Game deftly mixes humor and darkness
It is impossible to state how inspirational the original “Psychonauts” video game was. Released in 2005 by Bay Area company Double Fine, and directed by legendary game master Tim Schafer, it utterly redefined the platformer genre with its inventive combat and strange worlds set inside disturbed minds to explore.
A direct sequel to the cult classic surely arrives to a lot of expectations, and “Psychonauts 2” mostly meets them.
Available starting Wednesday, Aug. 25, the game picks up where the previous two (“Psychonauts” and “Rhombus of Ruin”) left off through a slightly overlong, but well-crafted, introductory movie. Our hero is Razputin “Raz” Aquato, a young former circus performer with telepathic and telekinetic powers who runs away to join the titular Psychonauts, an elite psychic spy squad trying to keep the world safe. After a series of adventures, he is now an intern at Psychonauts headquarters trying to maneuver through the bureaucracy and intrigue, as one of the psychic world’s most insidious villains is seemingly raised from the dead.
The strength of “Psychonauts 2” is definitely in the writing. Schafer and Erik Wolpaw
(“Portal 2”) have crafted a magnificent script that is equal parts eyerolling puns, mystery and heartfelt drama. One minute, a player is knee-deep in a dad joke about cocaine, and the next the characters are exploring the messy emotional trauma of watching a friend get radicalized to violence.
It’s amazing how well the story handles both tones and seamlessly transitions between them. The tension between the game’s juvenile humor and its examination of mental illness is what makes the game unique and compelling.
This is bolstered by the game’s stunning visuals. Raz has to navigate the brain spaces of both villains and friends, leading to a wide variety of bizarre landscapes to traverse. Some of these, such as the mind of the demented dentist Loboto, are nightmarish. His world is full of teeth and gum tissue, which is such a shocking way to start the game that players get a content warning about it on the screen. Other worlds, such as one clearly based on the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine,” are colorful, bright and wonderfully outlandish. The settings are instantly engaging and lovely to wander around in.
Where the title falls apart a bit is in its gameplay. At times it seems like a decade of game evolution has passed “Psychonauts 2” by and left little mark. The platforming still feels very similar