Sonic Mania Team (Evening Star)'s Newest Project - Penny's Big Breakaway, is out now for 30$ USD!

I realize this isn't directly Sonic related, but I think it needs to be said that, after everything Evening Star's Team, Tee Lopes, (as well as the newly added RSDK decomp programmer, Rubberduckycooly!) has done for this fandom and community, I'd like to create a threat to celebrate and advertise their newest, big IP release to help ensure the right people get the chance to buy and play it. These people have worked tirelessly for Sonic projects for many years, and they deserve the chance to also shine when they go to create a new passion project. Since this is neither a Sega, now Sonic, I didn't quite know where best to make a thread for this, so I chose here. I hope the mods will allow this topic to be here for at least a bit! It's already quite evident that there's a lot of Sonic and 90s SEGA influence in this title's designs.

Penny's Big Breakaway is new full indie 3D platformer game developed by Evening Star, and released on multiple platforms (Switch, PC, Xbox, PS5), now now out and available for download. US launch Price is only 30$!


https://twitter.com/dark1x/status/1756240341424902572

Early impressions are very strong so far from those in the know. I won't have time to play and test it for several hours personally, but I secured my steam copy immediately.

Regardless of how you feel about Mania (or the lack of a Mania 2 project), these people deserve a chance to have their newest projects fully supported, especially if it plays as well as the early reviews suggest!

 

So I took a work break and sat down and gave it 30 minutes to tackle stages 0-1 and 1-1 so far.

The controls are a bit complex at first and don't look immediately intuitive, but the learning curve isn't very steep and they brilliantly give you multiple buttons on the controller for doing every single trick. By the end of 1-1 I was getting a very solid grasp for it. Play around with it. Don't be afraid to experiment with the yoyo mechanics and try each button until you've got a feel for it. Momentum is the core of this game, and there are numerous tricks you can to do increase both speed and jumping height that become a lot more intuitive by the time you reach the end of 1-1. Tying the pseudo roll to the L and R triggers was a great thing to discovery, for example.

Also, perfect 60FPS on PC so far. The only glitch I've encountered is what seems to be some odd stuttering in the 2D game cutscenes, but the 3D overworld flows and plays perfectly. 30FPS on switch is a downer, but 90FPS on steam deck seems to be the next best alternative option.

And I think this being a launch thread that's visible in our most active forum is important. If nothing else, it may be worth discussing what Sonic and SEGA influences are directly in the design of this game. You can already see things like a YoYo spindashing mechanic which is crucial for getting uphill. Speed is used a reward for better gameplay and higher skill. Momentum is the foundation of the game's engine. It's all good stuff so far.

Edit: Official Dev Stream incoming!