3D Platformer • Collectathon • 3rd person • Combat • Story Rich • Sci Fi • Comedy

Psychonauts is a 3D action platformer that spans several different levels with a very big overworld. The overworld is broken down into different sections for you to explore. If you're a fan of collectathon platformers, Psychonauts 2 will give you your fill without completely overwhelming you on items to collect.

You start out with a very basic arsenal of moves, and as you progress through the story you will collect new powerups that improve things such as mobility as well as attacks among other things. Almost entirely based on psychic abilities. Things like projectiles, levitation, Pyrokinesis and more will become part of your arsenal throughout the game. By the end of the game you will have quite a fun loadout to play with. Unfortunately you can not have all abilities equipped at the same time, so you will be jumping into the submenus frequently to swap things out for different situations.

The various levels you will explore are quite amazing! Aside from the main hub world, the levels all take place inside various people's minds. These levels all have different themes as a result, and they can sometimes be quite twisted with routes that go in all directions, literally. Sometimes it will feel little like a traditional 3D platformer, and at other times go off the rails with perspectives or gravity shifts reminiscent of games like Super Mario Galaxy. It definitely shakes things up.

The only real downside is sometimes the camera can be a little annoying. This is unfortunately a common problem in a lot of 3D platformers. Luckily this is not a precision platformer most of the time so it never becomes a major problem to really irritate the player too much.

There will be plenty of combat encounters throughout with regular enemies and also different bosses. Nothing too hard as long as you know their weaknesses. Ultimately almost any enemy can be dropped with basic attacks, but sometimes switching to an alternate ability will drop them much quicker so fights don't drag out. It's far better to use tact, but brute forcing also works most of the time, albeit with more risk. I say most of the time, since there are still some (not many) enemies that do require you to use certain abilities no matter what.

Overall the gameplay is extremely fun and satisfying if you're into 3D action platformers and collectathons.

Psychonauts 2 is a direct follow up to Psychonauts and its VR only spin-off Rhombus of Ruin. It follows a character named Raz who happens to be a boy with psychic powers. He's fresh out of 1 adventure and dumped into a new one when he enters the Psychonauts headquarters and is made an intern. There's a big bad on the horizon in the form of a character named Maligula, and nobody can stop her except for a group called the psychic six. The group unfortunately has disbanded and are all completely mental wrecks after there last battle with Maligula. And it's up to Raz to help fix their broken minds in psychonauts fashion, by literally entering their minds. It's a good narrative that explores several different types of real world mental issues in a very tasteful manner.


In terms of overall fidelity, it's good looking. But nothing super high end so its not too demanding. There's nothing like FSR or DLSS built in that I noticed. And no ray tracing. Not that I think it needs any of that. The game looks fine on really any settings I tested, except for very low where it really comes off looking noticeably worse. Low settings are perfectly fine on the other hand. If you have capable hardware, the very high settings don't come off as too demanding and should be a breeze to run on a lot of modern systems.

Aside from fidelity, the real meat of the graphics here is in terms of aesthetics. And oh my, does Psychonauts 2 deliver here. The aesthetics was already great in Psychonauts 1, but here it's just off the charts! They cranked things way past 11 on this one. If you are looking for photo-realism, look elsewhere. If you however want abstract crazy looking motifs, burton-esque and with a little hint of M.C. Escher inspiring the sometimes fever dreamed and other times psychadelic and twisted and nutty and wonderfully colorful or dark designs for some of the landscapes you'll be exploring, this is it. Psychonauts 2 delivers.


The audio is in a nutshell, top notch. Voice acting is fantastic. Even for minor characters and NPCs. I found it a joy to walk around and talk to everyone. Some dialogue does tend to get repeated from time to time, but that is expected with ambient chatter.

The music is great. It's mostly scored by Peter McConnell who does a great job capturing different themes, and nothing sounds out of place music wise. But it's not all him. There's also music from Jack Black... and even Elijah Wood? Yes. Elijah Wood singing. He's no Jack Black, but somehow his little musical number just works.

While keyboard and mouse is supported, I think this type of game is best played with a controller.

Not tested

Fully supported during gameplay., Pillarbhoxes during cutscenes.

Not really anything here of note other than a recap of events from the previous games.

Nothing I have found. No crashes in the roughly 40 hours I have played at the time of writing this. I've played some of this on a laptop with a 3070 GPU, and most of it on a desktop with a 4070 ti. The latter being with a 1440p ultrawide monitor. Performance was excellent on both.


Wonderful game. Twisted at times, delightful at others. It does explore some of the darker themes of mental illness, so be prepared for that. Overall it's a good blending of fun gameplay and great storytelling with a great cast of characters. I do recommend playing through the other games first of course. But it's not 100% necessary with the recap in place.

Definitely recommending this one.

Psychonauts 2 it’s a perfect mix of humor, heart, and creativity that never feels forced. Every moment feels crafted with love and care. The characters are unforgettable, gameplay is a smooth mix of platforming and combat that never gets old, and the soundtrack? chef's kiss. Plus, the voice acting and art style is top-tier.

Whether you’re a fan of the original or new to the series, this is a journey worth taking.

Rating: 10/10 – Highly recommend. 👁️🧠

Awesome game. Just like the first game, the levels are super creative and unique. The game flows with imagination and gigantic artistry value. My only nitpick is that after the beginning level the next few hours feel bloated, stretched out and feature the weakest levels in the game. Those sections are not bad, but they are noticeably weaker and honestly feel like filler. However, after that it gets much better, the rest of the game is a wonderful adventure. One nuisance with the game though is that you can't collect everything in most levels in your first go, you will need to come back later after you learn new powers. In some games, you unlock massive whole new side areas, but here you merely unlock a single room to grab a collectable, it is a lazy way to implement backtracking to lengthen the playtime and feels redundant if anything.


8/10