I... I don't like it. At all. I'm sorry. The level design is sloppy, the camerawork is never satisfying, and the story has no pacing and is too naïve for its own good.

But this isn't about me; what did you think about the game?

Well as top wiki editor for Papo & yo, I have no idea. I looked up a bunch of videos of it to help the wiki. I don't have a ps3. So are you saying that I shouldn't play it?

I really like the idea, but judging from the quicklook it just looks like an extremely (like you said) sloppy game. The animations are horrendous. and it's such a drab thing to look at.

I just finished the game as well, and I'm not a huge fan. I liked a lot of the unusual visual design, thought the music was amazing, and I thought the monster/boy relationship was a great example of the kind of impactful game mechanics Jonathan Blow talks about.

But the story, which I though would be the high point of an autobiographical game, is kind of a mess. There's no pacing, inconsistent metaphors, unnecessary tangents, and it ends predictably. Though the game wears its "abusive alcoholic dad" metaphor on its sleeve, both through the opening sequence and in the press, it would have been much more effective without knowing the metaphor ahead-of-time.

The controls are sloppy, but I never failed a jump or died because of them. I just got caught against protruding edges while running.

The game was really very interesting, though, and I'd recommend it for ~$5. The $15 it's currently at is too high. IMHO, this would have been amazing if it were half as long and everything were stripped out but the boy-and-his-monster mechanics and the ending.

I think the game has a lot going for it in a narrative sense, and dealing with child abuse is not something seen all the time in a video game. The mechanics are broken, but I think this game will be talked about in the next few weeks quite a bit about how it goes about its material. I enjoyed it, but it is sloppy.

going to find the other 8 stupid hats & put this purchase down as another one that I shouldn't have made

Finally. I have been keeping this to myself up until now, but I am just completely disinterested in Papa y Yo. Everything about it looks just precious and dull.

Glad to know this doesn't make me a bad person, or at least if it does, there are a few of us around.

Lula! LUUUULA!!!!

the quicklook annoyed the hell out of me

I fell asleep sitting up while watching the quick look. The game looked that boring.

I loved the demo. The bad reviews are kind of shocking to me...

I really like this game. And what I like it for is the game part. The story is fine. There's a good, true message in their about how to deal with other's addictions. But what I loved was manipulating the world in ways that no game has ever done. There are new mechanics and ideas in here, they are fun to do, and the game's aesthetic is great. I'm happy I bought it, no matter the rough spots.

@Kierkegaard: In some way Papo & Yo is a cross between Pan's Labyrinth and Inception, but it doesn't have the impact of the former or the pacing or weight of the latter. I agree that manipulating the world in the first half is kinda neat, but it runs out of twists very quick, right down to ripping off the curling city of Inception (Ok, this is cool... but I've seen this before). And the latter puzzles (the last three if I remember) are incredibly tedious and repetitive.

It looked really boring from the quick look. Stupid easy puzzles and a weird plot...No thank you.

@VincentVendetta: I guess I just appreciate that it was constantly playing with my expectations. Each new area had a little or big twist, in aesthetics, in mechanics, in solutions, that built on and shifted what had come before. That's difficult and rare.

It's not really trying to be Pan's Labyrinth or Inception, is it? Yes, it is a fantasy world that corresponds to a real-world psyche, which is not a new creation (see Heaven and Hell), but it doesn't require the bloodiness of Pan's or the exactitude of Inception. It's loose and playful. It has its rules and its themes, but it seems to revel in finding as many angles as possible to come at them.

That's how I felt. I'm sorry it didn't grab you as it did me.

Well I just finished it and loved the crap out of it!

I played the demo and thought it was really cool, but then saw some not so good review scores so I nearly didn't buy it. I am so glad I did, cos it's awesome! Has this magical feeling to it from start to finish, I love it.