Planet of Lana Feels Like a Playdead Game That Doesn’t Hate You
Planet of Lana began as a single picture. Creator Adam Stjärnljus drew a girl and a doglike alien creature staring up at a multi-legged robot, and placed them in front of a watercolor-hued pastoral backdrop. It became the genesis of everything I play in a 10 minute Gamescom demo, from look, to gameplay, to feel.
What’s emerged is a smooth, intuitive narrative platformer, which will feel familiar to those who’ve tried Playdead’s Limbo and Inside - but it swaps the morbid, overtly hostile atmosphere of those games for a gorgeous, naturalistic, and crucially hopeful viewpoint.
The demo shows us the first true section of gameplay, as Lana’s awoken after a fall by her new companion, Mui. Their collaboration is Planet of Lana’s key gameplay conceit - Lana is stronger, but can’t jump or climb particularly far. Mui is weak, but (with a trigger pull and an onscreen cursor) can get to out-of-reach areas, cut ropes, travel through burrows, and make life easier for Lana along the way.
Together, they traverse a planet invaded by robots for reasons unknown - leaving Lana the only human we see, at least in the early stages. Where this could feel mournful, it’s clear developer Wishfully intends this to feel more like an adventure than a horror. Lana chatters to Mui in an invented language (which Stjärnljus tells me has real meaning behind it - he hopes diehard fans will attempt to translate it after release) and Mui chirps back. The bond feels strong, even in the game’s earliest stages.
That also makes its moments of actual threat feel genuinely frightening. The majority of my demo is about platformer puzzle solving - Lana uses Mui to attract an alien creature with a rock on its back, allowing her to cross an otherwise impassable gap, or
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