After a week or so with Beyond Galaxyland, the 2D RPG by Sam Enright, it’s notable how many influences the game displays over its 25-hour story. It’s not just the aesthetics and themes of the game; there’s a wide range of combat, puzzle, and traversal systems to engage with. While not always successful, with some systems and approaches feeling underdeveloped and clumsy, the developer deserves credit for the unique worldbuilding and fluid combat systems. This isn’t an RPG that goes beyond what you expect, but it’s a decent journey all the same.
Beyond Galaxyland asks plenty of questions in its main story, and the themes and characters are a real mixed bag. Doug, our protagonist, finds himself dislocated from present-day Earth due to an unexpected apocalyptic event. He finds himself in Galaxyland, an artificial solar system created by an ancient race to save species from the same fate as Earth. Each species has its own habitat, which exists as a unique planet in the system. Doug begins his journey on Neo, a hub planet where the refugees first arrive. He endeavors to find out more about the events that destroyed Earth, as well as the nature of his benevolent saviors and their goals and motivations.
The journey sometimes adopts a serious tone, reflecting on weighty subjects like genocide, destiny, and self-determination. This contrasts sharply with its humor and satire, with some locations and inhabitants rooted in a more Hitchhikers’ approach to their stories or more slapstick comedy. The characters around Doug exemplify this well. Martybot, an admin robot met on Neo, is a conduit for self-deprecating humour and pathos. The Malefactor is exactly that: an antagonist who serves to drive the plot forward with his questionable designs and history. Boom-Boom, Doug’s pet guinea pig, has a great character arc, and their relationship is one of the more poignant even in its absurdity. Towards the finale, the plot doubles down on its cosmic sci-fi mythos, although the ending is abrupt and leaves a lot of open threads. Given the story’s themes, it’s hard to know if this is a deliberate choice or if there are plans to develop the lore further.
The art design for Beyond Galaxland is really eye-catching. A combination of pixel art, 3D objects, and an excellent eye for stylish detail elevates all the locations. Industrial sectors are defined with harsh silhouettes and moody shadows, while pastoral forest worlds have wonderfully stylised sunbeams and areas of diffuse glow. Characters and creatures are similarly distinct, and the boss encounters are memorable and varied, even if these do strongly evoke past genre inspirations. Combat effects are simple, yet effective and further bring forth memories of late-90s JRPGs in some of their style and animations. The soundtrack is equally evocative of this era and boasts a wide variety of soundscapes, most of which are full-thrust synths.
Movement around these pleasant backdrops is through 2D sprite control, with more platform jumping than expected. Although most movement is pretty flat and point-to-point, there are areas where double-timed jumps and jumping from slides are needed. Control is forgiving and the double jump is airy, so this is never frustrating and adds variety to routine exploration.
Beyond Galaxyland‘s combat plays out in a similar vein to other turn-based 2D pixel RPGs. Players take turns activating abilities from a set menu, including their inherent skills, as well as gaining skills from monsters who can be captured in combat. Every successful hit on an enemy raises an Ability Point meter, while misses reduce it. Doing nothing for a turn automatically fills the meter by three points. Therefore, accuracy plays an important role in securing the means to use abilities: characters who are more accurate can help fill the meter even if their damage is less.
Another twist is that the number of basic attacks a character has is dictated by their current Turn Points (TP). Each character starts with three TP, and various equipment and rewards throughout the game increase it. This inspires further strategic choices. More TP means more potential attacks but may also mean more misses.
As Doug explores, he uses a photo function to identify hostile creatures and their abilities. In combat, there’s a chance he can capture them and add them to his portfolio once their health is low. Each creature gets summoned to deliver a single ability, and some abilities level up with Doug. In many ways, it brings to mind Final Fantasy VII’s Materia system, with different creatures offering elemental attacks, or a party buff such as Haste or Regen. This influence goes further because multiple creatures can exist together: you can tool up a lightning-based character, or load up with healing creatures to support the rest of the party.
You can find a fair amount of loot and equipment to develop characters and skills. Characters have one main weapon, and there aren’t many of these to find as the game progresses. However, they can equip up to four artifacts, and these offer flexible options to resist elemental damage or increase stats and suchlike. Most boss monsters hold unique artifacts, and since stealing during combat is automatically successful, there’s no reason not to grab these. Other elements — slowly filling active time bars, consumable items, summon/magical powers — are other examples of the game cribbing from several design sources. Overall, combat is quick, intuitive, and never feels unfair, even if it’s not as fantastic a spectacle as the setting.
Alongside the combat and traversal mechanics, Beyond Galaxyland features a range of other systems, some more fleshed out than others. There are light physics puzzles. There are side missions with light investigative mechanics. There’s a monster battle arena. There are two different racing minigames to contend with. You can craft items from collecting resources scattered around the level maps. All in all, it’s an impressive range of systems woven together from a range of inspirations. They don’t all mesh perfectly; the clumsy racing sections are weak, and the ball physics puzzles lack precise control. In fact, there’s a stealth section so brief and late on in the game it’s a surprise it appears at all.
Beyond Galaxyland does not take long to reach its endgame, should you follow the critical path and undertake some light grinding. There are a handful of other worlds to explore, each of which has a side mission or two. These include familiar gamewide quests, such as photographing a certain set of creatures or activating obscured tokens in the 2D scenery with Boom-Boom’s ranged attack. Despite the stylishly designed worlds, there’s nothing out of the ordinary, and there are not as many worlds to explore as there should be when you consider how many saved species the plot sets up.
It’s the style and feel of Beyond Galaxyland that kept me interested to the end of Doug’s journey. Though many of the supporting systems are pretty familiar and some are in real need of reconsideration, the thematic narrative has enough mystery to engage. Exploring the intricate graphical detail of the world, and its original worldbuilding, is fun for most of the runtime, and the efficient combat doesn’t bog this down. If a key element of the genre is exploring new worlds, then Beyond Galaxyland puts its best foot forward. It’s just a bit wobbly in how it gets there. Prepare to give it some slack on the journey, and you’ll have a decent time.
