Sackboy: A Big Adventure is a platformer released as a launch title for the PS5 (although also available for the PS4). It is part of the LittleBigPlanet series, although like the third game, it is not developed by Media Molecule, but by Sumo Digital. It also breaks away from the “create, share, play” user generated content of the series, as well as the 2D sidescrolling platforming gameplay in favor of 3D platforming. It’s not a bad change but does somewhat break away from the spirit of previous games.
Like with most platformers, the game has an excuse plot but at least there is something to link the events rather than just level after level. In Craftworld, Sackboy is enjoying his life when suddenly the gigantic villain, Vex, rips through the sky to invade and sucks up all the Sackpeople. Sackboy barely manages to escape and must now travel the world to collect Dreamer Orbs.
The gameplay is nothing new and doesn’t bother to add anything new to the genre. The level design isn’t particularly innovative or amazing, so Sackboy ends up being only a solid platformer, rather than a pioneering one. Sackboy can jump, a kind of floaty double jump, slap, dodge roll and pick up items. Sackboy runs just a tad bit too slow, and attacks don’t have a huge range, so the game takes some getting used to and can feel restricted.
Craftworld lends itself to craft-based level designs, like the LittleBigPlanet series. There are enemies that Sackboy can slap, jump or throw to their doom. While the game defaults to four lives per level, you can set it to unlimited if you wish. Sackboy can only be hit twice before he returns to the last checkpoint. It doesn’t reset anything, thankfully, and the checkpoints are frequent enough that you never lose much time or progress.
Surprisingly, or perhaps not so much given that this is a launch game, it makes a lot of use of the PS5 controller. The controller is constantly vibrating, and the adaptive triggers will increase the resistance required at times, such as when Sackboy needs to pick things up. Many of the game’s sound effects will be blasted through the controller’s speakers as well, which… doesn’t quite work at times and breaks the immersion. In certain levels, Sackboy will get access to gadgets and weapons, including hover boots, boomerangs and a grappling hook.
While the early levels are generic and stock standard, coupled with easy difficulty, as the game goes on, the level designs become more imaginative. It’s not to the level of, say, Tearaway, but it is still decent and very enjoyable to play. The platforming becomes trickier too, and you will need to time things right. However, these sections also drag out the flaws of the game. The controls are not tight enough for some of these sections, so it can be easy to die. Collision detection feels wonky at times, you thought you didn’t touch an obstacle, but you did, and you die. It can be mildly frustrating. It isn’t helped by the fixed camera angles, making jumps trickier than they should be given it is difficult to judge the distances.
Each level has multiple objectives. There’s the mandatory objective of collecting most, if not all, of the Dreamer Orbs in the levels, which are usually hidden away, so they’re not a given, surprisingly enough. Additional objectives include collecting all the prize bubbles (which acts as the high score counter) and completing the level without dying. These add some replayability if you want a reason to revisit a level but is also out of the way enough that you can ignore it and still progress through the game.
There are five worlds in which the story takes place in. There is no need to fear as this is a fully fledged game with a load of content. In addition to the story levels, there are optional multiplayer levels where you require another player (either locally or online), time trials and level remixes. All of these aren’t throwaway levels, as they also provide you an opportunity to get more orbs. In total, there are almost 100 levels, which is impressive.
Most of the bosses follow the familiar three stage, pattern recognition template of platformer bosses. The only slight difference is that they come with health bars instead. Despite this, they can be challenging, and the final boss is a decent length without overstaying its welcome. The game is not too long, taking around eight to ten hours to complete a first playthrough of the story mode. After the credits roll, there is a sixth world with more levels to play but on the condition that you need to have collected most of the orbs in levels before this to get access to all of them.
Lastly, the graphics are fantastic. Sure, it’s not something that will make you run out to get a PS5, but it still looks great. You can see the loose fabric in Sackboy’s body. Yes, it is also available on the PS4, but of course there are some graphical enhancements and higher framerate for the PS5 version, plus all the controller features. It does add up so that the PS5 version is the one to play if you can.
Overall, Sackboy: A Big Adventure is a great little platformer that’s worthwhile to play. It is a change from previous games, by being a 3D platformer rather than a sidescroller. Despite not having any user generated content, it retains its charms and humor and is a great return of Sackboy. It also helps that unlike LittleBigPlanet 3, the developer managed to not have it be broken upon launch as the game feels very polished.
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