Ah yes, Psychonauts 2. The game that no one expected to happen, but many hoped. Psychonauts, the very first project of Double Fine as a studio (even though a lot of its talent had prior industry experience), was a game released in 2005 and despite positive reception it was a big commercial failure. Yet, as years went by, more and more people came to love and praise it so when the studio was able to purchase back the rights for the game, the first rumors of a potential sequel started circulating. But it wasn’t until 2015, when the crowdfunding for the project was announced. And after 6 years, with a VR-only mid-equel Rhombus of Ruin released released in 2017, the game was released.
Was it worth the wait? Well, only if you’ve been among those who’ve waited.
Just like the original game, Psychonauts 2 is a really curious blend of genres. It’s an action adventure platformer mechanically, however it has far stronger emphasis on the adventure aspect and the story than many of the action platformers with collectathon elements tend to be. The game consists of the main “hub” world and minds of different people, with every mind level of the game being unique in some way, with some “gimmick” to it, completely unique visual style and often the focus on a particular psychic power or mix of them. There’s a selection of the said powers that can be switched and assigned to buttons, because there are far more powers than buttons available for them. And there’s lot of optional content, not just in terms of a few optional quests you could do, but also in terms of how many people you can have dialogues with at different points of the game that do not progress the story but shape the game world.
Also just like the first game, the story is an interesting mix of fun secret psychic spy adventuring through the eyes of a kid and really serious topics dealing with many different psychological issues and quirks people have. The returning characters are great while many of the new ones are as charming. A lot of the jokes and drama is done really well. And the audiovisual presentation is, as before, fantastic. The base movement mechanics are also still fun and rolling around on a ball is still great.
By now you might’ve figured out the pattern of the “and just like in Psychonauts” comparisons, except now it’s time to talk about where the similarities become a detriment to the game. All of the biggest complaints and issues of the first game are still here, unchanged and in some cases made even worse, for example. Platforming, despite the base mechanics being great, was always frustrating in the original and it’s often infuriating here as well. Lots of jumps along linear intended paths don’t land as you’d expect, distance judging is frequently difficult, there are many inconsistencies in which surfaces you can hang on when getting to the edge of and which you don’t. Action was never fun in the original, but it feels even worse in this one, especially since a lot more focus is given to it for whatever reason. It’s never challenging and I doubt you will actually have trouble getting to the end of each encounter, but the process is just unfun and frustrating, with lots of hits from off-screen, ridiculous hit tracking and annoying psychic power juggling for different types of enemies.
Though, speaking of that, the amount of powers yet again feels pointlessly high. While some powers would probably never leave your button assignment ever – why would you ever wish to unassign levitation, for example? Most of the powers get even less usage this time around too. The collectathon aspect has been made slightly less annoying in general, with more helpful quality of life improvements to how you can search for the remaining items inside minds, but that didn’t stop the developers from putting some of the items in really obnoxious spots anyway. Where you will either never notice them, because of how they blend with the level, or because you just need to go really out of your way to get them, to the point of seemingly breaking the game logic. Which, given how imprecise the platforming is, can be especially frustrating.
What is unlike the first game, though, isn’t positive. Since this is a sequel, a lot of the novelty of the original idea is gone. And because of that, just having levels with cool visuals and interesting perspectives doesn’t wow as much. And where the game feels like a downgrade is in how the levels feel much more conventional, despite their weird looks. Some of the levels from the original game still feel incredibly memorable and surprising, even when you revisit them. Psychonauts 2 doesn’t feel like that at all. Also many of the new characters are very underdeveloped and forgettable in comparison to how fun and likeable the huge cast of the original game was.
If I’m sounding more negative than positive about the game, it’s mostly because I got frustrated with it more often than had fun playing it. And while I did enjoy it, I suspect a lot of that enjoyment came from the fact that I like the original game and I’m already invested in this world and its inhabitants. If I weren’t, I doubt I would’ve liked the game that much. Especially with so much gross humor it has. Not like it wasn’t in the original game, but this time it feels like they overdid it.
So yeah. I’ve enjoyed playing Psychonauts 2. But mostly because I’ve played and enjoyed the original game several times. If you’re like me, you’ll probably enjoy this game too. If you love the original more than me, then, perhaps, you’re even more forgiving for many mechanical issues it had and will love Psychonauts 2 more than I did. If you haven’t played the original or didn’t care that much about it, though, I don’t think the sequel will be for you. It doesn’t fix almost any of the issues the original game has, doesn’t do too much to stand on its own and feels like a “good conventional sequel”, where it’s more of the same.