Psychonauts is a wonderful little game that both pleases and annoys you at the same time. As a casual gamer, I always considered gaming to be a luxury. Thus Psychonauts, being termed as a cult-classic game, didn’t appeal to me as much. What appealed to me was actually the old-school feel of the game. It has a neat story, a bit of mystery and a whole lot of crazy.

Story

This is the strong point of Psychonauts. The hero of the story is Raz – a conflicted but brilliant, young boy with ‘daddy’ issues, who ran away from the circus and has a terrifying fear of water. Raz comes to the Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp – a secret government facility full of agents with psychic abilities trying to recruit kids to become – a Psychonaut. Our protagonist is reluctantly allowed to undergo training but passes with flying colors. As he passes each test, he acquires new psychic powers such as telekinesis, levitation, pyrokinesis and invisibility. And, by emulating the ‘with great power comes great responsibility’ mantra, Raz uses his powers for good. He uncovers a conspiracy where the campers’ brains are being stolen by an unexpected villain. So, Raz and his “girlfriend” Lily thus set out on a mission to get the stolen brains back. They fight an army of psychic creatures and evildoers and save the day.

Now that I have showered praises on the plot, I am going to critique some things. 

The map

It is like a drunk guy trying to find his way home. More often than not, you find yourself asking the question, “Where do I go from here?” The map has several areas such as the lake, the camping area, the parking lot, etc, and though I feel they are confusing, traveling from one area to another is even worse. You have to keep guessing which way is the camp site or the lake and hope you get lucky. Your best bet would be to find Agent Cruller’s underground transportation and even then, the mission descriptions aren’t really that concise. But, that’s for missions, for finding arrow heads, you’ve got to go wandering all over the map like a goof.

The gameplay

It’s like chopping down a tree with a baseball bat. The jumping mechanism is poor. With or without the levitation power, you either end up overshooting or undershooting your jump. The shooting is also frustrating and you end up mashing the buttons continuously hoping you hit the target. Even with the mental focus ability, which they make you learn on your own and don’t ever tell you how to do it, it either doesn’t lock onto the target or it locks on to something else altogether.

Graphics

The clarity and sharpness isn’t the strong point of this game. The videos between the gameplay seem like prime examples of that. However, I understand that given it being a 12-year-old game now, the look and feel won’t be anywhere near the games we see today. On the flip side, the design is what gives the game an old-school vibe.

Characters

They went overboard with some of them. Raz’s character is well-defined and it makes sense as he is the protagonist. However, the stories of some the supporting characters seem patchy. The back stories are a nice touch, but they don’t fall in line with the story. The designs of the characters are just bad – I’m looking at you Dogan, you annoying little thing!

Conclusion

The game is decent. With no time constraints, it makes for a good game to play on a lazy Saturday afternoon. The gameplay glitches aside, you may still want to pick this one up, just to kick back and relax. For some of you who want to strike games off of your bucket list, Psychonauts is a good way to begin.

Final Score: 6/10