Four screenshots. That's all it took for me to buy Planet of Lana II

I usually don't play puzzle-platformers. I think Child of Light was the last one I played. My Steam library is a graveyard of city builders, strategy games, and the occasional RPG that have swallowed months of my life. If you told me yesterday that I'd drop money on a side-scrolling adventure about a girl and her cat-like companion, I'd have laughed.

Then I saw this post from The Indie Boss Bluesky this morning.

Four screenshots. Hand-painted environments. A dense forests, alien ruins, light cutting through fog in a way that made me stop scrolling. I didn't know what game it was. I didn't care. I just needed to see more.

Turns out it was Planet of Lana II: Children of the Leaf, the sequel to Wishfully Studios' 2023 puzzle-adventure. I'd never heard of it. It's sequel, Planet of Lana II, launched yesterday, March 5th. I had zero knowledge of this game's existence before this morning. None whatsoever. No trailers watched, no previews read, no wishlisting on Steam.

I looked it up on Steam. 10% off for launch. I bought it before I even watched the trailer.

Sometimes your gut just knows. You see something and the decision is already made before your brain catches up. No research, no review hunting, no hemming and hawing over whether it's worth the price. 

Four screenshots of a world that looked like it was painted by someone who actually cares about beauty, and that was enough.

Here's the release date trailer that I watched after I'd already bought the game:

Planet of Lana II: Children of the Leaf — Official Release Date Trailer

The game is a cinematic puzzle-adventure set on a planet called Novo. 

From what I've gathered so far, you play as Lana alongside her companion Mui, a small creature who helps you solve environmental puzzles and navigate a world where nature and technology collide. The sequel picks up two years after the original, with new biomes, underwater exploration, and a story told without spoken dialogue. Just visuals, music, and an orchestral score by composer Takeshi Furukawa.

It's supposed to be a 6-to-8-hour experience. That's it. No 200-hour commitment. No loot grind. Just a short, focused journey through a world that clearly had a lot of love poured into it. Quite the difference from EVE Online, or my usual city-builders.

I'll report back once I've played it, since it's seriously getting late here, and I spent way more time than I had planned spending in New Eden tonight. It'll have to wait in the morning.

But I've got a good feeling about this one.

Sometimes you just have to trust your eyes.