and very very funny, I particularly liked the adventurous secret agent style Psychonauts theme that plays in Ford Cruller’s underground HQ.

The Bad
The platforming can be awkward at times, as per usual.

The Bottom Line
Brilliant, the furthest out game I've played, so to speak. While it’s a completely different game in many ways than Grim Fandango, Creative Director Tim Shafer's previous game, it’s got a similar quality of style to it. I don't suppose there’s much chance of the sequel, but I'll be looking out for Double Fine’s second game sequel or no.

One third genius, one third insanity and one third hilarity!

The Good
Many of today's games are entertainment projects which don't fall short of movie productions, especially in terms of the artistic effort put into their visuals. Few games, however, are as convincing with their setting, characters and plot as Tim Schafer's Psychonauts.

This immersion is achieved on more than one level. Schafer creates a familiar little childhood world in which players feel at home - a summer camp. The twist: it's a summer camp for psychically gifted children. Our curiosity is piqued! Enter the hero, Razputin, a slightly kooky, yet immensely likeable and adventurous kid with the grand dream of mastering this little world and claim its reward: employment as a psychic government agent.

The test Raz has to overcome takes on greater proportions when the "usual" training he is supposed to undergo gets disrupted by a villain bent on harnessing the camper's psychic energies for his own purpose. During his journey, Raz studies with many mentors and enhances his mental powers. The learning curve and enhanced abilities that must be unlocked wake fond memories of prime genre representatives like Legend of Zelda in which players get an increasing feeling of skill and mastery of the surrounding world.

In terms of gameplay, Psychonauts translates into mental worlds which Razputin has to visit. Once there, he has to use his skills to solve the problems inside people's heads, helping them to overcome their personal demons and advance the story. Among the game's highlights are visits into a paranoid milkman's mind or the battle with an actress' inner critic in a world resembling a giant stage. While the premise gets weirder and weirder, it remains perfectly comprehensible because players are introduced to everything one step at a time. Like Raz, they only have a vague idea of what awaits them and are led deeper into the world of Psychonauts through exploration, an integral part of this action-adventure.

The game's graphics are the kind of bent-out-of-shape cartoon designs one would expect from Tim Burton, only less bleak. Bordering on the abstract sometimes, they can be a little hard to get into but radiate an appeal that's entirely their own. The presentation is topped off by a superb voice-over. Not a single character is miscast and no small part of the fun is exploring the "real" world tying together the mental ones and talking to many memorable characters and find out about them. No character in Psychonauts is two-dimensional and it speaks for the game's appeal that running around and talking to people is something players will want to do, even though it's not necessary to beat the game.

The Bad
While one of the most original games around as far as presentation and story are concerned, Psychonauts doesn't offer much in terms of gameplay that can't be found (and often better) in other action-adventures. The game isn't a cookie-cutter jump 'n' run, yet it's a far cry from brilliant gems like the aforementioned Legend of Zelda which offer better level design and a combination of action and puzzles elements.

Also, while Psychonauts is brilliantly written, it shows that Tim Schafer used to create equally brilliant adventure games for LucasArts. A slight disadvantage in this case as most of Psychonauts' main problems play out like classic adventure puzzles, but are far easier to beat because the solutions are action-based rather than brainteasers.

The Bottom Line
Psychonauts is a game players will play primarily for its story and characters. Giving a story-based approach the fair chance it deserves, it's easy to lose oneself in Tim Schafer's delightfully weird world populated by an incredibly strong cast. However, people who are looking for an experience in gameplay first and foremost may be turned off by this as the game's strength lies in its funny and intelligent plot.