Paper Planet

Developed by: Doodlegames
Published by: 2 Left Thumbs

Aug 21, 2023$14.99

Paper Planet is a planet-defender, arcade roguelike with a doodley, Flash-inspired artstyle. Battle through waves of unique enemies and bosses. Combine items with strange and wacky effects for insanely overpowered runs. Play with 1-4 players, for some chaotic co-op fun!

Consensus

C67.7/100

Steam players84.2% positiveVery Positive531 reviews

VG Insights estimate ↗≈16K copies · ≈$170K gross

What creators say

PepperHead

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Part 3 (Apr 2025) · #13 of 17 in that tierWatch the moment (2:25:54)

Tier list Part 3 (2025)

Paper Planet is a cute, hand-drawn, paper-styled bullet-hell roguelike where you defend a small planet with a turret that slides left and right and teleports to the opposite side. Runs are extremely chaotic and usually end with the screen flooded with bullets. He enjoys the vibe, the simple core loop and the boss fights, but finds runs too samey, the meta progression weak, and the game too easily overpowered. He calls it a fun mess worth a few runs and places it in B tier for now.

Liked

Cute hand-drawn paper visuals with a Flash-game vibe
Simple, straightforward core gameplay: move, teleport, aim with cursor, dodge yellow bullets, block red ones
Roguelike items create chaos that looks different every run
Bosses have interesting mechanics and require attention and care
Different planets play drastically differently (moving planet, spaceship orbiting), giving the best replayability

Disliked

Runs feel repetitive: same biomes and same few bosses every time
Regular enemies are one-shot so only bosses pose a threat
Being overpowered almost every run makes it feel less rewarding and less unique
Meta progression is weak: a shop with random unknown items (others vanish when you pick one) and minimal, situational upgrades
Wants more bosses and more in-run content; unsure he will return to it

What players say

A planet-defender arcade roguelike from Doodlegames (published by 2 Left Thumbs) where you fend off waves and bosses from a stationary circular planet with a hand-drawn, Flash-style look, using wildly synergistic items, in 1-4 player local co-op.

Paper Planet is a small, niche Steam roguelite rated Very Positive (about 84% of roughly 530 reviews, per Steam data pulled locally; the store page shows 89% of 380 for one filter). Players like the doodle art, the chaotic item synergies and the couch co-op, and several say it is fun on sale. Complaints are about luck-dependent balance where you need a broken build or boss fights drag, a short content loop (one reviewer says they finished everything in about 2 hours), and achievements that have stayed broken for years. Critic coverage is essentially nonexistent: Metacritic has a page with no critic reviews and only one user rating, and no OpenCritic entry was found. Community threads include a 'Game abandoned?' topic, and a player review from 2026 says some achievements have been broken for over 2 years, so it reads as lightly supported since launch (Aug 2023). I could not retrieve patch notes, so update cadence is unconfirmed.

Players love

Hand-drawn, notebook-doodle, Flash-game art style that is coherent and charming
Item synergies are wacky and build-defining (bee-bullet swarms, electric walls, teleporting rocket bombs, bullet recycling)
1-4 player local couch co-op with Remote Play Together, good for chaotic party play
Lots of unlockable planets/characters, modes, modifiers and visuals tied to achievements
Option to skip the metaprogression grind and unlock everything immediately (praised by a 21-hour reviewer)
Fast, pick-up-and-play arcade runs with enough variety to be 'highly addictive' for a few hours

Common complaints

Balance is lopsided: runs depend on getting a broken build, and without one boss fights become minutes of low-damage waiting
Most stats feel nearly meaningless; bullet count, fire rate and bullet recycling dominate while raw damage does little
At least 8 achievements reported broken for over 2 years, and '100% is bugged' is repeated in multiple reviews
Heavily luck-based, leaving little room for player skill according to some reviewers
Item upgrades lack descriptions, so players can't tell what they are picking (one review and a Steam discussion about item descriptions not showing)
Content runs out fast for some, with the loop feeling repetitive after an hour or two
Performance issues such as FPS drops in boss fights and lag from heavy bullet counts
Seen as too pricey for its content at $14.99 by at least one reviewer, even on discount

Can feel tedious

Boss fights that take minutes when your build is weak and you deal little damage
Waves of high-health enemies that become boring without good items
Achievement hunting blocked by bugs
Repetitive feeling after the first hour or two for some players
Chaotic screen with no item descriptions, making it hard to read what is happening

What's unique

You defend a fixed circular planet that cannot move, described by one reviewer as Asteroids without movement
Blend of arcade bullet-hell shooter and tower-defense style planet defense
Flash/doodle aesthetic with a school-notebook vibe, cartoony and family friendly
Items combine freely with each other, leading to absurd overpowered runs
Local co-op for up to four players on one screen
A switch to unlock all metaprogression immediately, unusual for the genre

Players want

Fix the long-broken achievements so 100% completion is possible
Rebalance damage vs. fire rate/bullet count so that stats matter and weak runs are not a slog
Show clear item and upgrade descriptions in-game
Fix boss-fight FPS drops and raise the damage-counter integer cap (requested in Steam threads)
Add more content and variety to extend replay beyond a few hours
Visible developer communication and updates, since players ask whether the game is abandoned

Summarised from Steam reviews and community discussion.