It's strange to think that today, in 2024, at the height of one of the darkest periods of the gaming industry, we would find ourselves playing a high-speed platformer (a not-so-modern genre) on a seven-year-old console. It is neither discouragement nor curiosity, but rather an undeniable surprise. Once the pandemic has been overcome and it has been established that the live-service formula is now clearly in decline, it has been a title of this type that has accompanied us in recent days, a production that in terms of game design demonstrates its desire to focus more on entertaining and entertaining the user, and less on the economic remuneration, as any video game should do. Here is our review of Penny's Big Breakaway.
Before giving a real evaluation to this title, we believe it is necessary to take a step back and think about how it made us feel: calm down, happy, happy, have funbut also intrigued And nostalgic. The last adjective is precisely the one that contains them all, because the work draws heavily not only on Sonic Mania – for reasons that we will delve into shortly – but also and above all on the two Sonic Adventure. Penny's Big Breakaway was developed by Evening Stara studio formed in turn by figures who contributed to creating the incredible Sonic Mania, including the mastermind Christian Whitehead.
Wink at the Dreamcast
It goes without saying that, as great lovers of SEGA's blue hedgehog, we certainly couldn't miss the opportunity to try out what lay ahead a tribute to all those dynamics that made the series characteristic.
Penny's Big Breakaway he is so curious union between the artistic direction of Sonic Maniathe level design of Sonic Adventure (in particular, the first) and a movement system that is very reminiscent Super Mario Odyssey. Taking the example of Mario's last great 3D adventure may seem strange, especially if a good part of the soul of Penny's Big Breakaway comes from Sonicbut there's a very specific reason why we say that.
In fact, the very first event that is narrated to us is an encounter that Pennya sort of clown who loves the world of show business and circus entertainment, does as he heads to a theater to perform in front of the King: hidden in an alley there is a mysterious sentient yo-yo which, at first glance, will help her put on an incredible show. However, during the performance, the yo-yo will prove to be too lively, and will tear off the King's trousers, ridiculing him in front of the audience and making him rage to the point of liberation a wave of penguins against poor Penny.
During the story, the protagonist will meet many other more or less important faces for the purposes of understanding the plot, which does not hide many twists and turns and, indeed, too often ends up showing signs of lazy and uninspired writing, starting from the discovery of the yo-yo itself. Many of the characters, moreover, suffer from a lack of real characterization, ending up as a side dish in one sometimes disappointing narrative.
This does not mean that the premises of the story – the very first moments narrated – succeed contextualise everything that the player will experience in terms of gaming experience is extremely good, from Penny's love for circus acrobatics, to the peculiar abilities of the yo-yo, up to the army of penguins who literally do everything to capture the unfortunate hero.
Ramps, stunts and high speed
In fact, the structure of the levels involves the need to reach a finish line by trying to avoid the penguins and obtaining an increasing number of acrobatics points in order to increase the final result. Through it all, Penny's Big Breakaway showcases all the knowledge and skills the Evening Star team gained during their experience with Sonic. The level design it is made of ramps, sharp curves, many overhangs, trampolines, cannonsscenic elements to which the yo-yo can be attached to reach inaccessible places or increase speed.
Not only that, in perfect style Sonic, the scenarios present different paths to reach the finish line. In this way, the Whitehead team managed to perfectly recreate what happens in the level design of the hedgehog titles. This offers the player Always new ways to rediscover the levelssuch as hidden areas and obtaining rewards, or returning to find the fastest way to complete the scenario in the shortest time possible.
This dynamic, in addition to the fact that the possibility of moving in a 3D and not 2D scenario, allows the player not to always follow a specific path and – thanks to a discreet “curiosity reward” system in Super Mario Odyssey style – entices constantly ad explore the environment putting his own to the test capacity with the yo-yo. On this point, however, we must also specify that given the extreme similarity of the scenic elements and the excessive simplicity in reaching areas that should be unreachable, it's very easy to get lost or forget the direction correct.
All levels, however, present challenges from the inhabitants of the kingdom who need help to complete some tasks. Whether it's destroying crates or getting an object to a specific point without taking damage, the addition of these short missions always manages to break the concentration, donating to Penny's Big Breakaway that one variety which was used for Don't get repetitive.
It's a shame that these challenges are often too similar to each other, although their brevity helps to alleviate that feeling of deja-vu. We also mention the possibility, thanks to a good dose of exploration, of finding special places where we will have to put our movement skills to the test and represent a challenge for more experienced users.
What convinced us more than the title, however, are their own the commands of Penny and her yo-yo, thanks to which she can perform rapid actions and which, if combined, can offer moments truly worthy of the cornerstones of the genre. The options available to us will be a forward sprint, a swing-style hold in the air, and the possibility of riding the yo-yo as if it were a motorcycle. Penny's Big Breakaway companion to Sonic Adventure it is not random for this very reason as the player, by concatenating these actions, he will be able to do more Accumulate stunt combos and get more points, but also get more and more speed.
Between great advantages and avoidable defects
We had a lot of fun trying to go faster and faster to reach the finish line in the shortest time possible and we are sure that many others like us will try to climb the rankings in the time trials. In short, it is certainly a mechanic as old as the Mega Drive, but the Evening Star team managed to set it up gameplay that works really well.
The biggest flaw of the production, unfortunately, is a unstable technical sector: we are not talking about resolution and frame rate, which have never given us problems despite the high speeds, but about frequent bugs and uncertainties in collisions which often ended up making us fly off the map or see missing parts of polygonal models. Indeed, we often encountered bugs that created soft-locks and forced us to restart the game, a sign that perhaps a few more months of development would have been good.
Before reaching any conclusions, an honorable mention should be made to artistic sector and to soundtrack of the title, which draws heavily on what we saw in Sonic Mania (including transitions from one scene to another), but always creating the right distance for give the idea of being in a circus worldplayful and extremely colored. In both cases, whether it's the soundtrack or the scenarios, it's often there little diversification between various sublevels, which always have the same elements, the same colors, the same songs. This is a shame, if you consider that one of the greatest strengths of Sonic Mania's areas is the great diversity between one area and another, but we understand this is an element that many won't even notice.
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