Please make an area-based figment count for post-game
I'd like to make a small suggestion that I hope can improve post-game enjoyment and reduce the frustration of completing the last percentages of the game.
31 hours into the game, I'm finding that tracking down the final 1-2 figment for larger levels is an excruciatingly tedious affair. With Psychonauts 2's huge levels, separated into many individual sections but with a collated figment list, one can never know whether they've combed through an area diligently enough, or, worse, whether they're looking in an area in complete vain.
It's a bit of a pareto principle situation -- it took me 24 very enjoyable hours to get to the credits with most things collected, and it took me 7 more hours to get to 99% of the game completed, each consecutive hour more frustrating than the last. Now I'm left with 1 figment each to collect across each of the most complex levels of the game (Hot Streak, Sensorium, Bottles and Collection) and there's no fun left in searching every nook and cranny over and over again in hopes of something finally turning up.
The figment list, while a great way to showcase figments visually for the player to marvel at the artistry involved in them, provides no practical help in collecting them, especially for 1/1 figments which don't appear in the list until collected (if I understand correctly). Besides, what helps finding figments is not really what they look like, but rather their visuals in context of the level.
The level-based figment collection stat was fine & totally acceptable in 2005, but with the sequel's huge, sprawling levels with unique art assets and amazing popping colours throughout, figment collection has become that much harder. Plus a lot of figments are hidden really well and/or are really small.
Other 3D platformers with "scavenger hunt" gameplay mechanics have introduced solutions to post-game exploration such as Supraland's "Chest Detector" which makes 100%-ing the game fun but at the cost of additional game development resources so are less plausible to implement after the fact.
One low-requirement solution, however, that could be implemented in Psychonauts 2 without needing to introduce new objects, mechanics or record new dialogue would be to simply display a counter in the post-game that shows for the number of figments left in an area below the number of figments in the level total. (Under area I'm referring to each separate segment of a level as listed by Oatmeal.)
Another, more brutal intervention would be to have an "increase figment outer glow by 100%" toggle in the settings post-game, but that's much less elegant.
Introducing the area-based figment count would help narrow down where figments need to be looked for and thus make this part of the gameplay experience that much more fun again. I hope you'll find a way to fit something like this in a later update.
Thank you.
