Introduction
Psychonauts is the story of Raz, a young psychic who has run away from his family's circus to a psychic summer camp. Now he must try to prove himself and learn as much as he can before his psychic tutors send him back to his parents, who Raz believes resent him for his psychic abilities. Essentially Psychonauts is a traditional platform game; you have a hub world which is the psychic summer camp (plus one other location) and various levels which you gain access to as you progress through the game. The levels are psychic worlds within the minds of the freakish characters you encounter and the design of these levels is where Psychonauts separates itself from other platform games. They are truly bizarre and each is very different from the others, but more about that later.
For those familiar with Grim Fandango and other Tim Schafer projects you'll probably notice similarities in the character/environment design and the dark humour that runs thick through the entirety of the game.
Gameplay
Getting started on Psychonauts is a wonderfully simple experience, especially if you've played platforms games before. First you find yourself in a small, kiddies area of the summer camp which serves as the tutorial zone and introduces you to the control system, the game mechanics and objectives, nothing too outlandish so far. The second part of the tutorial you'll find in a classroom at the top of a rickety ramp and is set in the mind of one of the camp tutors, a military man and his psychic landscape reflects this. It's looks like the worst war flashback the most shellshocked soldier could ever have; constant explosions, bunnies with helmets and twisted hulls of ships floating in midair. This is just a taste of what's to come. Again there's plenty to collect in these worlds too, most items contribute to your levelling up and in turn access to new psychic powers.
Once you've completed these two areas you are free to roam the rest of the camp, which is quite large but can be quickly traversed with the aid of a few shoutcut devices like the underground transport system. On camp there is a shop that sells a few items which will help with your quest and adds a small RPG element but purchasing is not a major feature.
As you progress some of the major characters will give you new powers as well, these are combined with a tutorial type level which introduces you to the new skill.
Sights and Sounds
Considering this game is also available on lesser platforms such as PS2 the graphics are very nice indeed. It probably helps that the creators were not going for any kind of realism, they've mostly used bold colours and fairly simple geometry for their characters and environments. While I'm all for a bit of realism some surrealism is refreshing, especially for a PC title, and this one has it in spades. Each of the levels is beautifully designed and with huge variety from level to level, one of them cleverly uses changes in the environment so one relatively small location becomes many.
The voice acting is top notch and there were even some laugh-out-loud moments for me, particularly in the Milkman Conspiracy level but there's no point in repeating the lines as it's the context that's funny.
Stuff that sucks
As usual with any 3D platform game the camera is not perfect. There will be the odd occasion when your view is obscured by a wall behind the character or something like that, but mostly the camera is very well behaved and certainly one of the best examples I've experienced.
The only other problem I have with the game is another one which afflicts most other games of this type; infuriating last level syndrome. Most of the last few sections of the game are easy enough, a couple of falls here and there but steady progress, then there were these two jumps which took about 20 goes each and had me cursing and physically abusing the joypad.
Conclusion
This is a great platform game. A great deal of time and effort has be put into every aspect of this game, and it shows. The pyschic worlds that makes up the levels proper are amazing, varied and great fun to explore or just look at for a while. The graphics and sound are both interesting and funny. If you enjoy platform games I thoroughly recommend this one. Oh and ... Use the bacon Raz ...
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