If this game had like 6 more months in the oven it could have been something truly incredible.
Penny's Big Breakaway was a game that I was highly anticipating since it was shown in that Nintendo Direct last year, and seeing it be shadow dropped last month excited me enough to buy it as soon as my next paycheck went through.
There is a lot to absolutely love here, from outstanding visual design, to exciting and bouncy music, all wrapped up in a world that is just fun to traverse. The environmental detail is absolutely stellar, and every nook and cranny in these levels were packed to the brim with hidden challenges and secrets that made them incredibly replayable.
The star of the show however is Penny herself. Starting out, I was a little worried because I wasn't fully clicking with how the game controlled, but after playing for a few more hours, I got to a point where I was flying through levels and pulling off incredibly fun movement combos. The game just feels good to play, and it reminded me a lot of Pseudoregalia in that regard, although not as deep. Penny's roll move where she rides on top of her YO-YO might be one of my new favorite 3D platformer movement techniques.
The issues however come from what I consider to be a surprising lack of polish. This game reminded me quite a lot of Super Mario Sunshine, where the core movement felt so good, but a plethora of bugs and strange design choices stop the game short of greatness. The amount of bugs I encountered in this game was unacceptable, and frankly made going for 100% a complete and total mess. There were dozens of times where Penny would just fly completely in the wrong direction, or the physics would not know what to do and just kill me instantly.
The lack of polish also led to a lot of moments having lackluster sound design, and boss fights not having the impact that I wanted them to have. The final fight had all sound cut out for me during it, and it just made the entire experience awkward. The combo system also felt poorly thought out, where once I found out I could double jump into a roll over and over again for an easy 100 move combo, every level had me quickly spamming that at the beginning to ensure I got the scrapbook piece at the end.
Overall, seeing that this game was shadowdropped in the most recent Nintendo Direct puts a sour taste in my mouth. I really do feel like if this team had another 6 months to iron out the strange kinks with it, this game could rival some of my favorite 3D platformers like Kirby and the Forgotten Land or A Hat in Time. But even with those issues, Penny's Big Breakaway was a thoroughly enjoyable game with some of the most fun traversal mechanics Ive used in a while.
It just bums me out that this game was just a few more weeks of QA away from true greatness.
Penny's Big Breakaway was a game that I was highly anticipating since it was shown in that Nintendo Direct last year, and seeing it be shadow dropped last month excited me enough to buy it as soon as my next paycheck went through.
There is a lot to absolutely love here, from outstanding visual design, to exciting and bouncy music, all wrapped up in a world that is just fun to traverse. The environmental detail is absolutely stellar, and every nook and cranny in these levels were packed to the brim with hidden challenges and secrets that made them incredibly replayable.
The star of the show however is Penny herself. Starting out, I was a little worried because I wasn't fully clicking with how the game controlled, but after playing for a few more hours, I got to a point where I was flying through levels and pulling off incredibly fun movement combos. The game just feels good to play, and it reminded me a lot of Pseudoregalia in that regard, although not as deep. Penny's roll move where she rides on top of her YO-YO might be one of my new favorite 3D platformer movement techniques.
The issues however come from what I consider to be a surprising lack of polish. This game reminded me quite a lot of Super Mario Sunshine, where the core movement felt so good, but a plethora of bugs and strange design choices stop the game short of greatness. The amount of bugs I encountered in this game was unacceptable, and frankly made going for 100% a complete and total mess. There were dozens of times where Penny would just fly completely in the wrong direction, or the physics would not know what to do and just kill me instantly.
The lack of polish also led to a lot of moments having lackluster sound design, and boss fights not having the impact that I wanted them to have. The final fight had all sound cut out for me during it, and it just made the entire experience awkward. The combo system also felt poorly thought out, where once I found out I could double jump into a roll over and over again for an easy 100 move combo, every level had me quickly spamming that at the beginning to ensure I got the scrapbook piece at the end.
Overall, seeing that this game was shadowdropped in the most recent Nintendo Direct puts a sour taste in my mouth. I really do feel like if this team had another 6 months to iron out the strange kinks with it, this game could rival some of my favorite 3D platformers like Kirby and the Forgotten Land or A Hat in Time. But even with those issues, Penny's Big Breakaway was a thoroughly enjoyable game with some of the most fun traversal mechanics Ive used in a while.
It just bums me out that this game was just a few more weeks of QA away from true greatness.