Soapbox options allow our particular person writers and contributors to voice their opinions on sizzling subjects and random stuff they have been chewing over. Today, Francisco shares his love of Rayman Legends because it celebrates its tenth anniversary — but additionally laments that it might have been a sufferer of its personal success…
I’ve at all times had a smooth spot for Rayman. While Nintendo and Rare duked it out for the N64’s platformer crown, I had no regrets about ignoring Super Mario 64, Donkey Kong 64, and Banjo-Kazooie to helicopter my approach by way of The Glade of Dreams’ robotic pirate dystopia in Rayman 2: The Great Escape.
In the years that adopted, I used to be crestfallen to see Rayman’s undeserved fall from grace — not as soon as, however twice. The first time was after the marginally disappointing Rayman 3: Hoodlum Havoc, after which he was deserted as Ubisoft’s family-friendly mascot, and was then brutally changed by the Wii’s Rayman Raving Rabbids. But then as a courageous new world of platforming — each HD and 2D — was ushered in by indie darling Braid and puzzle platformer Trine, Rayman was welcomed again to the world.
2011’s Rayman Origins was an excellent return to type, in addition to a wonderful throwback to the collection’ 2D roots. Michel Ancel and his skilled Ubisoft Montpellier crew — the identical builders now engaged on Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown — schooled the indie upstarts with their bustling ranges and luxurious, painterly backdrops.
Two years later in August 2013 got here Rayman Legends, the Wii U follow-up so good it merely blew my thoughts. Everything Origins did beautifully, Legends did higher.
Don’t Call It A Comeback
Rayman, Globox, the Teensies and crew had been deservedly again within the limelight, they usually’d by no means appeared higher. Rayman Legends has merely sensational visuals throughout its six worlds, and every degree seems like French surrealist cartoons delivered to life. Accessing every degree by way of a portrait gallery, that Mario 64 nod was additionally a testomony to the knowledgeable craft and creativeness that made each degree a murals.
Players of the Switch model are nicely conscious that Rayman Legends: Definitive Edition absolutely deserves its spot on our listing of essentially the most stunning Switch video games in addition to being one among the perfect 2D platformers on the console. You may body any second from this sport, with its watercolour backgrounds and comedian guide environmental particulars, and grasp it on a wall to show that two-dimensional doesn’t must imply flat.
Even at present, the sport’s shapeshifting environments stay a rollercoaster of spectacle and crafty surprises. Nathan Drake would die for its virtuoso setpieces, Ubisoft making use of Naughty Dog’s aptitude for the dramatic sequences to the 2D platformer with exhilarating panache.
All the set dressing on the planet wouldn’t matter a jot if the sport by no means imbued Rayman, Globox, Barbara or the Teensies with a way of springing motion, delicate weight and exact momentum. Rayman tears by way of ranges, his scurrying steps elevate puffs of mud, and he pleasingly arches right into a somersault on the peak of every bounding leap. At instances he reaches a tempo virtually matching Sonic’s rocket-speed earlier than these clunky yellow sneakers come to a chic halt.
And it’s all tied along with a rollicking soundtrack that by no means fails to shock with its endless stream of eclectic devices. Add in a way of bodily comedy Charlie Chaplin can be pleased with, and it combines into a busy good-time social gathering environment the Rabbids merely can’t match.
Keep On Running
Ubisoft borrowed quite a lot of concepts from pared-back autorunners of the time like Bit.Trip Runner with Rayman Legends’ music ranges. In these, all you do is leap and punch to lusciously rearranged covers of well-liked songs as you tear by way of elaborately staged obstacles at breakneck pace.
Just like in Cadence of Hyrule, you’re inspired to lose your self to the beat and faucet alongside to the rhythm; the second if you develop into one with the music and are sucked into your environment is just spellbinding. It was an unimaginably satisfying thrill, and I nonetheless get a shiver reliving the melodious tinkling whereas scooping up rising scales of Lums, or the best way a guitar solo anticipates you smashing by way of a precarious tower of enemies. These songs and their spectacular environment get higher and higher as you dash by way of a heavy metallic fort siege in Castle Rock, or by way of dungeons and volcanic chambers away from hovering dragons in Dragon Slayer.
If you requested me what Rayman has in widespread with Sylvester Stallone earlier than 2013, apart from a penchant for fixing their troubles with a punch, I’d draw a clean. But now they’ve one factor in widespread: Survivor’s ‘Eye of the Tiger’.
Rayman Legend’s model was the soundtrack to one among my prime 10 gaming moments, with Mariachi Madness’s model of the enduring observe as you race by way of a desert’s escalating hazards and away from a fiery inferno. You clatter by way of skeletons donning prime hats throughout fields of flowers to the strums of a Spanish guitar and the rasp of kazoos (who got here up with that kazoo solo?). It’s joyful, ludicrous nonsense that captures the sport’s wild, uninhibited spirit at its highest.
Ex-exclusive
Rayman Legends wasn’t supposed to be a multiplatform title – it was destined to be a Wii U unique till Ubisoft bought spooked over issues that the sport would not promote nicely sufficient on Nintendo’s console. Even although it did come to different platforms, the Wii U was designed with a fifth native multiplayer slot and the total suite of GamePad options with the grinning bug Murphy and his touch-control help.
Whatever platform the sport got here to, Rayman Legends was a merely pleasant gem that wowed the critics — together with Nintendo Life, in fact — and will have absolutely rehabilitated the ’90s “least cool” platforming hero. If you ask me, the sport’s the joyous peak of a department of pure 2D platforming earlier than all of it went only a bit Metroid-y.
But it was nearly as good because it ever bought for Rayman, Ubisoft foolishly determined that as a result of their big-nosed limbless hero didn’t promote as a lot because the grizzled Assassins Creeds and frat-house Far Crys of this world, his peculiar fantasy world filled with charming oddballs wasn’t value a brand new entry. Ten years later, I’m nonetheless heartbroken about it. His look within the third Mario + Rabbids DLC ought to have given followers a spark of hope for the character’s return forward of his thirtieth birthday in 2025, however as a substitute, he nonetheless seems like an afterthought.
The identical succesful crew is now entrusted with reviving one other beloved property in Prince of Persia. Ubisoft Montpellier have already confirmed their expertise for reinvention, I’m certain what they’re engaged on is about to blow my thoughts but once more. Just spare a thought for us dissatisfied Rayman followers. We loved our Rayman-issance whereas it lasted; benefit from the Prince of Persurgence whilst you can.
Do you’re keen on Rayman Legends? Do you wish to see a direct sequel to it? Join us in The Glade of Dreams within the feedback.
