Planet of Lana Review (Switch)

 Written by Thomas G.J. Sharpe

Thankfully, this is not a terrifying vision of an entire global sphere populated by Lana Del Ray clones that sing interminably, this is another cinematic platformer, and a darn good one at that! Much of the early coverage of Planet of Lana focussed on the visuals, drawing slightly basic comparisons to Studio Ghibli. While this comparison is correct in level of finish, the three-and-a-bit hours I spent with the game belie an interesting style of its own, no less beautiful, and a brilliant blend of puzzle, platform, and story.

This short, but well-formed, adventure starts in the titular Lana’s village. A coastal accretion of shacks and huts, with a population living out quiet lives. You learn the controls following your sister around and discover a sad family history. Then, in timely fashion, robo-aliens start piling through the atmosphere and do a kidnap job on everyone, which the nimble Lana is able to evade. These charmingly designed robots leave Lana alone, save for a small black cat-like creature called Mui. This is Limbo and Abe’s Oddysee for fans of Journey in a Wind-Waker colour palette. I dunno, the comparisons are still slightly non-functional. I was reminded of Brothers, obliquely, with the twin dynamics of tragic-adventure and co-operative puzzles. Lana and Mui work together to traverse the landscape, tame wildlife, and trash robot invader plans.

Some shots are just for show. The camera pulls out as you chase Mui down, wider and wider, until there’s a boulder crammed in a leafy canyon. There’s a tree sticking out of the top. It’s just for effect, played slow and careful. Lana trudges across a desert, despondent and defeated, everything lost (but a set up for an exhilarating reversal before the climax). Wishfully Studios have crafted something that has less vicious edge than its most obvious ancestors, Limbo and Inside. There was a longing, or hope against hope, that came to me from the sublime Spiritfarer. Lana is just capable enough, but there is a lonely and dangerous quality to the game. In this is my only real gripe, that many of the puzzles were a frustratingly tightly timed series of actions. If you failed to pull it off, there was a little long to get back into it, and often some setting up or pre-positioning that became real old, real fast if you’re stuck. This is certainly a personal problem, as I have such low patience, and such I am not docking too many points off Planet of Lana. Most puzzle or platform players will find this fine to accommodate.

Of particular note is the music. The score is so deftly handled that there is a real built sense from the small, yet bustling village, the peace of a forest gravesite, and quiet childhood games, to the soaring chase scenes, tense stealth sections, and eventual sci-fi battle grandeur. The compositions are linked with recurring motifs and themes, perfectly placed. There’s horns and bleeps and pads and all sorts. Just a real joy to experience.

Planet of Lana lasts around three to four hours (I was closer to four, but after looking playtime up, most did it around three, so I just suck) and is a taut experience that blends the best of this genre together. Between its presentation and its gameplay, there is huge value in a small package. Its core strength is this brevity, as the formula would not, in this reviewer’s opinion, have lasted to five hours. The push-me-pull-you, stelf-jump-stelf pattern is deployed for the right amount of time to engage us in a well-crafted adventure story, and no more. Knowing when to stop is a real virtue in games. Wishfully have made something special, intimate, yet grand, that seems to fit in your pocket.

Overall 8/10

The Eternal Castle Remastered Review (Switch)

Before the recent cinematic platformer revival The Eternal Castle had already landed on the Switch and the story and mythology behind it is just as intriguing as the game itself. You see, the ‘remastered’ part of the title is a misdirect, there was no Eternal Castle to remake. The idea put forward is that the game is the completion of an uncompleted game from 1987 that developers remember from their youth. In truth, no such game exists and the story is just a legend developed to set the up the context of how the game plays and looks.

The first thing that hits you is the incredible unique style of the game. Initially it is a little eye melting but you’ll soon get used to the faux retro look and it works perfectly in getting across the feel and environment. It’s difficult to describe to those who don’t remember games from the time period the game is supposedly set in but it certainly conjures the memories of the more ambitious platformers of the time. If you can visualise Another World running on a BBC Micro with only a few colours being used at once you’ll be in the right area.

The game plays much in the way we have come to expect from cinematic platformers. Your character takes extra frames to do things, so you know you have to make a slight adjustment to jumps and combat but the whole thing moves in a much more cinematic way. The game is also responsive and sharp so there isn’t much need to panic if you’ve struggled with these sorts of titles before. The main causes of death are due to the games difficulty and traps being hidden in the graphics rather than due to elongated movement.  

Though difficult, Eternal Castle isn’t particularly long so when you hit difficulty spikes you’ll likely want to push through them. After an initial introduction stage you have the choice of facing the next three stages in any order. Each stage has a unique look and focuses on different skill sets. One is a haunted castle which requires sneaking, while another is focused on using guns for instance. Each contains a string of near-constant set pieces and impressive boss fights at the end. it certainly lives up to the cinematic moniker. Once these have been completed and the parts to your space craft collected you can then fly off to the final level and eventually take on the big bad at the end.

In the two-hour runtime the game certainly throws a lot of variety at you so you’ll always be doing something new. It’s a carefully crafted game where every minute of it has been considered and set out to provide a unique experience for the player. The short run time also makes it more likely that players will return for another run through. There’s certainly plenty of law and things you may miss the first time as well so it’s well worth diving back in.

Overall, The Eternal Castle Remastered has both an intriguing back story and is a great experience in its own right. There isn’t really anything out there like it, even other cinematic platformers aren’t really the same. Players will certainly need to take some time getting used to how the game looks and works but once you do you’ll experience an adventure like no other.

Overall 9/10

Planet of Lana Review (Steam)

 

Written by Thomas G.J. Sharpe

 Thankfully, this is not a terrifying vision of an entire global sphere populated by Lana Del Ray clones that sing interminably, this is another cinematic platformer, and a darn good one at that! Much of the early coverage of Planet of Lana focussed on the visuals, drawing slightly basic comparisons to Studio Ghibli. While this comparison is correct in level of finish, the three-and-a-bit hours I spent with the game belie an interesting style of its own, no less beautiful, and a brilliant blend of puzzle, platform, and story.

This short, but well-formed, adventure starts in the titular Lana’s village. A coastal accretion of shacks and huts, with a population living out quiet lives. You learn the controls following your sister around and discover a sad family history. Then, in timely fashion, robo-aliens start piling through the atmosphere and do a kidnap job on everyone, which the nimble Lana is able to evade. These charmingly designed robots leave Lana alone, save for a small black cat-like creature called Mui. This is Limbo and Abe’s Oddysee for fans of Journey in a Wind-Waker colour palette. I dunno, the comparisons are still slightly non-functional. I was reminded of Brothers, obliquely, with the twin dynamics of tragic-adventure and co-operative puzzles. Lana and Mui work together to traverse the landscape, tame wildlife, and trash robot invader plans.

Some shots are just for show. The camera pulls out as you chase Mui down, wider and wider, until there’s a boulder crammed in a leafy canyon. There’s a tree sticking out of the top. It’s just for effect, played slow and careful. Lana trudges across a desert, despondent and defeated, everything lost (but a set up for an exhilarating reversal before the climax). Wishfully Studios have crafted something that has less vicious edge than its most obvious ancestors, Limbo and Inside. There was a longing, or hope against hope, that came to me from the sublime Spiritfarer. Lana is just capable enough, but there is a lonely and dangerous quality to the game. In this is my only real gripe, that many of the puzzles were a frustratingly tightly timed series of actions. If you failed to pull it off, there was a little long to get back into it, and often some setting up or pre-positioning that became real old, real fast if you’re stuck. This is certainly a personal problem, as I have such low patience, and such I am not docking too many points off Planet of Lana. Most puzzle or platform players will find this fine to accommodate.

Of particular note is the music. The score is so deftly handled that there is a real built sense from the small, yet bustling village, the peace of a forest gravesite, and quiet childhood games, to the soaring chase scenes, tense stealth sections, and eventual sci-fi battle grandeur. The compositions are linked with recurring motifs and themes, perfectly placed. There’s horns and bleeps and pads and all sorts. Just a real joy to experience.

Planet of Lana lasts around three to four hours (I was closer to four, but after looking playtime up, most did it around three, so I just suck) and is a taut experience that blends the best of this genre together. Between its presentation and its gameplay, there is huge value in a small package. Its core strength is this brevity, as the formula would not, in this reviewer’s opinion, have lasted to five hours. The push-me-pull-you, stelf-jump-stelf pattern is deployed for the right amount of time to engage us in a well-crafted adventure story, and no more. Knowing when to stop is a real virtue in games. Wishfully have made something special, intimate, yet grand, that seems to fit in your pocket.

Overall 8/10

Lunark Review (Switch)

 

Written by Thomas G.J. Sharpe

As cinematic platformers are on the re-ascendant it is heartening to me to see a developer making the case for the vital fibres of the genre. Flashback, Prince of Persia, and Abe’s Oddysee are all sort of the organs of Lunark, and it works out like a great slice of uncompromising pie.

The scene of this CINEMATIC platformer is sadly the weakest part of Lunark. The story is Deus Ex: Human Revolution adapted for a 90’s Saturday morning children’s cartoon. You play Leo, who is a peppy courier with a slight otherness to him, marking him against the human characters (like Jensen’s nano-guts), who has his very own guiding tech-mentor Gideon (like the fella with the office and the goatee). Things go chaotic at Gideon’s robot factory, however, and Leo is going to have to find out who’s behind it all. There are many locations to visit from futuristic city skylines to dank caverns, with a fun conspiracy narrative that won’t stretch your brain too much.

Rather than a beige-yellow-black cyberpunk murk, however, there are colours and adventure and boldness to Lunarks design. Having said that, there is a bit of a spattering of design styles on show here, which is jarring. There is beautiful, serious rotoscope cinematics (a la Flashback), with bold and blocky character portraits that take many styles. The occasional 3D model, lovingly frosted into abrasively large pixel form, work well, while some characters seem too small to make sense of. It is an odd presentation that I never quite got on with, but I do like the boldness of this game’s look.

To keep track; bold presentation, meek writing. So, the gameplay has to make up the mark and then some. And it does, for me. Lacking the fluidity of Conrad’s movements in Flashback, Leo is more noticeably taking a slot at a time on the ground. There is a plodding, but via this, thoughtful pace. Each little section can be tackled like a sequence of movements and actions that, if you get wrong, you soon learn costs you quite dearly. I bucked my ideas up and paid attention to jumps, ledges, enemy patterns, and obstacles, after Leo kept meeting his demise. At times this can feel quite punishing due to the distance of respawn points varying from quite close to too-far-to-be-enjoyable. You’ll get into the groove, or you’ll bounce off, probably, as the story isn’t quite compelling enough to drive it alone. Combat is inevitably pulled into this steadier flow too, where you have to fall into view of a drone or wee monster at the right time to get to cover, or get your shots off. There is a lot of timing and a lot of learning which movement keys to get in the right time, and during which cycle of movement. The difficulty curve isn’t that steep, but make sure you take your time.

I ended up enjoying the considered pace. There are very mild collectible-side-quest-NPC gewgaws to indulge in. The fact there was such a small amount of these felt like a song from a simpler time (I am currently playing through all the Assassin’s Creed games, so I’m generating a deep hatred for any collectible clutter like some gaming Marie Kondo). In fact, all of Lunark speaks from a different place. There is a lack of cynicism, a straight-forwardness, and a clarity of purpose that works. This is a tight and specific game, that speaks to an older time.

Much like point and click adventure games spawned new game types, the cinematic platformer was eaten by its own offspring (see Fade to Black) that pushed for greater excitement, embraced new visual angles, and sped up and up. These two genres are seeing a resurgence at the moment, and Lunark holds a particular spot with an entertaining game, that serves both something old and something new confidently and with a keen sense of joy.

Overall 8/10

The Library of Babel Review (Switch)

Styles of games always seem to run in cycles. Rogue likes, Metroidvanias, side scrolling brawlers etc. have all had their own revivals and now it seems is the age of the cinematic platformer. The pillars of the genre (Another World and Flashback) are already widely available on a host of systems but now we are starting to get games influenced by them and aimed at a new audience. Lunark is one and The Library of Babel is another.

The game is inspired by a short story by Jorge Luis Borges and deals with the idea that humanity has been long extinct. Intelligent robots now rule the earth, which has largely rewilded. Everything is harmonious until a library is discovered with everything that ever has or ever will be written inside it. This causes chaos as cults and revolutionaries start to rise. Amidst this backdrop you are sent to investigate a murder. There is also a heavy Apocalypse Now vibe that flows throughout.

The first thing that hits you is just how absolutely stunning the game looks. Every scene is gorgeous, and this is some of the finest artwork we have seen. All the areas have their own personality with jungles teeming with life and settlements buzzing with a mixture of neon and nature. The only minor complaint is that the game is often very dark and it can be difficult to see things at times. There’s also a lot of hidden passages and areas which don’t really have any visual ques to them so you’ll spend a lot of time crawling around on your knees by corners just on the off chance that there may be something there.

The story is strong and conjures the atmosphere of a noir-esque detective investigation quite well. There’s also a ton of characters to interact with and they all tend to be both interesting and well written in terms of dialogue that they dish out. This helps to keeps players engaged and keeps the plot interesting.

Gameplay is fairly straight forward and essential boils down to wandering around, jumping and crawling. A lot of the puzzles come down to finding an item and taking it to somewhere else, triggering switches or pushing boxes. This can become a bit dull at times, especially when you are trying to trigger switches in dangerous areas and keep getting killed. This is alleviated a bit by the fact that any doors opened, or key items gathered do stay in place when you respawn after death.

There is also a lot of wandering around back and forth. There are teleport points but sometimes you can get stuck in the dreaded ‘not really sure what I should be doing’ zone which can be frustrating. There is both a quest log and a map to help you out, but they aren’t the best. At one point we knew the name of the place we were meant to be going but couldn’t work out where it was on the map. Some people may see this as part of the investigation but for others it will become a drag as details are vague, especially if you come back to the game after a few days.

Overall, The Library of Babel is an interesting and engaging game, when it works. We enjoyed our time with it, but you can’t get away from the fact that there are long periods of time that can be a bit dull and directionless. If you can push through this though this is destined to become a bit of a hidden gem and it has clearly been crafted with real care and attention.

 Overall 7/10