I was originally gonna give it a 4 or maybe 4.5, but I've been playing more and more, doing some time attacks and just experimenting with the game...
And yeah, I've decided I adore this game. It is a bit janky, maybe could have used a bit more polish, but honestly, I don't even mind. I'm just always having a blast with this game. Getting good at the movement has felt so satisfying, and the level design complements it so well. Every level has like, multiple different ways to get through it, and it makes for such a fun time.

The graphics and story are really charming too! And then the music is frankly insane with how good it is.

I see why people might not like this game as much, but I don't really care. It's not often I can't stop thinking about playing a game even after I've beaten it, and this game has reached that point with me. I love this game so much.

A bit surprised at how divisive the reception has been with this one. Despite the fair amount of jank and bugs I absolutely loved my time with Penny's Big Breakaway, and would consider it a strong contender got game of the year.

What makes the game so much fun is the absolutely phenomenal movement the game allows. While it may seem a bit hard to get used to in the beginning (and can be fairly unforgiving with mistakes) once you figure things out speeding through the levels and keeping the combo becomes second nature. The level design also helps with this, with tons of secondary paths that showcase just how much tech exists with the relatively simple controls. Music is also phenomenal throughout, with Tee Lopes creating banger after banger which match the aesthetics perfectly.

It's not all perfect sadly. The biggest issue being just how buggy the game could be, with plenty of instances of clipping through the world or some things just not working as intended (thankfully no crashes or frame drops). The ranking system could also be better, with some rather weak explanations for max scoring besides needing to full clear levels (which thankfully is never an issue). Bosses could also be a bit better, as they all just kinda exist and are over as quickly as they appear (besides the final boss which is pretty neat).

Besides those easily fixable issues I had a blast with Penny's Big Breakaway. Once they iron out the issues I'll gladly go back and 100 percent the game because its just so much fun. An easy recommendation for any platformer fan.

9.5/10



UPDATE 3/13

Game got its first big patch so went back and did all the steam achievements (not scrapbooking because the score requirements are insane). Bumping it up to a 9.5 since most of the small technical issues I had got ironed out.

A top down co-op shooter where you are probably going to be killed by friendly fire more than by the three enemy forces. Amusing/terrifying use of Starship Troopers/American foreign policy style setting. A lot of different support features to call in and upgrade, even without any DLC, vehicles, airstrikes, heavy weapons, turrets, drones, etc. Three different enemy forces and 33 enemy types, different difficulty planets and different forces will make you use different loadouts to fit the situation.

Without the DLC the guns could use more variety, and upgrades are repeated. Terrible camera when you get four people. Joining players tend to drop on you. Lack of mission variety. Only one type of sidearm and a lot of players ended up wanting to refund upgrade points when they ended up hating the burst fire feature they gave the pistol.

Very fun game but it does start to become a grind to level up and it can be too easy if you have two or three people with you that have the slightest idea of what they should be doing.

For Democracy!

Helldivers is one of the more unique games I have had the pleasure of playing in the PS4 era. At it's core it's a top down multiplayer shooter with heavy references to the political satire adverts from the original film adaption of Starship Troopers. Sounds pretty crazy but that's only the start, this is a bizarre game where you have to rely on the community as much as your own skill to complete it and playing well with others is vital as killing yourself or your squad mates is as easy as the aggressive aliens you're fighting.

The goal of the game is to fend off three rather different, though equally aggressive races from progressing towards earth in a giant galactic war. Each player starts the game on the bridge of their own starship which is essentially a hub with each station acting as a menu for something from changing your characters clothing, weapons and skills to bios of characters and enemies. From here you can choose to either go out on missions on your own or join a squad of players (up to four) to try and take down harder missions together.

Each race has a good variety of units to fight from smaller easy to kill aliens that sound off alarms to huge armour plated killing machines that render pretty standard weapon load outs useless. You have the Bugs which are extremely similar to the bugs from the afore mentioned Starship Troopers movie, very organic, largely close range and quite often burrow underground. The Cyborgs, which are almost steampunk, tend to be heavily armoured, use a lot of guns and can also deploy tanks to the battlefield. Lastly there are the Illuminate which are the "apple" of the alien world, super slick, white armour, advanced technology with cloaking and lasers.

These races are fought in a tri-front war with each front being measured by points gained through successful missions completed added to a bar on each front. Every person playing this game commits to the war effort, this is all online, measuring how well humanity are doing. Push an alien race back far enough collectively and you can take on their homeworld and wipe them out for good (if the community beats all three races it all starts over again). Working together on the right front is key to victory for the community, but working together in missions is just as important as harder missions gain more points but are near impossible to play through without a team backing you up, this game can be hard.

Once on a selected planet for the mission there are a number of objectives for your team to complete across the map, defending missile silos, killing certain targets, saving survivors of a ship crash etc. The harder the level the more missions there are, completing them all gives you extra points towards the community victory as a whole. At the end of every mission your squad has to activate a beacon to call in a dropship to come and pick you up. This causes every alien to home in on your location causing a bit of a last stand situation with every mission you face, it's tense and pretty action heavy. I haven't begun to explain how crazy those can be, as I believe Winston Churchill once said "Friendly Fire, Isn't." Every shot you can take can kill your own squad so accuracy and positioning of your squad are super important as an accidental team kill can be the difference between success and failure.

If you do die or kill someone by accident though you can bring them back using stratagems. These are epic, before every battle each player can equip up to four of these plus the default revive stratagem. Despite the names, these are actually drop pods launched from your orbiting starship providing weapons, additional ammo, jetpacks, assault mechs, vehicles, mines, bombing raids, distraction beacons etc. as well as bringing dead players back to the battlefield.

These can kill you.

The pods slam into the ground from space, if you stand underneath one you will die, though explode would be more accurate. Sometimes reviving someone else will kill you, throwing a stratagem in the wrong place may blow up someone's tank, killing them, you or even your whole squad if truly unlucky. (There are options to kick trolls who are doing it on purpose though in like 70 hours of playing I rarely encountered that) Precision, timing, knowing when to run and what stratagems to take to compliment your squad and alien type are key. Some missions with groups of people we would get wiped out yet five minutes later with a new squad on one of the hardest settings we're running through like experienced commandos.

The presentation is pretty decent, the visuals aren't amazing though they certainly do the job effectively with pretty good looking enemies and weapon effects with decent music and voice acting. There are a variety of planet types, desert, swamp, volcano, snow etc. that effect the game slightly (slow to move through water and snow without vehicles and jet packs) but they all feel kind of empty, barren except for the odd rock, mountain or crevice. I feel the planets could have been more interesting to travel around.

The game has one big flaw though, repetition. It has provided some of the best, not to mention, tense moments in any co-op I've played in years where you struggle through rooting for the last member of your team alive to revive you, surrounded by aliens, low on ammo but the mission objectives are really quite boring and get old pretty quickly on the bland maps your pretty cool looking squad traverse. It's a pretty big flaw in an otherwise unique experience with fantastic gameplay but I really wouldn't let it put you off and urge you to give Helldivers a try while the community is still active.

Recommended.

+ Stratagems are a really cool mechanic.
+ The community victory and absolute need to work as a team are great design choices.
+ Large option of weapons, upgrades, vehicles and strategies to try.

- Planets and missions get pretty repetitive.

Momentum-focused 3D platformer that feels like a 3D Sonic Team game from the Saturn era. Kind of a NiGHTS aesthetic going on as well. This game is about chaining special movement techniques back to back to move around quickly. Basic walking is a bad way to speed up or switch directions. Air dashing, using a grappling-hook type move and riding across terrain to keep your speed up is basically the core gameplay here.

The platforming levels get fairly challenging to clear later on. Mainly the optional Star levels but fully unlocking these requires completionist item collection which may not be for everyone.

The games boss fights seem very weak compared to the main platforming parts. I wish the Busker Bonus minigame wasn't in the game at all, being a trivial quick-time event at the end of every stage. It breaks the pace between levels a bit too much, including the minigame music not being stage specific.
Time Attack mode gets rid of this but that's essentially post-game. Speedrunning through levels does seem like the core appeal and most fun to have in the game.

Levels and especially boss fights have some dead air with auto scrolling rail grab, etc. sequences where you wait around for the next scene. The campaign feels a tiny bit bloated personally. I really started enjoying the level design around World 6-7.

When there isn't dead air the movement does feel very fast paced. Being a momentum based game messing up is just heavily punished. Even in optional levels you're often able to skip sections by fully using all your movement abilities.

The game at launch is a little buggy and also doesn't allow remapping your controls which is strange. The default 'pro' layout has many duplicate buttons and wants you to dash by double flicking the right stick which felt awkward. I had a much better experience after using Steam Input to change R1/RB to be a yo-yo throw button allowing dash by flicking the right stick once and pressing a button.

I had trouble perceiving depth visually on a few levels, especially if the ground is lava or something else that doesn't show the players shadow. Generally seems good though and I can imagine this being polished later.

This game has been an incredibly rewarding and consistently fun experience throughout my playthrough and, having finished the game, I came out having wonderful time, even if its not entirely perfect.


Firstly I want to go over a lot of my positive thoughts:

This game's style is EXCEPTIONALLY strong, both in it's visuals and audio. The game has a really strong visual identity, with lots of bight and vibrant colours mixed with some excellent character and environment design, that work together to create a world thats an absolute treat to experience. Similarly with the audio, the music is constantly upbeat and energetic, really adding to the game's unique visuals and enhancing the experience as a whole.

Control-wise, I feel its really important to go in understanding that it doesn't play like a lot of other 3D-platformers. The game implements a duel-stick scheme that allows you to control Penny and Yo-Yo independently of one-another, and makes it so that the only buttons that are needed are triggers for things like jumping and rolling, though thankfully you can still use the face buttons for those and other actions too! Having messed around with it, once you get a feeling for how movement and controls work, you can tell these levels were designed around allowing for a lot of momentum and movement, as well as to allow for sequence-breaking and flexibility for how you choose to traverse them, and it fells INCREDIBLE to play! I recommend really spending some time to get a feel for the controls, as once you figure out the full potential of them, your options when it comes to movement and traverseal open up tremendously!

This is all brought together with exceptional performance on PC! On my set-up with an RTX 3070 Ti and a Ryzen 5900X, I was always able to play at a locked 120fps with no drops nor stuttering, and it felt incredible to play at that kind of framerate! Similarly on my OLED Deck, it ran locked at 90fps at max settings, so it seems like this game is very well polished on an optimization level!


While I've had a great time however, I DO have a few critiques about the game:

Physics can be a bit janky in sections that require more precision, as I found certain sections I had to play more carefully in order to avoid the physics causing me to fall-off a platform and die. This also extends to some gameplay issues in-regards to collision as there were several points where things like Yo-Yo or even Penny herself would get stuck on geometry, keep hovering in mid-air on certain platforms, or in some cases even getting soft-locked into parts of the level geometry. Thankfully the game is pretty forgiving in this sense with no lives and being able to restart at checkpoints instead of the beginning of the level, but they were something that could occasionally cause some frustration and break the flow of gameplay.

Another issue for me stemmed from some general polish issues in regards to cutscene presentation, as the cutscenes that are in-game felt like they needed another pass in terms of animation, as they felt rather unpolished and rough around the edges. Same with the pre-rendered cutscenes, though Id argue to a lesser extent, as well as there being some general issues with sound-balancing throughout both certain cutscenes and gameplay.


Overall however, despite some of my issues, I've been having a GREAT time with this game, and would absolutely recommend it to those who love 3D-platformers and especially those looking for something more experimental and faster paced! Its got it's quirks that I hope will get addressed in the future, but stick with it and you'll find a game thats bursting with charm and character and that will keep you coming back to replay and master for a long time!

Everything I wanted and more. Whitehead and his team continue to be masters at their craft at making great platformers.

It's not perfect, by all means, but the issues are so minor to the point where it doesn't detract from what's easily gonna be a 2024 GOTY contender for me. Easily the best 3D platformer I've played since Mario Odyssey.

I think a lot of the division I've seen seems to come from those who expected it to be more of a Sonic game, hence it sharing a lot of the staff from Mania. There's some of that here, by all means, but It felt more of momentum-based 3D Mario game (Odyssey came to mind with all the powerups). There's a bit of a learning curve, but I think that's exactly why the first world is as slow as it is pacingwise, to ease people into the controls, and I don't think that's an issue at all.

The two biggest critiques I've heard regard bugs and controls, and honestly barring a few minor instances early on I didn't have much of an issue with either. I only had one flat-out crash on PC total, and the worst I had with bugs was with World 2's boss fight (although I feel most of that was due to me still trying to get the hang of the roll controls), as I either would get knocked off course for seemingly no reason or in one specific case completely lock up and have no input on Penny's movements. And as I said prior, while I do think there is a learning curve to it, it's exceptionally satisfying to master, and the game does a great job of pushing you to play faster and thinking out of the box with your entire moveset to either skip whole areas or get into areas with special collectables/objectives.

Everything else is top notch. Tee Lopes' compositions here are admittedly a bit more low energy compared to what we heard in Mania (and even a bit recently with his Superstars tracks), but as someone who loved Mania's more slow tracks like Press garden I have no issue. Legit can't wait for the soundtrack to release.

My only real issue would probably be the currency you pick up in levels not mattering much in the long run. You have the stuff you can use for bonus levels, and that's all well and good, but the one-use items felt kinda pointless aside from it being a crutch for worse players or those who maybe want to explore the levels with more freedom. Maybe it's just me but I'd rather find things legit instead of relying on the items, so I felt no desire to spend them. Even something as simple as costumes would've given the normal currency more worth imho.

That, and probably the biggest thing for me (and I'd imagine some others), the price point. This game has around the same completion+100% timing as Sonic Mania (8-9 Hours) yet is 30 bucks, compared to Mania being just 20 when it came out. I have no issue spending 30 here since I'll support the devs no matter what here, but I do feel 20 is a more appropriate price point for this game and I feel like considering the teams background they wanted to do that, only for it to not happen due to Private Division or T2 meddling. Not a big issue at the end of the day and doesn't lessen my enjoyment, but if you ARE on the edge I don't think it'd hurt at all if you waited for a 10 buck price drop. Either way, highly recommended. Give these guys more projects, please.

This is the most fun I've had with a 3D platformer since I was a kid, and I'm not one to exaggerate or overhype anything. The movement does have a steep-ish learning curve, but I found myself getting acclimated to it far sooner than I did with Pizza Tower (which I honestly felt like I never got the hang of). There is definitely some jank going on as others have commented, and I think the QTE-fest at the end of each level was super unnecessary. Other than that, this is fantastic for the newly formed Evening Star's first stab at the genre.

I'm really surprised how negative the reviews are for this here because I had a great time with this. I'll chalk it up to the game being admittedly a little janky, but not to the extent, IMO, being described here.

I also think the pedigree of the game makes it seem like it's going to inherently be a "speedy" platformer when it's maybe not. Like there's definitely the capacity to go fast here, and it was built with that in mind, but in a lot of cases you're poking around looking for stuff or doing little tasks for NPCs or whatever, and the movement mechanics have a little bit of a learning curve that has to be overcome before you can really move quickly, so maybe some people are feeling like they got bait-and-switched? But once you have your head wrapped around and are flying thru using the full bag of tricks it's a ton of fun.

I will say that after a couple days of sustained play I began to find the aesthetic and music in the game kind of grating and the sequence in the last boss where you're riding up the ramp has a whirling camera that makes the correct inputs unclear and lead to a frustrating number of failures. Putting all that aside, this is a short sweet game with movement mechanics satisfying enough that I know I'll come back and have some fun blasting through now and again and that's I was looking for.

When I heard that the Sonic Mania team were making an original 3D platformer of their own it was an instant day one purchase for me no matter what. Despite obvious Mario Odyssey / Galaxy inspiration, this is really going to be unlike any platformer you've played before. At first the movement feels strange and it's a lot to learn and get used to, and this will cause some people to fall off it and give up on it much like with 3D Sonics, but if you are willing to put in the time it eventually becomes second nature to rack up massive stylish combos in these stages. Using the right stick for the yoyo makes everything feel so much better. Skill ceiling is crazy high here and there's so many ways to use momentum to your advantage to save so much time. Visual style is remincent of the later SEGA consoles and Tee Lopes has outdone himself with the soundtrack.

I'm not going to pretend the game doesn't have its fair share of jank, but it was honestly such a refreshing joy to play and I have already replayed its levels a bunch and can see myself continuing to do that. I remember Mania having problems at launch too so I think it will become more polished over time. If you like deceptively complex platformers that have lots of player expression, or liked Odyssey movement but want challenging level designs that actually make use of all those tricks, I think it's going to be a game for you. I'm not so bitter about the fact Mania 2 will never exist anymore...

what if we made counter-strike but it had the lightning pace & matchup knowledge required of fighting games. you have to put up with ubisofts abysmal pc client, occasional server issues, an extremely steep learning curve, and years of iterative liveservice grievances, but the reward for your patience, composure, and penchant for masochism is one of the most dynamic & fierce multiplayer shooters you could sink your teeth into. skirmishes are claustrophobic, intensely layered, and verge into eerie; when communications are in disarray and the information economy siege is founded on fails to tick properly every environment tends to feel like it's haunted, almost voyeuristic. you never know what hole operators are peeking at you through, or if they're inverse rappelling from above a window with laser sights trained on you. just as the cruelty of hunt: showdown ate up a lot of my time in 2022, i expect 2023 to be the year of siege standing in for my personal go-to multiplayer vehicle

Penny's Big Breakaway is a game I had been excited for since its announcement. Sonic Mania veterans Christian Whitehead, Tee Lopes, and others have created something wholly unique, and while a Mania sequel would've been great, I really love that they went on to do something as creative as this.

PBB to me feels like a mix of more classic level design, with each level containing a somewhat linear progression, mixed in with momentum based movement of more recent 3D platformers. PBB definitely takes inspiration from Super Mario Odyssey with Penny's moveset allowing you to stay in the air and use her yo-yo to attack and reach new heights, very similarly to Cappy from Odyssey. Within the first few levels I was immediately enamored by Penny's moveset, which felt easy to learn but hard to master. Everytime I fell off a platform, I felt like I could learn what mistakes in my "moveset planning" led me there. I love platformers that take an unconventional and new approach to movement, and PBB is no exception. Much of the level design is based around speed, and the game rewards you with new areas if you're capable enough to surpass a daunting obstacle. Many times there will be a ramp that you need to roll off of with enough speed to reach a collectible, for example. Throughout PPB's runtime, I felt like Penny's moveset was adequately used, with some exceptions.

The presentation of this game, graphics wise, is spectacular. The game has this bright, dreamy presentation that really catches your eye, and many times just starting a level the camera is panned out, allowing you to take in the gorgeous visuals before you enter. I've seen some people note a few glitches, like clipping into objects, which I've encountered but only 2 times through my runtime. Which is a shame. Hopefully there is a patch soon that fixes some of the rough edges, but overall I think the presentation is very well done for a studio's first game.

This game also tends to prioritize speed and a point based system, which I find really interesting for a modern 3D platformer. At the end of a level, you have the opportunity to score some extra coins/points by going through a quicktime event called a "busker bonus". Honestly, I didn't really care about how many points I accumulated by the end, so I think these events were more annoying than anything, and I think the reason I didn't care much about points is because there is hardly a reward for getting a high score. What I did enjoy, were the 6 "collectibles" throughout the levels, though. I ended up getting all of them, and some of them were tough to pin down at times. But I felt like they were perfectly challenging. Not too easy, but also not too hard.

Another point of the gameplay I really didn't care for were the penguins. I get why they are here, they motivate you to keep going through the level as fast as you can, but when I'm looking for collectables or trying to look for more health, I found them more annoying than anything. They weren't a huge issue, but just a small annoyance.

I think if a sequel were to be made for this game, I'd love for there to be even more cool yo-yo movement options. I think what they have here is great, but I can see a lot of potential for the future. Also, the wall jump was rarely used, which I found a bit confusing. Wall jumps are fun and I wish the level design allowed for its use. There's like one bonus level that centers around it and it uses it well, so to me it felt like a conscious decision to keep it away from the main game, which felt odd.

Also, really didn't care for the story, partially because I think the cutscenes felt like an after thought. I think the story pacing was just a tad weird, though I enjoyed the characters and their designs.

I really enjoyed PBB. While it doesn't completely realize its ideas, what is here is remarkably creative and very fun to play.