Psychonauts 2

Having never played this series growing up, I jumped into this it recently. After getting a little over halfway through the first game, I bounced off of it due to its age. There's a lot to love with its charm, soundtrack, visuals, etc... Luckily, I gave the sequel a try because it does everything that I loved in the first game without the issues I had. Everything has a purpose, whether it's a throwaway joke or a background decoration. A huge ensemble of characters without it being overwhelming - everyone fits into the story and does their part. Never overstayed its welcome and is a masterclass in how a platformer can play. The gameplay and mechanics actually feel like part of the universe and story. Cannot recommend enough for anyone, no matter what your taste in games is.

To Double Fine: kudos on gaining your independence from Xbox ! To everyone else : buy this fuggen game. It’s trippy yet beautiful, its funny , it’s deep without being pretentious, it’s emotional without being cheesy. I don’t have kids , but if I did, I would buy them this game and make them finish it before playing anymore brainrot live service games. Everyone should play this game

The short of it is that Psychonauts 2 is an objectively well constructed game from a presentation standpoint, however it's narrative and visuals are much more to it's credit than it's actual gameplay. I can't reccomend a full price game that fails to deliver on it's promised gameplay. While it is an improvement from the first game's gameplay, what is here does not impress much nor is it very engaging for a full price game. The brunt of the gameplay is basic 3D platforming and combat. The player gets psychic abilities to use throughout the game- However most abilities are just traversal tools and are generally not very fun to use. You can upgrade your abilities but I never actually found any terribly worthwhile. They don't improve or change the abilities much outside of flipping variables. Like increasing the damage of psi-blast or increasing the radius of pyrokinesis. Combat itself features a limited number of enemies, most of which do not do much of interest. Enemies do not synergize with each other well and combat often comprises of just running in circles around clusters of the same enemies while spamming your ranged attack or exploiting the ability specific weakness of an enemy. It gets old extremely quick. I never found myself fully engaged with the gameplay at any point during the experience. There is no flow-state to be achieved here, no exceptional challenge to be toppled. The gameplay is supplementary, it doesn't really need to be here. The game honestly might have been better as a point n click. The narrative and presentation is certainly the best part of the game, but I felt the story's antagonist was very unsatisfying. I also have personal qualms with the setting for the game in general because it fundementally explores a part of the first game's narrative that I thought was best left unexplained. I can't speak for everyone on this matter, but I felt that Tim's usual sharp witty writing was a little bit dulled this time around, like you can see the greasy stains of someone else's fingers all over this script. The game is well constructed. It is a visual treat for the most part, particularily the environments. I just can't speak for the rest of it. It just doesn't impress the same way Psychonauts 1 did back in 2005. Times have changed, and in this day and age Psychonauts 2 feels incredibly stunted.

This game retains many of the fun parts of the first game and there are many improvements. The writing is filled with politically correct mumbo-jumbo.

What if Psychonauts but more and sweeter? Phenomenal writing and some of the most wonderfully out-of-the-box creative framing and design for each and every level. I would have happily played for another 20 hours but I expect it would take another 16 years to come up with anything this wild again.... not that I'm not prepared to wait.

Great game, great story. Highly recommend and make sure to play the first game as well!

Do you remember what made the original Psychonauts good? Well...you will not find it here. Instead of staying true to their roots with genius writing, excelent level design, and memorable characters; they just tried to push woke agenda onto their players. - the Moderlobe quarry map is horrible, and it feels so out of place, same for Psy King's sensorium; it's a far cry from the Milkman Conspiracy and Fred Bonaparte's War level from the original game. - the new Agents design sucks a$$! both in terms of art direction and writing. - the Projection ability has very little usage throughout the game, and it is only used for backtracking doors and levers that were previously inaccessible. - the plot is so weak that you can spot the villain right at the beginning of the game. - they tried to revamp the mobs and abilitites, but they still reused a lot of the old ones which is very disappointing. - the back and forth to restore Ford's mind is so unnecessary, even the plotline doesn't make any sense.

Simply one of the best games ever made. The perfect sequel to Psychonauts 1.