The biggest stand-out of Psychonauts are its immensely creative level concepts, one moment you'll be journeying through someone's war-torn psyche, the next you're the star in a Godzilla movie, then a board game is turned into your playground, and this is to say nothing about The Milkman Conspiracy (for good reason the most famous part of the game). It's genuinely wonderful how many ideas Psychonauts can find within the framework of setting you loose platforming among people's minds, internal worlds brought to life from their trauma and struggles via striking visual design, and you can never really know what awaits in whichever subconscious is coming next.
The rest of the game is more of a mixed bag for me. People praise the writing, and there really are some lovely moments to it with its mix of delightful wit and off-kilter wackiness, plus how well the writing plays alongside the creative level designs (again, The Milkman Conspiracy is just impeccable in this regard), but there are also some distinct low-points to it for me also; particularly when the game descends into a bunch of characters incessantly shrieking at each other in annoying voices (notable personal grievances here including the actors in Gloria's Theater, and any scene featuring Dr Loboto). I think the positives outweigh the negatives here, and the writing is generally enjoyable, just not without its moments of annoyance.
On a similar note the gameplay is generally enjoyable in large part because exploring these worlds is so engaging, and the levitation ball is such a fun way of getting around that I literally never unequipped it from its item slot, but again there are annoyances; I had a handful of glitches and one incident of an awfully placed kill-plane throughout my playthrough, the controls never feel quite precise enough for some of the things you're asked to do, I can't think of any bosses in the game that I'd call good, and the early-game scraping together of arrowheads was a huge drag. Most of this is ultimately fine and easy enough to ignore as these levels really are enticing, but it all came crashing down with the game's conclusion for me; Meat Circus, and the parade of mediocre-at-best boss fights that surround it, is just a bad experience, and left a really sour taste in my mouth as the game's final note.
I can definitely see why this game is so beloved, it's incredibly creative and at its best very charming, but I also found it far from perfect in ways I struggle to ignore.
The rest of the game is more of a mixed bag for me. People praise the writing, and there really are some lovely moments to it with its mix of delightful wit and off-kilter wackiness, plus how well the writing plays alongside the creative level designs (again, The Milkman Conspiracy is just impeccable in this regard), but there are also some distinct low-points to it for me also; particularly when the game descends into a bunch of characters incessantly shrieking at each other in annoying voices (notable personal grievances here including the actors in Gloria's Theater, and any scene featuring Dr Loboto). I think the positives outweigh the negatives here, and the writing is generally enjoyable, just not without its moments of annoyance.
On a similar note the gameplay is generally enjoyable in large part because exploring these worlds is so engaging, and the levitation ball is such a fun way of getting around that I literally never unequipped it from its item slot, but again there are annoyances; I had a handful of glitches and one incident of an awfully placed kill-plane throughout my playthrough, the controls never feel quite precise enough for some of the things you're asked to do, I can't think of any bosses in the game that I'd call good, and the early-game scraping together of arrowheads was a huge drag. Most of this is ultimately fine and easy enough to ignore as these levels really are enticing, but it all came crashing down with the game's conclusion for me; Meat Circus, and the parade of mediocre-at-best boss fights that surround it, is just a bad experience, and left a really sour taste in my mouth as the game's final note.
I can definitely see why this game is so beloved, it's incredibly creative and at its best very charming, but I also found it far from perfect in ways I struggle to ignore.