Swedish developer Wishfully, based in Göteborg, Sverige, just launched Planet of Lana. It’s one of the most hotly anticipated indie games of 2023!

Available on PC and Xbox, this beautiful looking adventure nods to War of the Worlds and cinematic puzzle platformers such as INSIDE (2016).

Despite a slow start, we think this thing is a bloody triumph. An inventive, gorgeous looking adventure game with a lot of heart.

Robot Overlords and Puzzle Solving in Planet of Lana

Playdead’s masterpiece INSIDE set the benchmark for this type of game. On the face of it, it may seem dull—run endlessly to the right, solve puzzles.

The trick to mastering the genre is with the atmospherics. Ramping up the sense of drama and immersion as a visual narrative unfolds.

In Planet of Lana, you star as a young lady called Lana. She lives with her family on a beautiful planet, but once it’s invaded by insane robots that all goes to crap bags.

With her sister Elo kidnapped and civilization seemingly at an end, Lana races off to try and find her sibling. Along the way, she befriends a cat type thing (Mui) and this becomes a double team, puzzle solving adventure.

You can use Mui, amongst a few other special abilities, to solve puzzles around you and progress across the dazzling terrain. Here’s one of the Wishfully’s employees to explain what it’s all about.

To note, the game has a slow and simplistic start. Some of the early puzzles are borderline idiotic in their simplicity and could have been left out.

These early stages leave you awash with the spectacle of the game, rather than in awe of its platforming genius.

It does improve as the thing unfolds, but doesn’t ever become its core strength as a video game.

Where it excels is with its immersive qualities. The graphics were hand-drawn by Wishfully’s talented team of artists. And the soundtrack (more on that further below) is suitably orchestral, offering a grand sense of scale to your journey.

To help get you in the mood of it, here are the first 18 minutes.

Yeah, then, Planet of Lana’s opening phases shouldn’t put you off. As its complexity advances, it really becomes quite the enthralling experience.

The puzzles never are as clever or inventive as they are in INSIDE, but what makes the game stand out is its alien world.

And with the lovable Mui, you can’t help but be swept along in all of this.

There’s no speech or lengthy script to wade through here, yet the power of this genre is its capacity to engage you with quite visceral emotional highs and lows. You do get invested in the journey as its intensity ramps up in each new area.

Some gamers have criticised it as eye candy with little gameplay elements, but we’ve also seen some criticise INSIDE for that (a game we think is one of the best indie games ever).

So, Planet of Lana isn’t for everyone.

But if you love its looks and want to hurl yourself into a unique, startling alien world for three hours then this is a mighty fine choice indeed.

Planet of Lana’s Epic Soundtrack

The soundtrack here is the work of Takeshi Furukawa. The Japanese-American composer has worked for film, TV, and video games.

His work here is a sweeping, orchestral score with echoes of Gareth Coker’s work in Ori and the Will of the Wisps.

At its best, it’s a magnificent piece of work. All rather majestic and suggesting of peculiar alien worlds quite beyond our comprehension.

Its emotional at its core, having a sentimental approach to its themes. Swelling up symphonies and the like, as if it’s a John Williams score.

Furukawa’s work here reminds us a bit of Hoa (2021), a Studio Ghibli styled platformer with a remarkable soundtrack.

Planet of Lana doesn’t hit the same heights as there, we think, but that’s not to diminish too much what’s to listen to here.

The soundtrack is likely to be as celebrated as the game, we believe, which should go down as one of the best indie titles of the year.