Penny’s Big Breakaway is a loving homage that accurately captures what was both fun and awkward about the early days of 3D platformers.
By Steve WattsTwitter: @sporkyreeve on February 23, 2024 at 6:39AM PST
Penny’s Big Breakaway is a loving homage to a somewhat awkward period in gaming history. The early days of 3D mascot platformers were defined by garish saturated colors, exaggerated character designs, and a variety of gimmicks as the genre found its footing in this new environment. Penny’s Big Breakaway fits right into that legacy, like a lost gem that just got a shiny new remaster. But while its stylized look will probably be an acquired taste, it makes good use of its gimmick to avoid some pitfalls of the era it emulates.
The story revolves around Penny, an aspiring yo-yo performer who goes to a talent show audition put on by a stodgy Emperor. Along the way, her toy prop fuses with a creature, becoming a sort of sentient and voracious pet. The creature grants her all sorts of special abilities but also causes trouble at the talent show, angering the Emperor and putting her on the run from his army of penguin goons. Her “big break” turned into a breakaway, get it?
That sets the stage, so to speak, for a few different elements. For one, it sets the expectation that stages will be propulsive with constant movement. You’re a wanted fugitive! As a result, stages aren’t wide open worlds to explore as much as they are courses to navigate, often with great speed, as you stunt and trick your way past traps and obstacles. You can occasionally pause to catch your breath or find a collectible, but for the most part, each stage has you running from Point A to Point B as fast as you can.
The premise and stage design ethos also facilitates the major threat of the penguin army. While there are standard enemies and a life bar like you might expect from any 3D platformer, this is a more novel element. Instead of having your health whittled down by enemy crash damage, the penguins are trying to capture you. They don’t damage you at all, but they do cling onto you and slow you down, and if too many swarm you at once, you’ll be captured. You can fling them off in small doses, but it’s easy to get overwhelmed if too many come at once. They aren’t a constant presence in the stages, but the threat allows them to be peppered in at key moments to keep you on your toes or lightly encourage you to pick up the pace. It’s a clever little move that I appreciated more as I saw the way the stage design slyly inserted them at key moments.
Finally, there’s the yo-yo. This is the major gameplay gimmick of Penny’s Big Breakaway, and the impetus for your whole suite of special moves and abilities. You can fling it at enemies, naturally, but you can also use it to cling onto ziplines, to spin giant screw-machines, ride like a unicycle, and facilitate acrobatic mid-air moves. You can yank yourself forward for a pseudo-air dash, or make the yo-yo stick in mid-air a single time to swing off it like a grapple point. It’s a versatile set of moves that feels very natural after only a few hours, which helps you feel properly equipped throughout the progressively increasing difficulty.
On top of your regular abilities, the yo-yo can also get a variety of special abilities when it eats certain foods. A hamburger will make it extra heavy and able to knock down walls, and a red pepper gives you a speed boost for your unicycle ability, while a cake lets you spin into the air and flutter your way down. Like the standard abilities, these are scattered throughout stages to add a little spice and variety.
Standard yo-yo attacks are by default mapped to the right stick, which eliminates the opportunity for camera control. While this isn’t often a problem due to movement generally goes in one direction, there are moments where a manually controlled camera could be beneficial. Although the right-stick allows the user to run and fling the yo-yo in different directions, I find myself using button-based controls more frequently.
In later game chapters, level design sometimes provides too few checkpoints. Due to the level design being a mixture of tricks, stunts, and traversals, reaching the same point after going back to a checkpoint can be challenging. Thankfully, the only penalty for death is a lower high score as your checkpoint position is preserved even when you lose all your lives.
The game’s visual style is a homage to the era its imitating, giving me a mixed feeling. Early limitations in the transition to 3D gaming led to the adoption of simple shapes and saturated colors. The style in Penny’s Big Breakaway is well-executed, but not universally appealing. Yet it would likely offer a nostalgic feel to gamers who grew up during the N64 and PlayStation era.
The storyline concludes nicely, despite a somewhat hard to follow intermediate section. The story sometimes diverges unexpectedly. The judge character, one of my favorite bosses, unfortunately doesn’t get a lot of screen time, resulting in a desire for more time with him and less time with less memorable villains.
But then, even a hazy, dreamlike story could be interpreted as a tribute. Penny’s Big Breakaway is a loving tribute to a bygone era, warts and all. Its new and inventive ideas, like the acrobatic yo-yo mechanic or the penguins hot on your tail, show a level of cleverness, but it is also a sweet, earnest throwback. I’d like to see Penny return, though maybe next time, this lost-gem motif can be applied to a less restrictive era in 3D platforming.
