Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet

The only thing insane here would be your failure to download this game.

Fuelcell Games displays a savant-like grasp of the material they've created, and the result is easily one of 2011's best games.

When you sit down with Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, you're in for a visual feast, colorful, foreboding, intriguing, and worth every penny. And thankfully, the gameplay is solid. Gange's art is fantastic and even if you don't have fun, you'll probably be compelled through the game just to see what the next area or boss fight is like.

A game for all ages to enjoy. That is the rarest kind of game to behold these days, and each game that fits this description is a treasure to be respected.

With its outstanding design and smart puzzles, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet takes you on a ride through creator Michel Gagnés vivid imagination. The end result is a Metroidvania styled game that's well worth its 1200 MS Points.

For 1200msp you get an engaging adventure that is lovingly-crafted, full of charm and invention from the very start. There are a few frustrations, but rarely does Insanely feel unbalanced or unforgiving.

Sound and music are spot on – crank up the volume! With Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet and its strong atmosphere, the Summer of Arcade once again delivers one of the best Arcade titles of the year.

Given the relatively short game length (even for an XBLA title) and little incentive for replay, I think 800 points would have been a much fairer asking price. Regardless, this is one XBLA title you don't want to miss.

Although you might not get much else out of the game once it has been completed, the journey there is fun and at times a challenging one.

What makes this so immersive is the extraordinary animation and artwork. Everything feels alive, from the pulsating creatures that line the walls, to the slick and swift movement of the boss creatures.

Draws you into its unfamiliar terrain with a great sense of atmosphere and fosters experimentation with varied tools and fascinating situations. It's a fairly brief excursion, but it's worth the journey.

A very good cave shoot 'em up in the vein of PixelJunk: Shooter. The dark and simple graphical style is quite striking, if not original - Patapon, anyone? [Sept 2011]

You've seen these gimmicks in other games, so it's ultimately a familiar grammar involving water, gravity, light beams, and so forth. The charm comes from the execution and the funky artwork.

Even in the few sections of ITSP that ape the Metroid series more directly, it rarely falls flat simply because the formula is so solid. The game really excels when it changes things up with puzzles and boss fights.

Visual, audio and narrative tones are all in harmony for this short but memorable journey.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet is a far cry from revolutionary (though it hardly seeks to be), and it's too linear and shallow an adventure for a game banking on the appeal of Metroid. Nevertheless, it's a tasty hors d'oeuvre that teases with sheer beauty and some clever gameplay concepts in the later areas. Its appeal is greater than the sum of its parts, even if it does leave you wanting more.

An amazing adventure full of charm and invention that's well worth its 1200 MS Points.

A good exploratory shooter game pleasing you by its engaging gameplay, stylish art and specific atmosphere. If you want to take a breather, you do not want to play anything big and you need to relax – this game is perfect for you.

A multi-directional adventure that plays almost as good as it looks. [Nov 2011, p.110]

One of those games where the satisfaction is drawn as much from exploring the world as it is from attaining absolute victory. [Issue#113, p.116]

There isn't too much to say about Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet; it's a very solid exploratory adventure title that's needs a bit more length to justify a full-priced purchase of. Excellent art and music really bring the world to life, and a multiplayer mode that can eat up an hour or so of time, if you're so inclined makes a pretty good game that I'd casually recommend.

At first you think Shadow Planet is all about the original looks, but the more you play, the more you realise this game gives your brain enough complex situations to keep you occupied for hours on end.

ITSP is undoubtedly a work of art, even if you only based that evaluation on its unique and beautiful visuals. But the rest of the package more than carries its own weight, especially the design and variation amongst the bad guys and some of the level design.

An astonishingly well made forray into the Metroidvania genre with beautiful, original graphics and wonderful atmosphere.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet is a great platformer / twin stick shooter hybrid game that I can safely recommend to anyone who has a fine appreciation for great artistic design and competent gameplay design.

Insanely Twisted? Maybe not, but it's definitely entertaining enough to be worthy of the name Ultimately Excellent Shadow Planet: a fantastic adventure for anyone enticed by the thrill of exploration.

Quotation forthcoming.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet is a memorable title during a summer of incredible arcade games.

Seamlessly combining minimalist presentation with intuitive puzzle design, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet makes great use of the Metroid formula.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet is good fun, with striking visuals and a great setting. A few issues keep it from being totally brilliant though.

The game screams of style and has the gameplay to back it up. With the recent announcement of a co-op DLC campaign I am stoked to return to this twisted locale.

I would recommend that anyone who likes the Metroid style of exploratory gameplay try it out though - you'll probably enjoy it a lot.

The artistic direction of ITSP drew me in a dream, even though I was expecting a better storyline, and a tiny bit more out of the title overall. The gameplay remains solid, supporting an adventure with a nice blend of action and puzzle-solving sequences.

The boss fights showcase the game's weapons-based puzzle solving well, and no more so than the final boss.

This game successfully blends shoot'em up mechanics with Metroid-esque design, using cleverly the two analogue sticks, and although it is a bit short, it compensates for it with a multiplayer mode.

Summer Arcade 2011 goes on and this time a crazy action platform 2D will blow your mind with its vintage and crazy style.

Won't tax your skills much, but makes for a fun and easygoing ride while it lasts.

And while some nagging design annoyances and control issues permeate the game, its incredible, whacked-out art style does a lot to carry the experience.

The stylish visuals compliment the well-executed action, resulting in a game that resembles past SOA favorites Limbo and Shadow Complex.

An engaging, sometimes cerebral experience that transforms familiar genre elements and lumps in spectacular art design for a sharp single-player experience.

The game is solid in its mechanics to the point where it would be worth playing even if it were butt-ugly. If Bastion isn't quite what you've been looking for in the latest download bunch, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet may turn out to be the blackest, shiniest gem in the Summer of Arcade for you.

Begins stupendously, kicking things off with a visually stunning, orchestral bang. Its first moments are truly captivating, introducing a planet that is both hostile and inviting -- a world that begs to be explored.

It's worth playing for any fan of the genre, but it isn't the brightest star in the sky.

A brief but striking title, one that doesn't outstay its welcome, perfectly pitched at the digital market.

Leaves you wanting more. With such a well-conceived and beautiful world to explore, it's a shame we can't spend more time in it. But a great short game is more welcome than a mediocre long one.

It's a dense, intelligent game, and we felt smart for having finish[ed] it. [Sept 2011, p.78]

With its well crafted, cleverly designed levels and impressively high production values, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet is a 'must play'... but like that fanciful Friday night party, such a pity that it's all over too soon.

Fuelcell Games managed to create a really memorable game. Planet's tunnels are varied and surprise you with something weird all the time. Exploring this world is the most important aspect of the whole experience. Shooting constitutes for about 1/3 of the gameplay, leaving a lot of room for thinking and coming up with the ways to progress further. [Sept 2011, p.75]

A fun and enjoyable game. Sadly the mind-numbingly difficult side of things create the most hurt against it.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet offers some fun puzzles and way too easy bosses. Its unique art style definitely makes it worth playing but the familiar gameplay, as seen in dozens of older games, disable the game from being something truly special.

While the campaign could use more of that urgency, ITSP is a perfectly polished, bite-size shooter that returns us, however briefly, to a long-neglected sector of the gaming universe.

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet's biggest boon is that tries to do something different, and it does it well. It falters early on with unintuitive tutorial sections - at a time in the game where it needs to be as intuitive as possible - but this forces the player into the deep end, and it's probably not a terrible thing considering how the game plays out.