Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9167 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: THQ
• Released on: 2006-02-10
• Rating: To Be Announced
• Platform: PlayStation2

Manufacturer's Description
Any mind, any time. For years, the Psychonauts have deployed their psychically-armed operatives all over the world, but this time trouble is brewing right in their own backyard. Someone is abducting students from the Psychonaut boot camp-a deranged scientist who only wants their brains. One cadet-a mysterious and powerful new arrival named Raz-stands alone against the lunatic. Raz must develop and unleash an arsenal of paranormal powers, including telekinesis, firestarting, clairvoyance, and his most powerful weapon of all-the ability to launch himself telepathically into someone else's mind, and run around in the demented amusement park of their imagination. Raz takes on their inner demons face to face, wrestles with their nightmares, and digs up their secret memories. Ultimately he must enter the mind of his worst enemy and destroy his dark plans at their source, while trying not to lose his sanity in the process.

Customer Reviews

Quirky, Challenging, Original
Speaking as a woman it is not often I find a game that I actually like! Most involve constant killing (be it fantasy or military) or sports (take your pick). I love puzzles, so apart from a handful of games (Ocarina of Time, Wind Waker, Sphinx (Cursed Mummy) ...) there was never much that appealed to me. I don't mind a little action if it is balanced by good stories, puzzles and other challenges. Killing on its own - nah! Psychonauts turns out to be just such a game. Great story, weird, likeable graphics, music, characters, monsters, minds (dungeons to games aficionados). Some very challenging puzzles and some fun skills for those times when you need to outwit and/or slaughter baddies!

The game is essentially based on the theme of the psyche and psychics, but not quite in the way you might expect. The main character Raz, sneaks into a summer camp and is due to be “expelled” as he is not there legitimately. So he sets about trying to train as a fully qualified Psychonaut in the short time he has before Papa comes to drag him away. This means learning to use his mind in a variety of different ways, which all takes training and challenges to perfect. But as he learns he has to unravel the minds/moods/secrets of different people he encounters by literally going into their minds and dealing with whatever is there.

Given the wealth of games on the market it is an achievement to come up with something original and this is original. If you like Tim Burton then the graphics will suit you as will the humour, the weirdness and the occasional dark under/overtones. If you like games with more than fighting in them then I would strongly recommend this game.

Oh, and my teenage son who is a first person shooter fanatic (Battlefield 2 and Counterstrike take up many of his waking hours) thought this a great game too.

Great game, with a few little problems
Psychonauts is an amazing game. From a distance it appears to be a fairly standard platforming game but once you are introduced to the characters and the story the whole thing expands into an amazingly quaint and hilarious universe. The characters are brilliant, the voice work is top notch, the story is delightfully twisted and the humour is suprisingly mature. The whole world of the game is very Tim Burton-esque, but not in a rip-off kind of way, in a more original and good way. The visual style and art direction is fabulous, the sound is great too. Okay, so these are all the good points...

On the down side, the Playstation 2 version of this title does lack alot of the visual flare that the Xbox and PC versions hold, so if you have a PC or an Xbox, you should definitely consider grabbing this game on those platforms. There are a few annoying bugs in the game, sometime the soundtrack will double over on it self so you can hear two layers of the same tune simultaneously but they are slightly out of synch. This can be annoying, but it's not a massive problem. Whatever you do, make sure you get to play this game with a console style analog controller.

All in all, a brilliant game for those who like quirky, crazy chracters and a crazy plot that will keep you chuckling throughout, and even platforming fans looking for something a little different. Awesome stuff.

Hooked to the end
I really enjoyed Psychonauts. I was worried it might be a bit childish - but apart from a few of the cutscenes I was really pleased. It had lots of humour, it's difficulty increased gently, loads to explore, got to use my brain, lasted for ages. I loved it!

I liked the way that challenges changed - so I had to fight, I had to jump, but then I had to learn to float too in one level too! It kept me interested - enough variety without a milion button combinations to remember. And I had to use my brain to crack the levels too - not just jump, jump, jump, shoot!

If you like the same sort of things from a game as me this is a great one to go for. I like a bit of quirkiness, a bit of a story, good characters, some humour, some puzzles, ability to do it in my own time, dying doesn't wipe out all my previous efforts every time, enough variety in levels and tasks to keep me interested, good animation.
Thumbs up!