Lost Planet isn’t going to win any awards for storytelling or character development. It was released early in the 360/PS3 lifecycle and as such, the graphics are somewhat poor. But what it does offer is a fairly competent third person shooter, with some degree of charm.
Lost Planet takes place on a very cold, wintery planet. You have a limited amount of thermal energy that will keep you warm throughout the missions. Run out of thermal energy, and your life meter will drain, and if your life meter hits zero, you need to restart at the last checkpoint. I found that I seldom ever ran out of thermal energy, but this is how the game was designed. Even when you take hits from enemies, you don’t lose health so much as you lose thermal energy.
The main enemies are called Akrid, which are giant insect like creatures. They often emerge from a hole in the ground, and if you shoot the hole enough, you can stop the Akrid from respawning. There are also snow pirates, who shoot at you and are humans trying to colonize the planet. Boss fights are typically a giant Akrid, or a person in a mech suit.
Yeah, there are mech suits. They’re kind of cool, but generally pretty cumbersome to handle. They offer a lot more firepower, but taking a hit in a mech lowers your life energy, not your thermal energy. Because of this, you’ll only be using a mech for a limited time until you’re near death, at which point you need to eject. As cool at the mechs are, I’d like to see them able to be used for more time in the game.
I played the game using the Steam Controller, and found that the aiming was very precise, and there were no major issues with using a non-standard controller. In fact, I’d go as far as to recommend playing the game with the Steam controller, because the shooting is so much more precise. At the time I write this, the second community made config is the only one that allows you to change weapons and reload, so I recommend that one.
The game is anywhere from 10 to 15 hours depending on how you play. Like I said at the beginning, the game has it’s charm, but it’s not going to win a lot of awards. If you’re looking to bolster your third-person shooter collection, check it out. It’s fairly affordable on Steam.
3/5
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