Petit Planet isn’t the first to imitate Animal Crossing to some eyebrow-raising degree, nor will it be the last. Developer HoYoverse doesn’t hesitate to admit the similarities – the character even flinches at the thought of their novel planet-owning leader going into debt just because he has a house – although they don’t deny these improvements will be come at a price. In my low time, about five hours, with the announcement of the closed beta, Petit Planet offered a charming, “The Little Prince” –a thematic approach to Animal Crossing: New Horizons with an emphasis on clear progression and multiplayer. While some seemed to want these two things, and ACNH remained empty, the studio of Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail may offer an answer – with potential caveats.
Despite everything I liked about Petit Planet, I became disillusioned with the opening to a lackluster character creator. The range of skin tones is constrained and the hairstyle options are confusing, although more hairstyles and eyes and colors for each will be available later for in-game currency. I realize this isn’t the final version of Petit Planet, so I hope that’s the case for a game that touts customization that limits players everywhere to four skin tones, only one of which will be darker than a featherlight sun-kissed.
The general setup of Petit Planet is that you join three anthropomorphic animals owned by a company called Loomi Co, tasked with developing the fledgling planet and exploring the galaxy surrounding it. To start with, you can choose between two different environments and different starting planets. I chose the one described as “hot and dry” with golden prairies. Once you complete the tasks assigned by Mobai, completing Isabelle and Tom Nook, you are given special water for an equally special tree that serves as the heart and, in a sense, control center of your planet. With novel levels and upgrades, the play area takes shape with a multi-level field, a larger river, and a beach and ocean. I liked that after a while I could look at the types of improvements that awaited us, such as mountainous areas and novel types of trees.
The first hour severely constrained my playtime due to constrained tutorials and constrained space for any exploration or creativity, but it loosened up significantly after that, still introducing novel mechanics. Over the next three or four hours, improvements begin to lock in to your daily progress. This is not the type of countdown clock in mobile games, but real days similar to ACNH. Since access to Petit Planet is tied to logging in to the HoYoverse server, you can’t force your way further by changing your device’s clock. That being said, I had no shortage of fun things to do while I had to wait.
I spent time doing familiar activities; punching trees for fruit, catching bugs, picking flowers, breaking rocks for ore, fishing and, a nice and completely different touch, – using barnacle nippers to pick creatures from tide pools. Then, of course, there’s crafting and cooking, which is everything you’d expect, but with a bit of charm in the form of starry, circular patterns and constant, clear direction. Activities requiring the apply of tools require strength, or essentially energy, supplemented by eating fruit or food. There was plenty of fruit and sources needed to prepare food during my playtime, so it wasn’t much of a problem.
I also enjoyed meeting the three neighbors I met, or the inhabitants of the Petit Planet NPCs, whom you invite to live on your planet and build relationships with them. I especially love that, like other HoYoverse games, each character has a distinct identity that goes deeper than just their aesthetic and tagline. Each of them has a story and more information about them and their individual tastes that can be discovered over time. The first two serve as an introduction to the basic mechanics, but I’m looking forward to seeing who else I meet during my space travels.
While playing, I unlocked access to my own car, which allowed me to explore the stars – with restrictions. The car runs on batteries, which can be obtained and purchased (for in-game currency). One was enough for me to make two or three trips to Random Planets, which are small planets in a sea of stars that have constrained and sometimes unique resources or potential novel Neighbors. I found one on these Planets and convinced her to move to my larger Planet.
The second place I could go to was called the Galactic Bazaar, which is an online multiplayer hub with two basic mini-games and plenty of places to sit and chat with other players. More than any other game created by HoYoverse, Petit Planet aims to capture the attention of youthful viewers. Player characters even look like children. However, once you arrive at the Galactic Bazaar, you will immediately be encouraged to sit down and talk to strangers. The game’s text chat didn’t seem to have any restrictions on the gentle swearing I tested. You do To have sit in certain areas of the Galactic Bazaar and talk to others, but as it stands I haven’t seen any other way to limit interactions with other players in that space. had to visit as part of the main quests.
Safe online spaces for kids is a whole other conversation, but I hope HoYoverse plans to make sure I don’t invade younger people’s spaces when I just want to play a game like Animal Crossing with friends. Taking all this into account, official closed beta questions it eased my worries a bit to see that this beta test is constrained to “users 18 and older,” so I’d like to imagine that more solemn security features are coming, beyond blocking others.
The other thing that worries me is pricing: how much will it cost to play this free game? As with every HoYoverse game, there seemed to be plenty of ways to earn the few currencies I saw in the game, but it’s difficult to predict exactly how this will work in the future. I doubt we’ll see HoYoverse abandon its gacha method of random rewards combined with a tiny chance of getting what you want, but it’s difficult to say whether the target will be characters, cosmetics, or both. It’s also worth noting that I found two different AI chatbots at Petit Planet. One was a source of on-demand in-game assist, and the other was a barista you can talk to in the Galactic Bazaar. They can be easily bypassed if you don’t feel like using them.
Taking all this into account, Petit Planet being a HoYoverse online game is a potential huge strength. Progress has been brilliant and pleasant so far, and knowing how HoYoverse has supported other major games, it’s highly likely we’ll see plenty of quality-of-life updates, events, and regular support. Mobai mentioned that we don’t have a “restaurant” yet, and I’m already on the lookout for cute beauty products I want to save up for and entire furniture sets I want to create. All data from my game time will be deleted, but I still can’t assist but be excited about what the upgrades I’ve acquired will bring to my planet tomorrow.
