E3 2015: Lovely Planet’s Like a Shooter In a Kid’s Coloring Book

<p>In <em>Lovely Planet&comma;<&sol;em> I think I might&&num;8217&semi;ve died and gone to heaven – a six-year-old&&num;8217&semi;s heaven&comma; splattered in crazy colors and crayon monsters&period; Or was it hell&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>That&&num;8217&semi;s the gist of QUICKTEQUILA&&num;8217&semi;s eccentric first-person-shooter&comma; a rainbow of all shapes and sizes that live in one big&comma; lovely planet&period; That is&comma; until you the shoot the living bejeezus out of &&num;8217&semi;em&period; It might all seem a bit grim in any other context&comma; but <em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em> does it with a smile on its face&period; This is basically all of your pre-school doodles that used to hang on your parent&&num;8217&semi;s fridge come to life&comma; but beneath the kindergarten spectrum&comma; there&&num;8217&semi;s more here than meets the eye&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>You begin the game as a guy&sol;gal with Muppet arms presumably stranded&sol;invading a lovely alien planet full of living and only slightly off-putting cube&&num;8230&semi;things&period; Your objective&quest; Shoot them all with your endless stream of 8-bit bullets until you reach the end and do it all over again&period; And again&period; And again&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;85525" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-85525" style&equals;"width&colon; 800px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;06&sol;04215331&sol;Lovely-Planet-Wii-U-Instructions-BagoGames&period;jpg"><img class&equals;"wp-image-85525 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;06&sol;04215331&sol;Lovely-Planet-Wii-U-Instructions-BagoGames&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Lovely Planet Wii U Instructions BagoGames" width&equals;"800" height&equals;"465" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-85525" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Okay&comma; I can dig that&period;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>If the premise sounds simple&comma; then the controls are simpler&period; <em>Lovely Planet <&sol;em>may be an FPS&comma; but you won&&num;8217&semi;t find any scopes or iron sights here&period; There&&num;8217&semi;s no cover or camping allowed here&comma; so my shootouts generally pushed me right into the heat of the action&period; Instead&comma; my main method of attack firing away like a crazy person with the right trigger while controlling the camera with the left and right sticks&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>My goal was short and sweet&colon; destroy all enemies and reach the purple goal post at the end of each level&period; Sounds easy enough&comma; right&quest; For the most part&comma; it was&period; The majority of the demo&&num;8217&semi;s five levels act more like a tutorial than I&&num;8217&semi;d assume the full game&&num;8217&semi;s staggering 100 do&comma; but once I got accustomed to the environment&comma; I found each encounter to be a fast-paced affair&period;<em> Lovely Planet<&sol;em>&&num;8216&semi;s clearly a game meant to be speed-runned and beating your own times is its own amusement&comma; as is anticipating when you friendly neighborhood block people might pop up and pop you one&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;06&sol;04215358&sol;Lovely-Planet-Shooting-BagoGames&period;jpg"><img class&equals;"aligncenter wp-image-85523 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;06&sol;04215358&sol;Lovely-Planet-Shooting-BagoGames&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Lovely Planet Shooting BagoGames" width&equals;"800" height&equals;"465" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Though you may not be able to&comma; enemies can and will snipe <em>you<&sol;em> whenever they darn well please&period; Once they see you&comma; you&&num;8217&semi;re probably already – well&comma; &&num;8220&semi;dead&&num;8221&semi; isn&&num;8217&semi;t quite the right word&period; Though <em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em> lacks a lives system&comma; each &&num;8220&semi;defeat&&num;8221&semi; will place you squarely where you began at the level&&num;8217&semi;s beginning&period; Despite being stationary&comma; some enemies spew blocks which you&&num;8217&semi;ll have to shoot before being hit yourself&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s a surprisingly involved design and the resulting scene&&num;8217&semi;s strangely reminiscent of a cheeky&comma; kiddy <i>Halo<&sol;i> running and gunning indignant&comma; angry block faces&period; I only hope they did something to deserve it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em> is a sometimes  and at all times charming game purely as an aesthetic&period; This is a game cheeky enough to plaster its in-game instruction manual on a bright yellow wall&comma; after all&period; I can find it easy to imagine the game of cat and mouse getting terribly old terribly fast in the span of its full version&comma; but for the short time I was allowed&comma; I&&num;8217&semi;ll admit it&colon; it&&num;8217&semi;s oddly &lpar;and guiltily&rpar; engaging&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>I may have not idea what rules govern <em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em>&comma; but it strives to live up to its name in every way&period; An old-school FPS wrapped up in nursery room decor&comma; this is a game worth the time and attention it definitely deserves&period; QUICKTEQUILA&&num;8217&semi;s created something indelibly unique here something that&&num;8217&semi;s nothing more than good&comma; clean fun&period; Let <em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em>&&num;8216&semi;s close encounter of the cute kind entertain your eyes and only the block faces will be sorry&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p><em>Lovely Planet<&sol;em> is out on Steam&sol;GOG&comma; PC&comma; Mac&comma; Linux&comma; and available for free digital download on the Wii U eShop &&num;8217&semi;til <strong>June 22nd<&sol;strong>&period; Be sure to check out <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;nintendos-letting-you-download-e3-indie-demos-from-home&sol;">all things Nindie<&sol;a> and more E3 coverage right here at <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com">BagoGames&period;<&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;