Reviewed: May 17, 2005
Reviewed by: Mark Smith

Publisher
Majesco Games

Developer
Double Fine Productions

Released: April 19, 2005
Genre: Adventure
Players: 1
ESRB: Teen

10
9
10
8
9.7

Supported Features

Tim Schafer….

If you said Full Throttle or Grim Fandango then pat yourself on the back. You are a true adventure gamer. Mr. Schafer is one of those creative geniuses, not unlike American McGee, who can take a truly inspired vision and turn it into a masterpiece of a videogame. His past efforts helped put LucasArts on the map, and many were worried when he left to form his own studio in 2000.

But after nearly five years of waiting, Tim proves once again that genre-defying games are best left to simmer for a long time. Psychonauts has launched for the PC and Xbox (PS2 is on the way) and there is no doubt about it; it’s been worth the wait.

It’s hard to pigeonhole this game into one genre. The game itself defies description, borrowing heavily from numerous game styles then enhancing them all to create something that it totally original yet oddly familiar. If you doubt this game’s creative originality you only need view the title screen that features our young hero perched atop a giant pink brain. You must walk and subsequently rotate the brain to locate the various menu options represented by doors into the mind.

The setup for this story is genius. You play Raz, a young boy blessed with telekinetic powers who sneaks into a government-sponsored camp that trains other young psychics who aspire to become Psychonauts, elite agents who can enter a human brain. Raz gets busted while eavesdropping on a campfire pep rally of sorts, and will be sent home the following day; still plenty of time to engage in what is easily the most original adventure you will take this year.

The first few hours of the game take place in the real world as you explore the campground and chat with the other campers, counselors and the oddly familiar groundskeeper. Here you learn of the collection system whereby you gather purple arrowheads that become the currency used to purchase useful items at the main lodge. Arrowheads respawn overtime so there is no limit to the number you can collect, and later in the game you will obtain a device that allows you to find arrowheads that are hidden deeper underground and worth much more than the ones you can easily spot from the surface.

Raz controls much like any platform or action game hero. He can run and jump and even double-jump. He has a few pole-swinging and trapeze moves that won’t put the Prince of Persia or Lara Croft to shame, but it does help him get around. He can also punch and use up to three Psi powers at a time.

While the game starts off in the real world you quickly learn that much of the game (the best parts) take place in the minds of the various people you encounter. This starts with a training mission in the mind of one of your counselors (aka psychic trainers), a military man whose mind is a collage of every war-inspired cliché you can imagine. This level is sensory overload yet only hints at what lies in store for you.

Regardless of the mind you enter there are always a few core components you are always on the lookout for including figments of your imagination, transparent cardboard cutouts, some hidden, some totally obvious. There are hundreds of these scattered about all the mental landscapes you will explore and for every 100 to find you get to level-up. There is also emotional baggage in the form of steamer trunks, purses, hat boxes, etc. and these require you to find a corresponding key before you can open them and free the mind of this "baggage". There are also safes that look oddly like piggybanks that you must chase down and punch to open up, thus revealing a View Master slideshow of fond or sometimes painful memories locked away in that person’s mind.

The collection quest doesn’t end there. You also have PSI cards to collect. You need nine cards and then you can combine those with a core you must purchase from the main lodge to level-up. There are also mental cobwebs but these can only be collected when you have purchased the vacuum device from the vendor at the main lodge. Collected cobwebs can be taken to the professor’s lab and woven into upgrades. Near the end of the game you will need to locate hidden jars that contain the stolen brains of your fellow campers.

And what summer camp experience wouldn’t be complete without a traditional scavenger hunt; 16 items, some hidden, others obvious, and some requiring special abilities like invisibility to steal that nut from the squirrel. For every four items you earn a level upgrade, but only when you turn them into the groundskeeper who gave you the quest.

While there is a lot of collecting going on it is all cleverly masked in the entertaining story, charming dialogue, and challenging gameplay. Your status screen will keep you on top of where to go next, your current list of challenges that often chain into sub-quests, and all of your collectibles, by level and overall.

As you level-up (all the way to 100 if you are perfect or 91 if you are me) you will earn Merit Badges that give you new psychic abilities, usually just about the time you need them. You will learn how to levitate, use clairvoyance, telekinesis, pyrokinesis, invisibility, shield and others.

The trick here is that even though you will eventually have a large library of skills and attacks you can only assign three at a time to the right trigger and black and white buttons. This means you will constantly be going into the menus and tweaking your current skill set. It’s not as annoying as it sounds though and can best be compared to the constant ammo switching required in Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath. Raz also has a Psi punch that is permanently assigned to the X button.

With solid gameplay intact Tim Schafer has literally gone inside the human brain to create some of the most fantastic levels in gaming history. Each level is tailored to the personality of the individual you have entered, even when you go into the brain of a giant mutated lungfish in what is perhaps the best level in the history of platform adventures. I dare not say more lest I spoil the fun, but suffice to say, Godzilla’s got nothing on Raz.

Even the quests are tailored to the level and the mind of the person you are exploring. Making things right with Napoleon requires you to engage in a mini-strategy game complete with hexagonal map and miniature playing pieces that you must first free, then telekinetically move around the board. Helping Eduardo reach his damsel in distress requires you to enter the velvet painting world that turns Raz into a glowing TRON-like character in a city with poker-playing dogs, a stampeding bull, and four rounds of masked Mexican wrestling.

There are plenty of enemies to keep Raz on his psychic toes, the most aggressive of which are the censors, the “Agents” of the Matrix, or the white blood cells of the mind that detect Raz as an infection and attempt to eject him from the host mind. Fortunately, none of the enemies pose too much of a serious threat and most can be defeated with proper use of your skills.

The bosses offer a greater challenge, but only until you learn their patterns and the proper sequence of psi attacks required to defeat them. The game checkpoints frequently and there is a central hub system that grants you quick access to any previously explored level so you can return and collect any missed items.

The game does take a turn to the dark side for the climactic boss battle that lasts more than an hour after the “point of no return” auto-save. Not only does the Meat Circus demand the most patience I’ve had to muster since VEXX, the platform racing up through the big top pursued by rising water was enough to pop a vein in my forehead. Thankfully the game checkpoints so you don’t lose too much progress, but if you lose enough “lives” you will be ejected into the real world and have to start the level over.

Psychonauts is infused with outrageous humor from the opening title screen right up to the moment before the seemingly endless final boss fight. Raz is a wisecracking kid that blends the mischievous nature of Bart Simpson and Willy Beamish. When offered a kiss as a reward for rescuing his “girlfriend” you can further inquire, “About this kiss…is it an open-mouthed kiss?” whereupon the girl will go on a rant about how boys “just don’t know when the moment is over”.

Every conversation in the game is delightful, and you will want to explore all possibilities down each possible branch, even if it makes the aspiring camp cheerleader cry, or another boy cringe when you point out he is holding a squirrel's “nuts”. Eavesdropping can also reveal some of the funniest dialogue in the game. I can’t recall a game where I laughed out loud this much and this often.

Each new mind you enter has its own look and often its own gameplay, so in essence there are times when it feels you are playing new games within the game. When you can go from the neon-glow of the velvet painting world to a giant Hellraiser puzzle box challenge of Sasha Nein to the disco world of Milla Vodello or the lungfish metropolis, all in the same game, you have something very special.

Best of all you never get taken out of the game from the interactive opening title turned menu to the cabin and bunk profile select, to the camp map and notebook-style status screens, you are Raz for the duration of the game. The HDTV 480p support puts the finishing touch on an already-impressive presentation.

Sound effects are rather subdued but fit the game perfectly. You have all the appropriate sounds for all the psi powers and the environments all offer up their own unique sounds whether it be the crickets of the campground or the overwhelming sounds of battle in the war torn mind of Coach Oleander.

Of course the voice work is what really steals the show. With more lines of dialogue than I care to count, this has to be the funniest, best scripted, and professional performed game since Sam and Max. This is one of those games you will break out for company just to show them certain scenes.

Realistically, there is no reason to replay the game, but that’s not going to stop me from revisiting this enchanting title as often as time permits. Just think of it as your favorite comedy movie and think of how many times you have, and will watch it in the future.