A First Look at HoYoverse's 'Petit Planet' Beta: Familiar Comforts with Unique Flair

HoYoverse's latest offering, 'Petit Planet,' has entered its closed beta phase, presenting a life-simulation experience that draws heavily from genre staples like 'Animal Crossing,' 'Harvest Moon,' 'Stardew Valley,' and 'Disney Dreamlight Valley.' The game prioritizes a gentle visual aesthetic, creating a calming atmosphere for players. While it successfully integrates many beloved elements of cozy games, such as farming, decorating, and building community, the beta also highlights certain design decisions that could impact player enjoyment and creative freedom. These include rigid item placement mechanics and a character customization system that, at present, feels somewhat restrictive, particularly concerning clothing options. The game's narrative weaving of environmental care and more interactive furniture pieces introduces refreshing aspects, yet concerns linger regarding the consistency of its localization and the puzzling inclusion of AI-generated text, which might detract from the game's inherent charm and personality.

Upon first impression, 'Petit Planet' closely mirrors the structural framework of an 'Animal Crossing' title. Players begin their journey on a new planet with minimal possessions, guided by a helpful animal character who introduces them to the game's mechanics and the process of upgrading their surroundings using in-game currency. Notably, the beta experience has been free from microtransactions or gacha elements, focusing instead on pure gameplay. The overarching objective involves transforming the planet into an appealing habitat to attract more residents, a goal achieved through a series of familiar cozy game activities. These tasks encompass cooking, farming, extensive decorating, collecting various creatures, performing favors for neighbors, tending to plant life, beachcombing, exploring new areas, and trading goods with local merchants.

Adding a layer of strategy, 'Petit Planet' incorporates a stamina system akin to those found in 'Harvest Moon' and 'Disney Dreamlight Valley.' This mechanism dictates how many actions players can perform before needing to replenish their energy by resting or consuming food. A subtle ecological narrative underpins these activities, where acts of planetary and interpersonal care generate 'Luca.' This unique resource is then used to nourish a prominent blue space tree, symbolizing the planet's health. As this tree flourishes, the planet expands, unlocking new terrain types, crop varieties, and other features. While the environmental theme is a welcome addition, its practical impact on gameplay remains largely contextual in the current beta, without significantly influencing player actions or choices.

The progression in 'Petit Planet' also echoes the gradual unfolding seen in 'Animal Crossing.' Players start with a modest dwelling and a limited set of island features, progressively gaining access to larger homes, more furniture options, terraforming capabilities, and an ever-expanding array of items. The open-ended nature of the game allows players to pursue their desired activities at their own pace. Daily objectives, reminiscent of those in 'New Horizons' and 'Pocket Camp,' provide incentives for engaging with smaller tasks, rewarding players with collectibles and currency that can enhance neighbor relationships and unlock rarer items.

Despite its familiar gameplay loop, 'Petit Planet' carves out its identity primarily through its distinctive aesthetic. The visual style occupies a middle ground between folksy, whimsical, and cottagecore, characterized by vibrant yet soothing colors and an absence of sharp angles. This design philosophy fosters a profoundly relaxing atmosphere, emphasizing 'vibes' over strict thematic adherence, which provides considerable freedom for players to blend and match furniture items within their homes and across the planet. However, this artistic flexibility is paradoxically contrasted by a surprisingly rigid decorating system. The game employs a grid-based placement mechanic that, much like building without cheats in 'The Sims 4,' imposes strict limitations. Objects cannot be placed too closely together, directly against structures, or off-center within a grid square, leading to frustration for players seeking precise customization.

On a more positive note, 'Petit Planet' appears to address a common grievance in decorating games by ensuring that larger, interactive furniture pieces are indeed functional. Unlike 'Animal Crossing,' where swings often remain purely decorative, characters in 'Petit Planet' can genuinely use them, gradually swaying in gentle arcs with contented expressions. This attention to interactive detail, while perhaps not rivaling the photo mode potential of games like 'Infinity Nikki,' brings it commendably close. However, expanding the variety of customization options could further enhance this appeal. The character customization in the initial beta feels somewhat limited. While gender-neutral avatars and freedom in choosing starting outfits and hairstyles are present, the available clothing predominantly features 'fluffy' and traditionally feminine designs, with a scarcity of gender-neutral or masculine-leaning options. This design choice, while potentially reflective of player demographics in similar titles, might restrict self-expression for a significant portion of the player base.

The neighbors encountered so far in 'Petit Planet' exhibit distinct personalities, avoiding the repetitive archetypes often seen in 'Animal Crossing.' Instead of multiple characters sharing similar traits, players interact with unique individuals, such as a energetic rabbit fond of sea creatures and car decoration, or a galactic explorer on a treasure hunt. These characters play a more integral role in daily planetary life, offering specific goals and unlocking new narrative moments as relationships develop. While this system theoretically prevents neighborly interactions from becoming stale, concerns arise regarding the quality of character writing. HoYoverse's localization efforts have historically varied, with 'Petit Planet' showing instances of stiff, lightly edited translations alongside more thoughtful passages. A particular oddity noted is a character's use of 'lickle' instead of 'little,' which suggests dialect inconsistencies that can be mildly irritating over time. This highlights a need for greater investment in human-led localization processes.

The beta's inclusion of a small amount of AI-generated text for some characters and tools is a curious decision. While currently negligible, it raises questions about the long-term impact on a game that relies heavily on charm and personality—qualities that AI currently struggles to authentically replicate. For a game where daily interactions form its very soul, relying on such technology for core elements could prove to be a baffling choice. The game's success will ultimately depend on its ability to cultivate genuine engagement and a sense of connection, which robust and nuanced human-crafted narratives are best positioned to provide. As 'Petit Planet' moves towards its full launch, refining these aspects will be crucial for establishing its unique place within the cozy game genre.