Planet of Lana

🍃 A Calm & Cosy Journey
Planet of Lana was a really nice, chill game to sit down and relax with. My favourite takeaways were Mui and the world design.
Mui was a great companion to have, and added a lot of charm throughout. The world is stunning, with a mix of 2D & 3D looking environments, and the soundtrack is amazing for the atmosphere. The entire game has a really calm, cosy feel to it.
My only gripe was that the puzzles and stealth felt a bit repetitive by the end. The puzzles are enjoyable, with different ways of Mui aiding you, but there isn't much variety between them and they can be fairly simple to work out. My biggest struggle was during one of the puzzle sections where Mui needs to be navigated through a sort of wind tunnel with big fans, because he can died quite easily.
It is definitely on the shorter side, but I think the length suited the game's calm experience. Ignore my total hours - I accidentally left the game open after playing once.
Overall: Beautiful world, amazing soundtrack, adorable little companion. Repeated puzzles and stealth, but still a really enjoyable relaxing game. I'm excited to se what the sequel is like for continuation.
🏆Achievement Notes
Easy 100%. Most achievements are natural through playing, I used a guide for hidden shrines, and the no-death achievement is less daunting than it sounds with checkpoint reloading.
🥇 100% Completed
Completion Difficulty: ★★☆☆☆
Time to 100%: ~6–8 hours
Missables: Yes
⋆⁺₊⋆ ☽ ⋆⁺₊⋆

The Love Child Of ‘Inside’, ‘Gris’ and ‘The Last Guardian’ (with ‘Horizon: Zero Dawn’ being the distant cousin)
All the reviews I’ve previously browsed for this game pretty much universally agreed on several things in regards to ‘Planet of Lana’, both positive and negative.
The game is undeniably very pretty, and its visuals are its strongest asset. The developers themselves claimed they were inspired by such Studio Ghibli films as ‘Spirited Away’ and ‘My Neighbor Totoro’, and this inspiration shows a lot. The game’s plot goes as followed: a little girl named Lana, who lived in peace with nature her whole life, experiences the loss of her elder sister who gets kidnapped by fierce ‘The War of The Worlds’ like machines in a sudden mechanical raid that happened overnight, and she searches for her ever since in the wilds. On her way to the main source of machines (and where her sister’s located as well) Lana finds a cutie patootie little creature she names Mui, and after that the best part of the game kicks in.
We go through absolutely stunning landscapes accompanied by simple but nicely-made instrumental music (which was written for PoL by the composer of ‘The Last Guardian’ by the way), solve easy common riddles, interact with our cutie patootie a lot and… meditate, basically. The pace of this game is really slow and steady, which contrasts a lot with the enemy’s encounters though, that actually require you to act quick and be sharp when necessary. Because otherwise you will experience several pretty rough deaths of your character or your little pet, which is so much worse. And sometimes I didn’t like that contrast at all, honestly.
Speaking of contrasts, I absolutely loved the level design in this game. The structure is pretty classic for the games like ‘Inside’ and ‘Limbo’: we’ve got to experience several different backgrounds, walk onto the surface and experience gorgeous nature’s views while it lasts, then descent into the caves and dark depths, get to the beach, walk through the foggy swamps, visit the location from the very beginning of the game, and finally enter the alien futuristic insides of the huge machinery plants and get to the final anti Greta Thunberg boss. All of these backgrounds aren’t really new for the game of such genre, but it was just made so, so well. And by the way, the obligatory Limbo reference with a giant spider was featured as well! I liked that.
But while the visuals absolutely serve, the gameplay is indeed pretty lacking. I’m not complaining about the riddles being simple though, contrary to the majority of players! I am actually not a huge fan of complex and mind-breaking riddles in platformers, as I am simply not very good at solving them on my own and I lose patience really quick. So I am not really minding the riddles’ simplicity, but rather their repetitiveness and overstaying their welcome. One specific puzzle was really copied and pasted several times, which is just unacceptable. And some puzzles seem really insane in combination with the game’s wobbly controls. A reminder: PoL features ‘No deaths’ achievement. So to hell with all those puzzles where Mui has to travel on top of the robot where he can die basically from the wind blowing, with several glitches accompanying those levels.
To sum it up. ‘Planet of Lana’ is a visually stunning game that knows exactly what it wants to be: a cute, relaxing, pretty predictable platformer that doesn’t give you much sweat and allows you to finally get that ‘Inside’ scratch so many people were yearning for, but in a form of a Studio Ghibli spirit and art. The gameplay however may seem disappointing for those who wanted complex puzzles that would challenge the players. The full price for it can be pretty high given its length though, so I’d recommend you to grab this game at the discount.

🌄 Planet of Lana Review 🌳

What an emotional, beautiful game. The story is very heartwarming, sad, and also beautifully done. The game had me cry, laugh, and feel shocked and happy at different parts and stages. Amazing artwork,I could tell a lot of work went into it. The scenes and areas you visit are visually beautiful and have a great style.

The music was also the icing on the cake. The song used was woah!!! Beautiful lyrics. The song is called Horizons, and the lyrics: “And all over the whole wide world, there’s still so much more to hold” are my favourite line.

The game is full of puzzles, whether figuring them out alone or working around enemies. I found the puzzles to not be too easy or too hard, they were just right. Even on a harder puzzle that I struggled with, I was only stuck for a couple of minutes before having a “duh” moment and realising it was easier than I thought lol.

Your little companion in the game, Mui, is so adorable. I loved having a little buddy to help me. Even though the game does not have an English language, the expressions and character movements make it easy to work out what they are saying without needing any subtitles, which I thought was really cool. There is not much talking, but the few moments where there is are really nice.

Achievements are somewhat easy, you mostly just need to go through the game. There are hidden shrines, some easier to find than others. The hardest achievement is completing the game without dying, but the game is very fair with checkpoints. If you think you’re about to die, just reset to the checkpoint so you don’t have to redo the whole chapter again. I did die a few times in a couple of chapters, mainly due to poor timing or the fact I found it a bit hard to control the robot with Mui on top towards the end of the game. There are a few hard sections, but just take your time. Remember, there is no rush.

Amazing game. I can’t wait to play Planet of Lana 2, which just came out a few days ago (at the time I posted this review). I am vvery excited for the adventure that awaits. Great game, if you love puzzle games that are also a bit relaxing and cozy, then this is for you!!

Go find your sister! 🤖

Tip: If you want to find more reviews like this, check out our curator page Moon's Tea House

Charming, but short. I liked the puzzles. Takeshi Furukawa composed the soundtrack for this game. 8/10

Fine/10 "faсeless child goes right" artsy puzzle platformer.
Can't possibly win the competition with the best of them (aka INSIDE), but is pleasant enough nonetheless. Sequel honestly looks more promising, but I kinda want devs to remember that those artsy games are fondly remembered for the unique moments and not for 10 samey puzzles in a row. And not for the wildly out of place big boy music puzzles that stop the game's pacing dead either.
Oh, and please stop starting every cutscene with fade in/fade out; this is a 2D game, it can be done seamlessly without any fuss.

Cool little side scroller. The game is basically a combination of simple puzzles, stealth parts and platforming. It doesn't bring anything new to the table or is special in any way but it's still fun if you want to sit back, relax and enjoy the atmosphere.

Very beautiful game, but i dont know if its worth 20$. But if you buy it on sale 100% worth it. very enjoyable 4 hours of gameplay