Sackboy: A Big Adventure PC Edition - Charming the Keyboard and Mouse Crowd
Another day, another old Playstation game making its way to the PC. It is clear that Sony has finally realised the value in catering to those that consider themselves as part of the PC master race and are pumping their back catalogue for all it’s worth. For the most part, these ports have been a success, with a few quirks and oddities that show that Sony, while new to the PC, is learning but has some ways to go. The latest to make the switch and follow the trend is Sackboy: A Big Adventure, a surprising choice, but honestly a welcome one.
Let’s start with the game. Sackboy is a sequel of sorts to the Little Big Planet franchise. This time around, the creativity has been put to one side and the game focuses solely on platforming and adventuring, an odd choice considering the IP’s history, but in my mind, it is a welcome one. The Little Big Planet games were fantastic, don’t get me wrong, but for those like me, the uncreative shall we say, there is a limited appeal. The platforming alone wasn’t enough to pull me through. With Sackboy, the entire focus is on gameplay and it shows, with one of the most enjoyable 3D platformers in recent years being the result.
The game has charm to spare and while it is by no means a tough game, it certainly has a fair amount of challenge to offer players. There is also a huge amount of variety in the levels, with races, minecarts, music-based missions and more all making their way into the game. It is like the platform game genre’s greatest hits all rolled into one big package. Special mention goes out to the Uptown Funk level, which is the best music-based level I have played since Rayman jammed to Black Betty.
But, we know all this. The game has been out since the launch of the PS5. How does it handle the varied configurations and pure power of the PC? Well, pretty darn well actually. There is a host of tweaking options to get the most out of the game with the hardware you have, much more so than in the recent Uncharted ports. It is also worth mentioning that players should make sure they have the latest drivers for their video cards. I had all sorts of issues when I first started playing the game, but the next day Nvidia released a new set of drivers, with a special mention for Sackboy and all the problems went away. I know it is something that should be common knowledge, but I feel it is worth mentioning anyway.
Not everything is smooth. The game has an oddity that always annoys me when I come across it in PC gaming. The old “double launcher” issue. My review key was on Steam, but it had to connect to my Epic Game Store account to run. I expect this sort of painful stuff from EA and Ubisoft, not Sony. It is odd that this, of all the games they have recently released on the PC, is the title they choose to do it with. I can only imagine there is some sort of distribution deal in place with Tim Sweeny and co, it is the only thing that makes sense.
With Sackboy: A Big Adventure, PC gamers are getting something that they don’t get often, a high-quality, triple-A platform game from a major publisher. It is a genre that is poorly served for the Keyboard and Mouse crowd and that makes Sackboy a must-buy for those that crave this sort of action. It isn’t breaking any new ground nor is it going to blow anyone away, but it will provide a fantastic adventure dipped in an excess of charming characters and creative levels. Sackboy might have been a strange choice for a PC port at first glance, but I have a feeling it will be an astute one at the end of the day. Now if you will excuse me, I have some knitted creatures to rescue and they won’t do it themselves.
