It’s a Thursday evening, I’m browsing the Xbox store like a lost puppy despite the fact I’ve a pile of roughly 12 games I could jam in my drive and play away on, and I come across something that makes me think “Well, what could possibly go wrong on a planet like that”.

The game in question of course, is Lifeless Planet. A 3D platformer from the people at Stage 2 Studios, it sets itself up for a little jump through space and onto an unknown planet to which the player (being a tiny little American space man) is told he’s there to never return. Still Curious and wondering about what could happen on this seemingly huge giant orange ball, I pressed Start and off I went (not through space myself, just my tiny American sprite friend). 

The opening few chapters of this game are rather good. After crash landing and being told you’re not going to last long without oxygen, you’re informed you should hop along to a glint in the foreground and explore. Being that all around you is a flat, arid looking desert, this glint is seemingly your only hope of surviving a few more hours on this mysterious planet. Shortly after this the story begins to unfold when your tiny friend finds what is seemingly an abandoned Russian housing site and a mysterious lady who appears and then disappears as quick as she came. While all this is going on, there are small book looking objects that can be collected, explaining a little further as to why you’re there, but mostly these are from the Russians point of view and why they’re there which further expands and creates a want to explore deeper and darker into this unknown planet.

Sadly, that’s where it gets. For lack of a better term, a bit lifeless.

The game makes you hop around following glints and a rather horrible looking green smear for around 6 hours. You’re constantly chasing the mysterious lady, but the further you go in you begin to notice there is another life force at work and it’s not a particularly pleasant one at that (it simply eats you, and its game over). Alongside this, the level design doesn't lend itself to working in your favour, by setting pathways in obscure places that generally just look like you’re about to fall off. There are some cool additions to your little space man, albeit only 2, and even then these are so restricted to use that you just forget they’re there half the time (I won’t go into great detail, as sadly like I said, there are only 2). Environmentally you go to a few locations but even these become uninteresting after a few minutes and you find yourself just hopping towards either another bland area or another vast expanse of nothing.

The game does throw a few curve balls in the way of flashbacks to what life was like back home on earth before the unnamed man took off into the stars, but even these feel disjointed into the story and almost pointless.

Ultimately towards the end, I felt frustrated with the time I’d put into Lifeless Planet. It started out well and although feeling a little budget (which is absolutely fine), it felt like it had potential. Sadly it’s all too late when it comes to light that it doesn't, and by the time you reach the pinnacle moment, frankly the care is already gone.

@Just_Ge0