{"id":14196,"date":"2015-11-09T00:01:36","date_gmt":"2015-11-09T00:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=14196"},"modified":"2015-11-04T12:21:37","modified_gmt":"2015-11-04T12:21:37","slug":"freedom-planet-wii-u-pc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2015\/11\/09\/freedom-planet-wii-u-pc\/","title":{"rendered":"Freedom Planet (Wii U, PC)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"FREEDOM_BOX\"<\/a>There hasn\u2019t really been a very good Sonic the Hedgehog game in the past 10 years or so. Sonic Generations and Sonic 4 almost got it, but they weren\u2019t quite there.\u00a0 So if you miss the classic 2-D Sonic games of old, you\u2019re in luck.\u00a0 There\u2019s a new game in town that plays like those classics, and it\u2019s not even made by Sonic Team or SEGA!\u00a0 The game is Freedom Planet, and it\u2019s a fast-action 2-D platformer with lots of loops and thrills and awesome bosses!\u00a0 It was a hit last year on Steam, and now you can download it on the Wii U as well.\u00a0 It\u2019s a perfect fit on the Wii U system, and that\u2019s the console I played it on for this review.<\/p>\n

Similar to 2-D Sonic games, you\u2019ll run through levels with lots of loops and corkscrews and robotic enemies, and battle a boss at the end of each stage. But it doesn\u2019t play EXACTLY like a Sonic game from the Genesis days, as it has some elements from Treasure titles from the 32-bit era, too.\u00a0 Like Silhouette Mirage on the PSOne, and Mischief Makers on the N64.\u00a0 Some parts also reminded me of Gunstar Heroes and Ristar on the Genesis.\u00a0 So if you liked any of those games, you\u2019ll enjoy Freedom Planet as well.<\/p>\n

You can play as three different characters. Lilac, Carol, and Millia.\u00a0 Lilac is a dragon, but she really looks more like a lavender Sonic the Hedgehog.\u00a0 She plays most like Sonic, too.\u00a0 She has slash and uppercut attacks, and can do a cyclone jump that acts as a double jump and an attack.\u00a0 When a meter is full, she can unleash a spin attack to help her bounce around to reach higher places.\u00a0 Carol is a green lizard cat thing.\u00a0 She has slash attacks, too, but she can also climb walls and bounce on special platforms.\u00a0 If you come across a gas canister, Carol will hop on a motorcycle, allowing you to go super-fast!\u00a0 Millia is kind of a secret unlockable character, but it\u2019s not very hard to get her.\u00a0 She is a rabbity dog thing who can summon blocks to throw at enemies and activate a shield to block attacks.\u00a0 She can also fly for a little bit.\u00a0 While she can run as fast as the others, she offers a slower-paced gameplay style as she has no direct attacks and has a smaller energy bar.<\/p>\n

There are two main modes of play: Adventure and Classic. In Adventure Mode, there are fully voiced cutscenes between levels.\u00a0 Only problem is the cutscenes are oftentimes way too long, and a game such as this really doesn\u2019t need an epic storyline to be fun.\u00a0 Luckily, Classic removes all of that, which is how I recommend playing the game.\u00a0 There is also a time attack mode, too.\u00a0 Power-ups include lots of different kinds of shields, diamonds and caged animals for extra lives, and healing items as well as invincibility.\u00a0 Hidden in each level are star cards that unlock music tracks, voice clips, artwork, and other goodies when you gather them and beat the stage.\u00a0 With three playable characters and lots of secrets, there is tons of replay value.<\/p>\n

There are three difficulty selections, and while I was able to blast through the whole game on Easy, I still couldn\u2019t beat the final form of the last boss! Argh!\u00a0 But really the only other problems I had with this game were the long cutscenes and some hit detection that was slightly off or inconsistent.\u00a0 And the in-game instructions are not very well-written on the Wii U, although it\u2019s pretty easy to figure things out by playing.\u00a0 If you enjoy classic 16- and 32-bit 2-D platformers, you should definitely download this.\u00a0 Hey SEGA!\u00a0 If you want people to like Sonic again, have the Freedom Planet folks make your next game!\u00a0 Or better yet, have them revive Ristar!<\/p>\n

\"FREEDOM_SCREEN\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Kid Factor:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Freedom Planet is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Fantasy Violence. Enemies just explode or run away when you defeat them, and your characters just fall down or explode when defeated.\u00a0 Only thing worse is some of the cutscenes have characters being tortured or killed, but the sprite-based visuals keep things from getting too horrifically graphic.\u00a0 Reading skill is helpful for some of the text, and younger gamers may get frustrated at the more difficult later levels.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There hasn\u2019t really been a very good Sonic the Hedgehog game in the past 10 years or so. Sonic Generations and Sonic 4 almost got it, but they weren\u2019t quite there.\u00a0 So if you miss the classic 2-D Sonic games of old, you\u2019re in luck.\u00a0 There\u2019s a new game in town that plays like those […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14196"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14196\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14198,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14196\/revisions\/14198"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}