Primal Planet

Primal Planet is a really weird dinosaur metroidvania about a caveman getting his kid back with the help of his pet dino. Beat it and 100%ed achievements in 11 hours using a game controller. Difficulty is Medium, but can be brutal in the beginning. Story - Dinos vs Aliens Vs Really Big Mosquitos, and you're just a dude with occasional food poisoning and a spear. The story was loose through most of it, but I'm glad the creator added more at the end to make it extra weird. Graphics - Pixels. Reminds me of Kingdom: Two Crowns. Music - Tribal and some tracks played louder than others during my playthrough. Really really grew on me throughout. Bought it at full price (6$). It's now stuck in my head forever. Gameplay - Took a little to get use to the controls, especially filtering through and using items with the shoulder buttons in the thick of a battle. Kept knee-jerk confusing 'use item' and 'stab spear' for some reason, or throwing torch instead of waving it. Took me half the game to realize there were two maps. In the early-game, the dinos and other beasts hit really hard and when you die, you go back to the last camp with one health. Sometimes that can put you in a real pickle, especially with that allosaurus battle. When you get stuck like this, it's better to explore elsewhere, gather resources, cook meat, and build your skill points up to improve yourself. Once you Get Gud, or at least get enough health on you and Dino, you'll be flying through the map in no time. Portals - The portals are spaced out around the map to get you to places quicker, but do they really? I had a hard time remembering what portals went where and it soon became easier to just run across each section instead of use them. Wish portals gave you a choice on which to come out of, at least in late game. Achievements - Completely doable in one playthrough. Be warned that finding Mette is not as mind-numbingly tedious and difficult as some of the guides lead you to believe. You just [spoiler] Have to find all the secret areas and Mette will randomly appear around the last one[/spoiler]. I spent a while following the guide around Late-Game for the one achievement and it wasted my time because I didn't have to. Summary - Gotta be honest here, I had a royally hard time getting into Primal Planet. And I freaking love dinosaur games. It's lacking something in the first hour that keeps you engaged and gives you more of a reason to care. The wildlife is too unfriendly, you'll die for dumb reasons, everywhere looks the same, and - even after bigger events start - you'll hit a pretty significant cliff because of one big dino standing in your way. But once you just play the game to enjoy all the little things, explore around, bulk yourself and your little friend up a little, and get past that hurdle, you'll find Primal Planet is a genuinely, amazingly good game all around. I had an extremely fun time playing and really hope the game is expanded upon or the developer makes more like it :D

Excellent little game with great atmosphere (both visual and audio). Would like to see it on Steam Workshop to expand content and story.

Kinda boring. Nothing really going on for the most part. Idea sounds cool but the game just feels empty. The gameplay also feels a bit clunky.

It's a mediocre metroidvania but it's got dinosaurs in it sooo

The beginning might feel a little awkward. There's like three or four story events that unfold before the game becomes fully open to start exploring. The story elements are at least pretty gripping. Even if you feel a little lost from the start, I suggest staying course and it'll pay off. Once past the story/tutorial opening, the game makes you explore and figure out the world you're in. It's pretty fun exploring, leveling, and collecting resources. The crafting and town upgrading is very streamlined and easy to deal with. The combat works, but kind of turns into dodge then attack then repeat those two moves. You still have to pay attention to the enemies, but your forced to use your invincible dodge, attack quickly, then dodge again. It's almost like button mashing. I wouldn't say it kills the gameplay experience. You can still get hit by enemies doing this. It's just that if you don't, you'll probably get murdered quickly. It still feels rewarding to slaughter your enemies to upgrade your character and dino companion. Exploring is also rewarding, especially if you don't look up guides to figure out what to do. There's a decent amount of backtracking, but it doesn't feel cumbersome. I beat the game without coming anywhere close to fully leveling my character. However, there's an underwater teleporter that I think might contain a separate ending or more content. I have to go back and check it out... luckily once you beat the game it's easy to continue your progress if you want to continue to explore. The story is surprisingly effective especially since there's no text or voice overs explaining anything. This game is a relatively unique entry in the Metroidvania genre. Highly suggested if you're looking for something a little different.

I love this pixel art game, you really notice the care that the developers put into the details

Became one of my favorite metroidvania experiences.