It is simple to take a look at Petit Planet and name it HoYoverse’s legally distinct Animal Crossing, and, after spending every week with the closed beta forward of its launch on Nov. 7, it is also kinda true. For those who took Nintendo’s life-sim and blended it with parts of Harvest Moon, Stardew Valley, and Disney Dreamlight Valley, you’d have a fairly good concept of what is going on on right here. All the pieces in Petit Planet is one thing I’ve executed many instances earlier than, and the one factor it is doing to face out is leaning arduous into its smooth visible aesthetic. It really works, for probably the most half. However I am coming away from the beta questioning simply how nicely HoYoverse understands what makes cozy video games worthwhile.
Petit Planet‘s broad construction is very much like what you’d see in an Animal Crossing sport. You arrive at a brand new location with nothing to your title however the garments in your again and a suspiciously useful animal prepared to provide you a tutorial and cost you cash for upgrades. Since it is a HoYoverse sport, I ought to make clear that is in-game cash. I have never encountered microtransactions or any gacha parts within the time I’ve spent with the beta.
Anyway, your aim is build up the planet so folks need to transfer there, and also you try this by doing just about all of the belongings you’ve executed earlier than in cozy video games. You’ve got obtained:
- Cooking
- Farming
- Adorning
- Catching critters and constructing a set
- Doing pleasant favors for neighbors
- Tending flowers
- Beachcombing
- Exploring away from dwelling
- Promoting stuff on the native service provider
There’s additionally a stamina system like in Harvest Moon and Disney Dreamlight Valley, the place you possibly can solely carry out actions for thus lengthy till it’s important to relaxation or eat meals to get better your energy.
A free ecological theme is woven via all this. The universe responds to your acts of planetary and interpersonal care by producing a substance known as Luca, which you employ to water the large blue area tree that is the signifier of your planet’s well being. The more healthy the tree turns into, the extra your planet grows, and development unlocks new options like numerous terrain varieties, crops to plant, and so forth. The environmental undertones are welcome, however they do not actually manifest in sensible methods. The concept of caring for the surroundings is there, yeah, however at this stage it is simply contextual, with no affect over what you do or the way you do it.
Petit Planet‘s development cadence is rather a lot like Animal Crossing as nicely. You begin with a modestly sized home and a handful of options you need to use across the island, and you then progressively unlock further stuff: a much bigger home, extra furnishings, terraforming choices, extra furnishings, extra every part. Nevertheless, it is open-ended and allows you to do what you need, once you need it. Collectibles and foreign money earned via finishing day by day actions — assume New Horizons and Pocket Camp‘s bite-sized targets — assist add some incentive to maintain up with the little issues as nicely, since you need to use them to enhance relationships with neighbors and buy rarer gadgets.
Aesthetic is the primary manner Petit Planet distinguishes itself to date. It sits in a gray space between folksy, twee, and cottagecore, with vibrant colours which can be soothing however by no means garish, and few corners or arduous edges to be discovered. It is supremely chill to simply exist in, and the emphasis on vibes over particular adorning themes provides you lots of freedom to combine and match furnishings gadgets in your home and across the planet.
That stated, the precise act of adorning with this stuff is surprisingly restrictive. Petit Planet makes use of a grid-based system like most life sims, however it’s inflexible, extra like constructing with out cheats in The Sims 4. You possibly can’t drop an merchandise too close to one other object exterior, so if you would like an arch close to the river or a chair flush in opposition to your home, too unhealthy. You additionally don’t have any choice to set an merchandise in the course of a grid sq. or off-center, which limits object placement far more than you would possibly anticipate. It is a irritating limitation.
On the intense facet, it looks as if Petit Planet will keep away from one annoyance widespread to different adorning video games, specifically that the larger items of interactive furnishings are literally interactive. It all the time annoys me in Animal Crossing that you could’t truly swing on the swings, however after sitting on one in Petit Planet for a couple of seconds, your character progressively begins to swing in gradual, lazy arcs with a peaceable smile on their face. It may not have fairly the photograph mode potential to rival one thing like Infinity Nikki, however it’s shut.
It might get nearer with a broader number of customization choices, although. Character customization is in a bizarre place, no less than for this preliminary beta. Your avatar has no particular gender, and you’ll select no matter beginning outfit and coiffure you need. However nearly each piece of clothes I got here throughout was very… fluffy. I ended up with perhaps three gender-neutral or masculine-leaning outfits — 4 if you happen to depend the vegetable costume, I assume, since broccoli is not gendered — and lots of tights, clothes, and frilly skirts. Males historically make up a smaller portion of the participant base for The Sims and Animal Crossing, so I get not overloading it with masculine garments. Nevertheless, that is additionally not the Forties, so the preponderance of clothes and emphasis on a really particular form of femininity make for an odd mixture, particularly in a sport about self-expression. Girls like pants too, HoYoverse.
The handful of neighbors I’ve encountered to date match particular archetypes, however they do not overlap. There aren’t, for instance, three sporty varieties and two goofballs who all say the identical factor such as you’d discover in Animal Crossing. As an alternative, there is a hyper rabbit who loves catching sea critters and adorning automobiles and a galactic traveler on the hunt for some form of treasure, amongst different, equally bespoke personalities. They play a extra concerned function in your day by day planet actions, too, with particular targets to succeed in and new storytelling moments that unlock as you develop nearer.
In idea, this setup ought to preserve neighborly relations from getting too stale, although I do have some reservations in regards to the character writing. Localization in HoYoverse video games varies wildly at instances, a mixture of stiff, evenly edited translations with extra considerate and even poignant passages relying on the state of affairs. It is just a little simpler to miss a number of the much less prosaic localization selections in one thing like Honkai Star Rail, because the focus is on the large narrative image. However these day by day interactions will likely be a part of Petit Planet‘s soul, and there is already a obvious oddity with one character’s script. Yunguo, your first neighbor, is supposed to be a sheltered child from a rural background, so she speaks with a couple of country-isms like droppin’ the ends of phrases ‘n such. That is superb. She additionally says “lickle” as a substitute of “little,” which is a utterly totally different dialect and mildly irritating to learn a number of instances in a single alternate.
HoYoverse wants to speculate extra time and sources in its localization, in different phrases, and I imply investing in folks doing the work. This primary Petit Planet beta features a small handful of characters and instruments with solely AI-generated textual content. It is simple to disregard, for now, but additionally a baffling choice for a sport that depends upon qualities AI cannot perceive — attraction and character, amongst different issues — to work.
