Psychonauts

This is a really fun action platform from the PS2/Xbox era of games. I'm glad I could play this on PC with the Steam version. Firstly, the art design is fantastic. This gives the game, what I might proscribe as 'soul', and helps it age quite well in a field of new releases. Voice acting is also really solid, not a single performance drags down the story. Story is also really solid. Despite clearly being a kids game, this touches on some very adult themes surrounding mental health. Level design for the most part is pretty good, I particularly enjoyed [spoiler] Waterloo World [/spoiler]. In fact most of the levels were good, and really enjoyable to interact with. It's cool how there is item usage, bacon to request help (don't ask) and a fantastic variety of mental abilities that make the gameplay really varied, therefore not stale. However... This being a PS2/Xbox era game, I've faced problems where the controller input, while solid, can be a slight sluggish, and [spoiler] Meat Circus [/spoiler] relies on quick inputs, awkward platforming and limited time areas that players don't really encounter earlier, making the level fairly frustrating. However you can use the float ability, to resolve that specific section when you need to jump onto another curved wall (hope this helps). If you are looking for an enjoyable platformer, which are few and far between on Steam, this is a fantastic edition to have in your library.

What a delightful "action" (you fight things) "platformer" (you jump around a lot) "adventure" (you talk to NPCs, search for and use various objects) wrapped around the story inside other people's heads. The difficulty ramps up quite a lot towards the end, which can be a bit frustrating - but nothing a few profane words aimed at monitor and couple of retries can't solve. Overall, what a great experience it was!