Whenever I play a new Mario Kart game for the first time, there’s always a moment – usually when I get to the Bowser stage – where I look at the road ahead, that wide, curvy The roads weave through gorgeous Mario clutter, and I wish I could have thought of it as an action game, a platformer, and not a driving game. What would that look like?
I don’t mind that it might not work, or that it works just fine as is. I don’t even fully know what I’m responding to. Maybe it’s the feeling of being low to the ground in a world that unfolds toward the horizon, a world that propels me forward to adventure. I don’t get this from actual 3D Mario games, which tend to feel like toy boxes. But I got it from Penny’s big break. In a weird, hard-to-pin-down way, this is what I want in an action game when I play Mario Kart.
Which is weird, because the clearest lineage here is Sonic. With speed, momentum, and inertia playing into play, Penny’s Big Breakaway feels like a Sonic game, and the people behind it count, including Christian Whitehead and other Sonic Mania veterans. Top of the list. The color scheme favoring orange, pink, green and purple is reminiscent of Sega’s 16-bit glory days. Even before all the lava is dumped in later levels, there are a lot of marble areas to look at. The coin collectible has a unique gold ring ringtone. Squinting, the figures scattered here and there are squat and round and could be from Bonanza Bros, while Penny herself, smiling and angular, feels like she stepped out of a treasure trove game.
I guess all of this is to say that we’re in nostalgia territory, as is often the case when it comes to 3D platformers. But I think what stands out about Penny Breaks is not its retrospective. That’s how all of this stuff makes sense now.
As Whitehead’s involvement demonstrates, this is a game that encourages player talent. This is a game made for fast runners, shortcut finders, and combo builders. You can see this in the action set, which gives you basic jumping and attacks but adds the protagonist’s signature yo-yo to mix things up. So you can jump, double jump, and arc your yo-yo swings for extra reach. You can run or jump on the spinning yo-yo and ride it like a little chariot. This will give you a burst of speed, which you can then try to stay alive for as long as possible. Combat lets you hit the ball with your yo-yo or have it spin in a wide arc, which is a big help against the game’s penguin enemies, which attack en masse from all directions. Elsewhere, yo-yos provide great options for sudden bursts of speed, direction changes, and environmental interaction. All of these things give you options, but require flexibility in return, especially since the game really wants you to link everything together to create huge combos while playing.
The levels also take full advantage of this. I really like Penny’s level design, which tends to be broad and promises secret areas. Cityscapes, beach communities, giant sci-fi kitchens; just like Mario Kart, there’s always a lot in front of you, and you usually have a degree of freedom in how you proceed. The automated camera does a surprisingly good job of building up the action and selecting perspectives as you move from the penguin arena to sloping hills, giant cliffs, and hairpin turns. Some levels feel like golf courses as you roll your yo-yo chariot over perfectly sculpted grassy hills. Others incorporated odd details, like a diving board or a cast-iron skillet that swayed underfoot as you moved back and forth in it. One minute you’re jumping with precision between bouncing pads or swinging construction platforms, the next you’re running along curving passages, dodging penguin baddies with nets, or being chased by a boss in the form of a giant bait ball. enemy.
Themes have shifted from water and sand to lava and sci-fi treadmills, but what remains the same is the broad approach, the scattering of collectibles and side quests within each level, the vibrant color scheme and focus, if you want it, at all Find a racing line through the chaos, use your yo-yo moves as motivation and create the best time with the best combinations. The game never forgets that yo-yo. Even beyond the nuance and challenge of combo chases and simple jumps and flips, it also allows you to gain power-ups, like turning you into a chili pepper or other power-ups that send you flying into the air. And then there are the gymnastic poles you can grab and swing, the screws and bungee cords you can yo-yo on to launch yourself into the troposphere, the constant need to think about moving up, maybe, and forward.
There’s a lot to take in, and I hit some difficulty spikes, usually around bosses and sometimes at moments when I needed to ride my yo-yo chariot through water or lava and stay motivated. But the play of that dynamic, and learning how to build and maintain it, is at the heart of its fun. It’s what takes you through this thick, colorful platforming world, and it provides those magical moments where the clutter, excess, and collectibles are a bit iris-like, and all you see is a clever path to the exit, a slick The path written by the ball jumps and twists.
Oh, and the exit from each level itself tends to be a multi-layered cake that you jump on, as high as you can, and then perform a series of yo-yo tricks to get your score higher. And of course there’s cake at the end. This was Sega’s idea. Here are thoughts on purple and pink skies. This is a very creative and challenging platform game. It’s weird, fun, and totally delightful.
