Journey To The Savage Planet made a strong impression on me when it came out this past January. I was charmed by the brightly colored world densely packed with unique and silly aliens discover. It felt like a cross between a light-hearted Ratchet & Clank adventure and an exploration-centric game like Metroid Prime. It delivers a satisfying experience in about 10 hours with plenty of collectibles scattered around for completionists. Savage Planet has been at the top of my recommendation lis♏t all year.
The first DLC pack, Hot Garbage, was announced just a week ago during Microsoft's latest 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Inside Xbox stream. The expansion is a 2-3 hour side story that introduces a new planet, DL-C1, and a competitor to Kindred Aerospace, called Vyper Corp. Hot Garbage introduces some new ideas that fit in really well with the core game and managed to convince me that Savage Planet might have more longevity than I expected. For only $7.99, anyone who enjoyed Journey To The Savage Planet will certainly get their money's worth.
Looking For Some Hot Garbage
The DLC's implementation is a bit clumsy. If you've already finished the game you can log in and find a new quest in your log and a new waypoint to teleport to start Hot Garbage. If you're playing for the first time the quest will unlock as soon as you acquire the Shock Fruit Stabilizer. Once you've unlocked the upgrade, the quest and waypoint simply appear without any notification or voice line. I like a DLC that seamlessly integrates into the base game because it makes replaying the game more interesting, but the sudden appearance of Hot Garbage will confuse new players.
DL-C1 has just as many diverse biomes as the base game in an even more compact package, only this time you'll be exploring them from a much different perspective. The new traversal mechanic in Hot Garbage is a jet pack and its a real ꦦbutt-clencher both in exploration and in combat.
Jet Packs Make Everything Better
Typhoon Studios do a great job of taking familiar concepts and really make them their own in Savage Planet, and the jetpack is no exception. Passing through floating rings fills the tank, meaning it's necessary to constantly move from ring to ring to stay airborne. Flying high above areas you've already explored on foot is a blast. The pink rings are spaced out just barely within reach of each other and, should you run out of fuel before reaching the next checkpoint, the fall will almost certainly be lethal. At the risk of exhausting my Insomniac reference quota, it reminds me of the flying levels in Spyro whe𒆙n you need to fly through eꦅach ring just as the timer is about to hit zero.
In combat, the battlefields are peppered with pink rings that allow you to stay afloat and take on enemies from the skies. Flying and fighting feels amazing because you really need to split your attention between enemies and pink rings, navigating around both while keeping an eye on your eneಌrgy tank. I loved fighting the𓄧 new robot enemy types from skies even when there was an option to stay on the ground.
Speaking of new enemies, it's a bit of a mixed bag. There are 3 new robot enemies to challenge: a Roomba thꦗat rushes to vacuum up any craftinܫg materials on the ground, a robot that's weak to either bombs, acid, or electricity, and a murder machine that can't be dodged no matter what you do.
As ꦬmuch as I liked the puzzle-combat style of matching weaknesses on the smaller robots, the big robot was a real pain. You only fight two of them, but I never figured out how to effectively deal with it other than t🎉ank all the damage and wait patiently for it's panels to open and reveal it's weak spots.
There is a boss fight, but it's more of an arena that tosses waves of the new enemy types at you. At a certain point, lava rises from the floor and you're forced up into the air. While flying around shooting targets, I couldn't help but be reminded of the final boss fight from Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage.
I don't know how many of these $8 DLC packs will be made for Savage Planet. If this is the only one I find it a bit odd. It's hard for me to justify reinstalling a game I've completed for just 2 more hours of content. On the other hand, if this is the first of, say, 3 similarly sized DLC expansions, it will be great to replay the game when all 3 are available and experience all the content together. If you're playing Savage Planet for the first time though, pick up Hot Garbage and consider it a side quest that opens up three quarters into the game. You'll get some great upgrades that will help you in the late game (infinite stamina is amazing) and it will remind you a lot of Spyro the Dragon.