Five years after the release of Journey to the Savage Planet comes Revenge of the Savage Planet, an equally hilarious and entertaining game that manages to be its own thing on a much larger scale, but at the same time quite familiar to those who’ve played its predecessor.
Raccoon Logic did a stellar job injecting a whole lot of personality into the game yet again, with an incredibly funny premise that has you, as an ex-employee of an even bigger corporation that the last game’s, make do on an uninhabited planet after spending a hundred years in cryosleep.
The biggest change introduced in Revenge of the Savage Planet is the shift to third-person gameplay. While Journey focused on providing a more immersive experience in first-person, taking cues from Metroid Prime as you explored the titular Savage Planet, Revenge is a lot looser in that regard thanks to the much wider field of view and crafting-focused gameplay loop.
This one is similar structure-wise, having you 3D print power-ups after collecting enough materials in order to get through artificially-placed obstacles as you trip and tumble your way through lush forests, sandy deserts, and the slippery tundra. There’s your usual array of abilities like double jump and the hookshot, but it’s in the way that you use them that Revenge of the Savage Planet excels as its worlds are detailed and provide good reason to explore them, in the form of collectibles that boost your characters stats.
Combat, while simple, can get pretty involved, having you take heed of your environment in order to defeat the hostile fauna. For instance, one enemy type in particular can only be defeated by being frozen before being shot, thus forcing you to lead them into danger, or, in a much more enjoyable manner, pull or push them towards it. Puzzles come in all shapes and sizes. Some are quick to get through, like feeding a tree whose roots are blocking the way, all the way others can get a little more involved, but all are cleverly designed having in mind the fact that Revenge can be played entirely in combat.
That’s right – you can share the anguish of unemployment with another human being in this game! It’s a separate campaign from single player that has you doing basically the same things, but as a team. You know how the saying goes, twice the brains means half the work, right? I guess that’s how it goes.
Anyway, it’s a neat way to play for sure, one which should please parents especially, as it gives a change to have fun with their kids thanks to the surprisingly funny writing throughout the whole thing, which, coupled with the cute gimmicks all throughout make Revenge of the Savage Planet a very worthwhile pickup for moms and dads worried about the games that their kids play.
There’s plenty to say about how this looks and sounds. Much like Journey to the Savage Planet, Revenge is very, VERY colorful. Simple character designs populate its visually varied environments and blow up into puddles of green goon quite nicely. Thanks to some fantastic animation, it’s never boring watching your space explorer bolt around and slip on said puddles. When approaching a body of water, they walk all weird and just seeing them flail their arms around like a fool is in and of itself a spectacle to watch, really.
The main star of the show, however, lies in the script. Journey was already hilarious and the new game only amps it up by having you be accompanied by a cute little helper bot that is always yapping at you. This could have been a horrible Navi-like experience if the jokes weren’t good, but they are so witty and sarcastic that I found it hard to turn off – the option is there if you aren’t keen on listening, though!
I couldn’t be happier with how Revenge of the Savage Planet turned out. It’s a game that isn’t especially original, but what it does is done in far from a bad way. Crafting is simple and easy to do, fighting isn’t too involved, and it’s just a joy to run all over the place seeing what might be hiding in the next corner. This is the type of sequel that manages to be different from what came before it and at the same time familiar to those looking for more of what made Journey to the Savage Planet so great to begin with.
