I've been watching the progress of Freedom Planet since 2012 and I was extremely pleased to find out that it was released to Steam as of July 21, 2014. After so much waiting, has it been worth it for me? Glad you asked. I have played and beaten the entire game and I have everything written down! Follow me after the jump to find out what I thought.

What is Freedom Planet, anyway?
Freedom Planet is, according to the official site, "a combat-based platform adventure that pits a spunky dragon girl and her friends against an alien attack force". That does sum it up pretty well, but I will expand for you. At its core, Freedom Planet is a game that harkens back to the days of the classic Sega Genesis platformer. The game contains homages to games such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Rocket Knight Adventures (or Sparkster if you only had a SNES) and Gunstar Heroes in its style, but don't think that they simply copied it: Freedom Planet takes inspiration from those ideas and adds new elements to define a niche of its own.


At the beginning of the game, you get two characters to choose from: Sash Lilac (a dragon) and Carol Tea (a wildcat), each of which have special abilities that are unique to that character. Lilac can run, jump, do a mid or low kick in front of her, do a rising uppercut (a...dragon punch, if you will), a spinning attack float, a dive kick and a special move that is very reminiscent of Sparkster's rocket charge move. Carol is a completely different beast, with the ability to claw everything in front of her and cling to/climb walls to navigate the terrain. She also has a motorcycle which she can use to travel at high speeds and actually race up rock faces and cavern interiors. For my playthrough, I decided to go with the principle character, Lilac.


Gameplay
Navigating Freedom Planet feels exactly like you remember if you played a non-generic 16-bit platformer back in the day. The game takes you through a wide variety of levels featuring all types of obstacles (such as pistons, spikes, giant drills and flame wheels) and pathways (featuring objects such as loop-de-loops, ramps, and springs). Every level has its own gimmick (or two) which keeps levels feeling fresh as you explore each of the huge 8 levels. The inventiveness and effort put into this ideal is outstanding. You'll end up running on the ceiling, sprinting along ramps into the background, rocketing through the air and swimming underwater all in your quest to rescue the Kingdom Stone, the most important relic of their planet, Avalice from the forces of the evil Lord Brevon (who come onto the scene in one of the more memorable introductions I've seen in a while, but I'll get to story later).


I have to say, the gameplay is smooth like butter and tighter than skinny jeans. It's amazing how responsive the controls are. Every move that you make in Freedom Planet is your own. Yes, every mistake that you make, every breath you take...is all your own fault. And it is vital that the gameplay is so well-done because this game also has an old-school toughness to it. Enemies are everywhere and are as varied as the stages themselves. In my time with the game, I engaged enemies such as poison-spewing penguins, hordes of angry praying mantis bees, near-indestructible robots, guardian creatures and giant frogs. The bosses are no slouches, either. There's giant serpents, metal monstrosities, normal-size story character fights and, of course, Lord Brevon himself are serious business. This game rewards you for studying your opponent and exploiting the weakness in order to stay alive. If you just try to brute force your way in for a victory, more often than not, you will fail. Spectacularly.


Graphics
And you know what else is spectacular? The graphics. This game is one of the most beautiful games I've ever seen. It reminds me so much of the visual fidelity of 16-bit Sega games. You know, back when games realized that there were more colors than gray, black and brown and weren't afraid to reach into the crayon box for the other ones. I kid, I kid, but let me be an old man yelling at a cloud for a moment. That said, there is so much detail in the game that it almost makes me cry. Take a look at the pictures in this review for examples of what I'm talking about. Underground crystal caverns have rich crystal blues and greens with pillars in the mid background and stalagmites and stalactites in the far background. A run through the city has multitudes of paper lanterns floating into the sky and fireworks explosions. A special shoutout has to go out to Jade Creek, with a color palette that makes me feel like the this game was merely a lost classic Sega game revealed from the vault. It hit me so hard in the nostalgia. Characters, enemies and environments all have a level of art quality that I would have seen from one of the big companies back in the day. I can't think of a higher compliment than that.


Music
Another thing to compliment is the music. My goodness, the team behind this music deserves a huge shoutout. The quality of the music is just as high quality as the assets developed by the art team. The Freedom Planet theme makes me think immediately of an adventure. It's fun, it's inviting and it entices me to imbibe more. Every stage theme makes an aural case for its stage. There's Asian-influenced sounds, pounding synth and smooth rhythms. For the first stage, Dragon Valley 1, the beat is pumping and engaging, perfect for an outdoorsy, rock-climbing stage. I won't break down all of the music here, since I could make an entire article about this fantastic soundtrack, but I feel like a need to give a few props to a few standouts such as Relic Maze Part 1, which the perfect musical painting of "exploring ancient temple" music, Aqua Tunnel, which is so funky it hurts and Final Dreadnought 1, which sounds so heavy and serious and driving that it really announces to the world that this is the final challenge. The emotions I felt during were legit. It took me back to my childhood. A big tip of my hat to the developers!


Plot
But alas, there has to be a bit of a wag of the finger when it comes to the story. To be candid, you do not have to play story mode. The game, at the very beginning, offers Classic Mode where you simply play the stages back-to-back like you would Sonic the Hedgehog games. However, I went through the story. I feel a little bad to criticize the story in a platformer, but since the devs put it in here, it has to be addressed. I actually think that the main story is okay, but nothing super special. Lilac is a great main character and I take her seriously as the main force of the game. Brevon is also a pretty good villain. Like I said earlier, when you first see him, he makes an IMPACT. So it would seem like everything is set up to make a good buildup to a finale. However, Freedom Planet does not quite manage to get to the height I think it could have. I think that this is partly due to the game feeling like a few pieces of plot were missing. I think a couple extra scenes of what Brevon ultimately wanted to do and more of him and Lilac and her pals would have made the denouement a little sweeter. That said, it's a story in a platformer. I'm honestly not that bothered by it since the core game is so good.


Wrap-up
And that's what this game is. Soooo good. Freedom Planet feels like a game that wouldn't have been out of place on a shelf back in 1994 for the Sega Genesis. It looks gorgeous, controls like a dream, sounds like an angel and despite whatever little imperfections it might have, I'm more than willing to say that it is definitely worth the asking price of 14.99 on Steam. If you liked Sonic, Rocket Knight or Gunstar Heroes, stop reading this review and go buy this. It lives up to the pedigree of all of them.