Interplanetary craziness returns after 5 years away with Revenge of the Savage Planet. This time you’re a nameless explorer who is dropped off and left to their own devices by their company of employ on an unknown planet bereft of supplies. You can’t trust big business, especially when they trap you inside a dangerous environment filled with bitey little cretins. However, you’re a persistent little space person, and you’re poised to travel back to your former employer’s headquarters and pay them a receipt in the form of swift brutal revenge. Does Revenge of the Savage Planet meaningfully improve on its predecessor Journey To The Savage Planet, or is this brand of revenge a dish best served to the bin?
Journey to the Savage Planet was a whacky, colourful and slapstick take on massive and ambitious planet-hopping adventure titles such as No Man’s Sky, and Revenge of the Savage Planet is pretty much that with a side of revenge and noxious gasses. The quirkiness, as well as the fusion of animated cutesiness with an environment of both vicious and sweetly innocent critters gives off a sense that not everything is as it may appear on the surface.
Goofy could be the ideal way to explain how Revenge of the Savage Planet presents itself. Advertisements for squirt burgers are gross akin to three men urinating in your face, and that Nu Grob 2 supergoo brings back piercing reminders of the purple ooze from the Power Rangers Movie, albeit advertised by someone who has likely taken a lethal overdose of psychedelic happy drugs. The strangeness and suspicious exuberance on display concocts a freaky but particular vibe that lets you know that you ain’t in for a simple-minded creature-scanning escapade here.
The humour of Revenge of the Savage Planet may air on the side of grating for some due to gratuitousness, but there’s a sense it’s a parody of similar planet-exploring adventure titles, as well as a parody of our real-life culture with its rampant commercialism, encouraging you to buy the next big money-grubbing products that may appear “new” but are actually modified versions of what came before.
In classic survival game fashion, you start your road to revenge with barely any equipment, but as you explore and satisfy objectives, your arsenal will become bulkier with new gear. Early objectives are straightforward, typically involving collecting and acclimating to new equipment, as well as climbing a ginormous oak tree and feeding a giant monstrous tree some delicious flying-bug entrees to convince him to lower gates to open up new areas.
As you advance, you’ll be given a to-do list of objectives such as collecting set amounts of raw materials and you’ll learn how to neutralize and capture trickier bugs successfully. Once you’ve captured bugs they’ll be homed near your base of operations, and you’ll be able to pet them if you feel they require that kind of tender love and care. Some creatures are easy to nab, especially when you require the lasso—though some like the hognork present a greater challenge, as you’ll need to stun them until birdies rotate around their heads, and then you’ll need to quickly lasso them and drag them towards you before you successfully capture them. These bugs may or may not be as easy to capture as Pokémon, but their unique traits are worth admiring at the pen, though the sense of endearment you have towards them may not be so strong because you can’t do much but give them a good petting.
Second Opinion:
Jamie – EiC
I’ve been enjoying Revenge of the Savage Planet a lot this past week or so. I didn’t really get on with the original for whatever reason, but Revenge has been scratching my itch for a new adventure just about right. It’s heavy on the collecting, be it upgrades, loot, or the like, but each new discovery feels rewarding and – importantly – it’s never a chore to go fulfil any of the objectives in our current list. Even some of the more basic ones such as doing certain actions to fill out the D.A.I.P.E.R. Initiative list are fun and offer worthwhile rewards for taking the effort to complete.
It’s also a stunning looking game in my eyes, with some gorgeous use of colour and modern effects to really bring the fairly-sized areas to life, be it a glistening jungle or icy domain. In preparing this page for review I realised I’d taken a lot of screenshots which is always a good sign that I’m enjoying the visual feast in front of me.
Comedy is a key part of the experience, and while it’s a bit overdone at times, overall I’ve found it actually quite funny for the most part. From the fake ads playing in the habitat, to the humorous descriptions or simply blowing a cute animal to bits only to see their oversized eyeballs roll away out of the goo, it revels in slapstick throughout.
But at it’s core, RotSP is just a fun videogame, the kind we used to get back in the good old days; no bloat, no cramming of bullshit MTX, and no need to try and cater to all and fail to cater to anyone. Just a simple, lovingly put together adventure that will keep us engaged throughout.
Like similar titles of its ilk, you’ll find yourself going to town with a scanner you acquire early on, and documenting every pest and critter you find as you journey your way to your revenge on this savage planet. By pressing down on the D-pad you’ll enter an analytical scanning mode, where you scan everything with a glowing hue that you can see, be that elements, creatures, or plant life. Scanning the environment will no doubt be an obsessive part of your routine in Revenge of the Savage Planet until all the orangey red objects glow blue. Not only is scanning a necessity, it’s also very useful for collecting information on every creature, but in addition, you’ll find details about their weak points in combat—which will come in handy and save you from spamming the same rote tactics over and over and getting nowhere.
Your nimble little protagonist spaceman is quite a plucky and agile fella. He can leap through the air with the greatest of ease, and slide down embankments like a 9-year-old boy who just scored a goal in a game of footie and wants to celebrate in style. Similarly, you can kick some critters and Mr Spaceman will shoot as though he’s making a shot on goal. The little explorer’s running animation is quirky too with the hand flails, which complement the game’s zany humour.
Although the explorer you control has speed and is a deft hand with his tools, you need to be mindful about taking falls from great heights because he’s not going to survive giant dives into the cold hard ground. The blaster pack on the chap’s back may save you from devastating plunges though, because if you time the boost right, he’ll be given a momentary blast into the air and land back down safe and sound.
Teleports can be accessed once you’ve discovered them, and you can zip to any area with a teleport device in it. Be warned though, if you snuff it while you’re out in the wilderness, you’ll be relocated to your base of operations and you’ll lose some resources in the process—which can be quite annoying when you need to craft particular items. Retracing steps isn’t fun and Revenge of the Savage Planet could’ve done with being a little more forgiving in this regard.
Gear and equipment unlocks after you successfully complete challenges and missions. Some of the equipment such as a lasso for capturing wildlife and the grappling hook to reach higher ground come in handy and are worthwhile for exploration. You’ll gain access to a pee-shooter which can help shatter purple shard walls and quickly dispatch pests who won’t leave you alone. The water gun can be a good bit of fun as well, though its usefulness besides stunning critters is insignificant.
You can gain access to new equipment through a 3D printer, which is home to many of the tools and weapon upgrades you’ll gain throughout your journey. In order to craft new weapons, you’ll need to conjure up primary resources in the form of printer slurry, silicon, carbon, and aluminium, each of which are found in widespread areas as you explore each of the game’s planets.
Traipsing about trying to accrue elements isn’t ideal and can slow the pace of the adventure down a smidgeon, but when you’ve got all the resources and are able to gather rare loot and equipment, you won’t be complaining much then. At the beginning of the game is when collect-a-thons are at their worst, and gathering resources depletes the engage with the worlds mindlessly in a carefree fashion, but later on you’ll be glad you’ve combed through every inch of every planet for the most valuable gear.
As for your base, it’s a small habitat that’s home to a computer where you receive e-mails and logs, and where you can research the animals you’ve captured. Plenty of information can be found and updated as you progress through the game, and the same goes for that huge TV screen that plays through corny advertisements. If you want to stand and watch grown men bounce about in rubbish bags that’s all fine and dandy, but don’t get any ideas…..actually the game won’t let you do that, but don’t you the player start doing this! Just play online or local co-op with a friend and take them through this lunacy, they’ll either thank you or paint your face with cake.
Although the animations are nice, the environments are lush and varied, and there’s a playful if underlying sinister bent to it all, it won’t blow you away visually. The allure of Revenge of the Savage Planet lies in exploring and discovering, not standing back in awe and admiring grains of sand. The soundtrack is quite punchy with its adventurous vibes, and reinforces the game’s quirks spiritedly.
Conclusion
If you took the journey five years ago to Journey to the Savage Planet, you’ll want to book a trip to Revenge of the Savage Planet as well. Marmite humour and low-key exploration pleasures aside, Revenge of the Savage Planet is a good and enjoyable time that allows you to scan to your heart’s content and mosey through unknown landscapes to complete objectives and challenges en route to your ultimate revenge. Revenge of the Savage Planet won’t take up much of your time either, but just know that this brand of revenge is a dish served with a slice of weirdness and a platter of squirt burgers—meaning you should just go and have fun for a while.
This game was reviewed based on Xbox S|X review code, using an Xbox S|X console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.
