''Journey to the Savage Planet'' is a 2020

adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus on story allows it to draw ...

developed by Typhoon Studios and published by

505 Games 505 Games S.p.A. is an Italian video game publisher based in Milan. It was founded in 2006 as a subsidiary of Milan-based Digital Bros. History 505 Games was founded in 2006 in Milan as a subsidiary of Digital Bros. The company found its earl ...

. It was released for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013 in ...

, and

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

on January 28, 2020, followed by a

Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a Tablet computer#Gaming tablet, tablet that can either be docking station, docked for use as a home video ...

port on May 21, 2020, and a

Stadia Stadia may refer to: * One of the plurals of stadium, along with "stadiums" * The plural of stadion, an ancient Greek unit of distance, which equals to 600 Greek feet (''podes''). * Stadia (Caria), a town of ancient Caria, now in Turkey * Stadi ...

version on February 1, 2021. An upgraded version of the game titled ''Journey to the Savage Planet: Employee of the Month Edition'' for

PlayStation 5 The PlayStation 5 (PS5) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 4 in April 2019, it was launched on November 12, 2020, in Australia, Japan, New Zealand, North Ame ...

and

Xbox Series X/S The Xbox Series X/S are home video game consoles developed by Microsoft. They were both released on November 10, 2020, as the fourth generation Xbox, succeeding the Xbox One. Along with Sony's PlayStation 5, also released in November 2020, t ...

was released on February 14, 2023.

Gameplay

''Journey to the Savage Planet'' is an adventure game played from a

first-person perspective A first-person narrative is a mode of storytelling in which a storyteller recounts events from their own point of view using the first person It may be narrated by a first-person protagonist (or other focal character), first-person re-teller, ...

. In the game, players are tasked to explore ARY-26, a colorful planet inhabited by various alien lifeforms such as Pufferbird, Barfer, and Floopsnoot. The player's main task is to catalogue various alien flora and fauna, and collect the resources needed to craft new items and upgrades, such as

jetpack A jet pack, rocket belt, or rocket pack is a device worn on the back which uses jets of gas or liquid to propel the wearer through the air. The concept has been present in science fiction for almost a century and became widespread in the 1960s. ...

s and

grappling hook A grappling hook or grapnel is a device that typically has multiple hooks (known as ''claws'' or ''flukes'') attached to a rope; it is thrown, dropped, sunk, projected, or fastened directly by hand to where at least one hook may catch and hol ...

s, which enable the players to reach previously inaccessible areas. Players will encounter various hostile lifeforms, which can be defeated using weapons such as

laser gun A laser weapon is a directed-energy weapon based on lasers. After decades of R&D, directed-energy weapons including lasers are still at the experimental stage and it remains to be seen if or when they will be deployed as practical, high-perfo ...

s and throwable items such as acid grenades. The game can be played cooperatively with another player.

Plot

As an employee of Kindred Aerospace, the "4th Best Interstellar Exploration Company", the player must explore an uncharted planet named ARY-26 to see if it would be suitable for future human colonization.

Development

''Journey to the Savage Planet'' was directed by Alex Hutchinson, the director of ''

Assassin's Creed III ''Assassin's Creed III'' is a 2012 action-adventure video game developed by Ubisoft Montreal and published by Ubisoft for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii U, and Microsoft Windows. It is the fifth major installment in the ''Assassin's Creed'' series ...

'' and ''

Far Cry 4 ''Far Cry 4'' is a 2014 First person shooter game, first-person shooter game developed by Ubisoft Montreal and published by Ubisoft. It is the successor to the 2012 video game ''Far Cry 3'', and the fourth main installment in the ''Far Cry'' se ...

'', and it was the debut project for Typhoon Studios. About 20-30 people worked on the game, and the game's development started in late 2017. The team wanted to make the game a very focused experience, thus they avoided adding many features that were considered as "extras" in other triple A titles. Elements from

Metroidvania Metroidvania is a sub-genre of platform video games focused on guided non-linearity and utility-gated exploration and progression. The term is a portmanteau of the names of the video game series '' Metroid'' and ''Castlevania'', with games in th ...

games were incorporated into the game, and the team introduced a lot of hidden content to encourage players to explore the world. In comparison to standard video games the game was designed to be shorter and easier than most modern titles, this was done so that players would not "see it as a liability". Speaking of the game's tone, Hutchinson called the game an "earnest comedy" and that the title was "very much more in the fiction side of science fiction". The game's dialogue was designed to be humorous, but the team ensured that players can create funny moments on purpose or by accident via the title's various interconnected gameplay systems. ''

Metroid Prime ''Metroid Prime'' is an action-adventure video game developed by Retro Studios and published by Nintendo for the GameCube. ''Metroid Prime'' is the fifth main installment in the '' Metroid'' franchise and the first game in the series to use 3D c ...

'', the ''

Far Cry ''Far Cry'' is an anthology franchise of first-person shooter games, all of which have been published by Ubisoft. The first game, ''Far Cry'', was developed by Crytek to premiere their CryEngine software, and released in March 2004. Subsequent ...

'' series and ''

Subnautica ''Subnautica'' is an open-world action-adventure game developed and published by Unknown Worlds Entertainment. The game has the player as a non-essential systems maintenance chief who is the only survivor of a spaceship crash on the alien planet ...

'' influenced the game's design, while the game's bright visual style was inspired by films such as ''

Men in Black In popular culture and UFO conspiracy theories, men in black (MIB) are purported men dressed in black suits who claim to be quasi-government agents, who harass, threaten, or sometimes even assassinate unidentified flying object (UFO) witnesses t ...

'' and ''

Ghostbusters ''Ghostbusters'' is a 1984 American Supernatural fiction, supernatural comedy film directed and produced by Ivan Reitman, and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis. It stars Bill Murray, Aykroyd, and Ramis as Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, and ...

''. The game incorporates elements from ''Pioneer'', a cancelled game that Hutchinson was working on at Ubisoft. The team took influence from the

Golden Age of Science Fiction The first Golden Age of Science Fiction, often recognized in the United States as the period from 1938 to 1946, was an era during which the science fiction genre gained wide public attention and many classic science fiction stories were published. ...

specifically the optimism expressed in those works. Hutchinson announced the game during

The Game Awards 2018 The Game Awards 2018 was an award show that honored the best video games of 2018. It was produced and hosted by Geoff Keighley, creator and producer of The Game Awards, and was held to an invited audience at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angele ...

. Publisher

released the game on

, and

(via the

Epic Games Store The Epic Games Store is a digital video game storefront for Microsoft Windows and macOS, operated by Epic Games. It launched in December 2018 as both a website and a standalone launcher, of which the latter is required to download and play gam ...

) on January 28, 2020. Due to the relatively light content Hutchinson chose to release the game at a budget price of $30 which he hoped would help players "take a risk with a new IP". A

port was released on May 21, 2020. On December 19, 2019,

Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...

acquired Typhoon Studios and placed it under

Stadia Games and Entertainment Stadia is a cloud gaming service developed and operated by Google. Known in development as Project Stream, the service debuted through a closed beta in October 2018, and publicly launched in November 2019. The service was to compete with Sony's ...

(SG&E), the division developing games exclusively for

, Google's

cloud gaming Cloud gaming, sometimes called gaming on demand or gaming-as-a-service or game streaming, is a type of online gaming that runs video games on remote servers and streams them directly to a user's device, or more colloquially, playing a game rem ...

service. The studio was integrated with SG&E's existing Montreal studio, which was headed up by Sébastien Puel. ''Journey to the Savage Planet'' was not part of the acquisition. A Stadia version of ''Journey of the Savage Planet'' was released by SG&E on February 1, 2021. On the same day, Google shut down SG&E and its internal studios, with all former Typhoon Studios staff leaving the company. Due to these closures, the developers became unable to fix several bugs present in the Stadia version, including hangs and crashes. 505 Games stated that all assets of the Stadia version were owned by Google and SG&E, therefore the publisher could not resolve the situation. Google eventually released a

patch Patch or Patches may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * Patch Johnson, a fictional character from ''Days of Our Lives'' * Patch (''My Little Pony''), a toy * "Patches" (Dickey Lee song), 1962 * "Patches" (Chairmen of the Board song) ...

on February 23. Former members of Typhoon Studios established a new studio Raccoon Logic in August 2021, with some funding support from

Tencent Tencent Holdings Ltd. () is a Chinese multinational technology and entertainment conglomerate and holding company headquartered in Shenzhen. It is one of the highest grossing multimedia companies in the world based on revenue. It is also the w ...

. Through negotiation, they were able to retain the intellectual property rights to ''Journey'' and the planned sequel that Typhoon had been working on at Google.

Reception

Reviews of the game were generally positive according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://savageplanetgame.com/ 2020 video games Indie video games Video games about extraterrestrial life Metroidvania games Nintendo Switch games PlayStation 4 games PlayStation 5 games Science fiction video games Video games developed in Canada Video games set on fictional planets Windows games Xbox Cloud Gaming games Xbox One games Xbox Series X and Series S games Multiplayer and single-player video games 505 Games games Unreal Engine games Science fiction comedy Video games set in the future Stadia games