Journey To The Savage Planet Rank 3

[James Talbot]

Fansof science fiction and space exploration games got quite a few treats last year. Whether that came in the form of The Outer Worlds' skewering of capitalism, The Outer Wilds universe puzzle box approach, or any of the No Man's Sky updates, there was something out there for every fan to enjoy. Announced at the Game Awards in 2018, Journey to the Savage Planet looks to continue that trend, and it does a fine job doing so.

Journey to the Savage Planet drops players into the shoes of a space-explorer for Kindred Aerospace, Earth's fourth-best space exploration company. Along with an AI companion and a blaster pistol, players set out to find a new home for humanity amongst the stars. Regular updates from Martin Tweed, CEO of Kindred Aerospace, let players know how their discoveries are shaking things up back home as they try to uncover the secrets of a lost alien race that once called the planet home.

With a variety of tools to help back the player up and popping environments to gaze at, exploring the planet is an absolute joy. At its core, Journey to the Savage Planet feels like a playground. There are things to bounce on, walls to climb up, grapples to swing around with, and tons of obstacles to navigate. The game is at its best when it puts all these elements together, letting players maneuver around the planet in a variety of ways with the hope of a reward just around the corner. It's a love letter to some of the best movement mechanics of the generation, and the game blends them incredibly well, easily contending with some of the best level design of last year.

While they don't have a ton of variety, there are plenty of rewards for players to discover scattered around the world, too. Orange Goo, a gross looking blob, will upgrade the player's health and stamina. Those blobs are stuffed in every nook and cranny, with some being far more difficult to collect than others. There are also Alien Alloys, a key ingredient in upgrading the player's toolset. Alien alloys are harder to come by, and usually require a combat or environment challenge to complete. Alien Tablets and Explorer's Logs will help unravel more of the game's narrative, which is pretty secondary to the exploration. It isn't one of the best stories out there, though there is a prudent message in the end.

Finding these upgrades is the greatest joy of Journey to the Savage Planet. Progression happens quickly, with upgrades becoming readily available as players gather resources throughout their journey. The only roadblock for that progression is the player's Explorer Rank, which can be upgraded through challenges. Challenges are actually pretty fun to pull off, though they can take some trial and error. It's a nice distraction from constantly running between the planet's three main zones, adding some nice variety to the adventure.

Journey to the Savage Planet is a game for explorers. Those that want to blaze through it won't have any trouble doing so, as the main story portion of the game doesn't take long to finish once players have all the necessary upgrades. But Journey to the Savage Planet is a game worth taking the time to explore. Doubling back to find things previously unattainable usually reveals several more equally interesting things to discover, each of which tied back into upgrading the player.

These upgrades, which range anywhere from extra jumps in the air to weapon damage, are key to the game. They allow players to explore previously inaccessible areas, almost like a Metroidvania, and offer even better movement throughout the game's various platforming challenges.That platforming isn't always perfect, grabbing ledges doesn't always work well and mid-air movement can be a pain to nail down at times, but it isn't enough to ruin the experience.

With mixed success, Journey to the Savage Planet is almost constantly delivering jokes. Not all of them land - in fact, some are pretty terrible - but there are few that actually manage to prompt a fair bit of laughter. It's in the same vein as what Borderlands 3 humor tries to accomplish, though a little bit more PG in a lot of instances. Creature descriptions and world events tend to have better delivery, while auto-playing videos in the player's ship, the Javelin, are typically just obnoxious, save a few.

Combat, by far, is Journey to the Savage Planet's weakest aspect. Many of the game's enemies need a certain level of precision to defeat - precision that the blaster simply isn't great at. Projectiles are relatively slow against fast creatures. Targets are typically small and difficult to hit, but the aim-down-sight doesn't help precision all that much. Using some of the planet's grenade-style resources can help stun enemies or lock them into place, but even that can be difficult to accomplish at times. The blaster can be upgraded to deal more damage, hold more bullets, and reload faster, which does help immensely, but it still isn't ideal, leading to an overall lackluster combat system.

That being said, Journey to the Savage Planet has some surprisingly fun boss fights, shooting aside. The big baddies at the end of each zone are surprisingly well-designed, with a blend of platforming, shooting, and resource management happening all at once during face-offs. The only exception here is the final boss, which emphasizes the game's worst elements - precision shooting and confined spaces. Dodging and dashing make the combat feel fast, but the final boss periodically restricts players to three small platforms in its third phase, which makes the player extremely easy to hit and kill.

Luckily, not everything on the planet wants to kill the player. Many look like they could be added to the Pokedex with very few changes. Finding new creatures, or variations of those creatures, is one of Journey to the Savage Planet's better aspects. Of course, science experiments and a constant need for resources will result in the player slapping, blasting, and otherwise torturing some of the friendly inhabitants of the planet, so it's best not to get too attached to the little critters.

As a sort of side goal, players are tasked with scanning and documenting these creatures, similar to what one would find in a game like No Man's Sky. Each one is memorable in its own way, often bringing along their very own quirks and oddities. Puffbirds, cute round creatures, have a variation that basically turns them into a mindless zombie. Some minor boss enemies will have versions with outer layers of rock or amber that need to be blown up or melted away before they can be damaged. They aren't major differences, but it's enough of a change to keep things interesting from encounter to encounter.

There's a profound sense of exploration and discovery in Journey to the Savage Planet. It's constantly motivating the player to double back and take another look at an area without ever explicitly telling them to. It's like being let into an amusement park with no lines and no rules, giving players the freedom to make their own fun whenever they need a break from an incredibly vertical, and hardly ever uninteresting, scavenger hunt for new resources and upgrades. It may not be an entire planet to explore, but it could easily fill one up.

In a segment on 'Path to the Draft', LSU Tigers quarterback Jayden Daniels, North Carolina Tar Heels quarterback Drake Maye, and USC Trojans quarterback Caleb Williams are revealed as the names of QBs who will attend the 2024 NFL Draft in Detroit and be a part of the green room.

The 2024 NFL Draft offers yet another pool of potential franchise quarterbacks. Before we welcome those prospects into the club, let's take stock of where we stand today. Marc Sessler has once again updated his rankings of each QB draft class that has entered the NFL since the turn of the millennium. Last offseason's rankings have been altered to reflect a scenery-shifting 2023 campaign.

We begin our journey in grim territory. The 2007 NFL Draft was "headlined" by JaMarcus Russell, arguably the most severe quarterback bust of all time and a first-overall whiff who set the Raiders back years. The 6-foot-6, 265-pound LSU star produced a grotesque 7-18 mark as a starter and finished 2009 -- his final year in the league -- as the worst passer in football. Russell netted $39.4 million, while the Raiders, in return, were handed a raging headache. Ugly vibes for the Browns, too, who reached for Brady Quinn at No. 22, only to turn around three years later and trade him to the Broncos for fullback Peyton Hillis -- who at least managed to sneak onto the cover of Madden. Career backup Drew Stanton is one of the few to earn points inside a flatlining class that handed us John Beck, Trent Edwards and the overhyped Kevin Kolb. High-level busts and zero reliable starters make this the worst crop of them all.

Best in show? I side with Josh McCown, the enduring and fun-to-watch sometimes starter who might wind up as a head coach someday. While David Carr never lived up to the status of being the No. 1 overall pick, his situation reminds me of what happened to Tim Couch in Cleveland: a young quarterback tossed into the fire on a wanting expansion team struggling to find its way. David Garrard produced a flock of flashy moments with the Jaguars, while Shaun Hill -- an undrafted arm -- spent 15 years in the league. This class was also yanked to Earth by two first-round nightmares, Detroit's Joey Harrington and Washington's Patrick Ramsey, who combined for a 28-51 record with the teams that mistakenly chose them. For diehards, this class gifted us with undrafted mystery Chad Hutchinson.

Teams were surprised when the Bills reached for EJ Manuel with the 16th overall selection. Seen by most as a project with potential, the Florida State product was a turnover-prone flop in Buffalo -- a player Doug Marrone replaced with Kyle Orton before Rex Ryan signed Tyrod Taylor, to avoid leaning on Manuel.

No first-round love poems here, but second-rounder Geno Smith is one of football's better tales. Tabbed as a post-Russell Wilson patch in Seattle, the ex-washout went on to earn Comeback Player of the Year honors (and his first career Pro Bowl nod) in 2022, then made the Pro Bowl again in 2023. That alone can't rocket this class up the list, but Geno stands out from an otherwise putrid crop.

3a8082e126