Rayman 2
Reviewed by Clement Chan Zhi Li
I'm expecting Rayman 2 as the same as every other action and
adventure games that are released already and boy, was I
wrong. As Rayman 2 was already released for the Nintendo
system, Playstation and PC, porting the whole game to
Dreamcast sounds like a rather silly idea. But a few
extremely cool new levels, tons of mini-games installed
within with a secret access to the Globox disc make this
game the king to other versions of Rayman 2.
Graphics - 10
Couldn't be better. The 2D graphics of the older brother
Rayman is already stunning before and now, fully in perfect
rotating modeled 3D graphics. Characters, moving objects,
enemies, background, mosquitoes and many other objects are
re-created in a better formula of colours. Of course, having
more than a million colours make Rayman 2 really bright and
'cheery'. The lighting source in most of the levels are used
effectively that makes this game look slightly real, despite
its 'cartoony' aspects.
Music - 10
Water splish-splashing about and sound of tidal waves with
their own sound effects fits into the realism category.
Honestly, you'll feel as if you're now lying down in the
ocean while saving the day. All of the sound effects are
quite all right; you know the usual ones, lightning, fire,
attacks, punches, barrels and many others.
There are dozens of background music available, all in
different sort of forms for different type of levels. As
some levels will make you feel as if you're in Resident
Evil: Code Veronica, the background music will twist into a
dreadful, deadly, scary tune that will surely scare you to
the end of the other world. Another good thing that can be
seen in most Dreamcast games is the voice. Though the voice
is totally in French, there will be an English text
specially done for us bad-French talkers (surprisingly, only
the introduction voice is in English).
Gameplay - 10
Simple. Simple. Medium. Medium. Hard. Hard. Hard. The game
will proceed from the easiest level which even a baby could
pass through to the hardest level beyond which needs you to
oil up your brains for hours. Even the second level already
requires you to have great controls with an action game like
this, together with quick thinking which could save you from
any danger.
There are more than 10 levels for you to sneak in to, up to
18 levels to be exact, excluding the button-mashing bonus
levels and other secret levels for you to play and explore.
Most levels take a long time to complete, resulting over 40
hours of gameplay, that is, if you completed the whole game
correctly first time through.
The enemies that consist of jumping and snapping piranhas
together with robotic pirates are not really difficult to
defeat. The only thing that could prevents you from getting
further is the design of the level itself. Every levels will
have their own theme, ranging from the slippery ice, bulbs
of scorching hot lava, friendly mental green environment,
even including a ghastly place which you must enter.
At certain levels, you can ride with joy through the titanic
levels by using the Walking Shell, an odd little animal that
will chase you quickly along and you'll need to tame it
before riding on it. You can jump anywhere you like with it
and boost yourself easily while sitting on the Walking
Shell. Just beware not to let the easiness enter your head
and you could just slip off and fall to the endless holes.
Ssssam, another animal which is Rayman's friend will also
appear in a level and you can deliberately enjoy controlling
it, swinging through marshes. You can also take a barrel and
light it up with fire which makes it a temporary rocket
which zips through tunnels, holes and many others. You'll
also need to rescue lots of Rayman's friends through the
humongous stages, each with their own theme.
You can find yourself in one huge cavern with lava pouring
in it which you need to ride on a purple plum (it's found in
the original Rayman before). There's also another level
which requires you to zip through the slippery floors, wide
ocean that needs you to gasp for breath after a few minutes,
beside the shore and in jungle full of snappy creatures and
buzzing mosquitoes. Not only that, there will be a level
which will simply make you scream if you turn off the
lights, what with the ghastly tune and annoying snapping
monster after you.
Rayman will also get his powers little by little after you
completed a few levels. You'll start off with his attack,
upgraded from his original 'fist' attack which now allow him
to throw white power ball across enemies and the power can
repel back if knocked against walls and obstacles. There are
many confusing and deliberately difficult tasks that you
must complete, some requires you to jump from platforms to
platforms, climb on sticky spider webs, avoiding yourself
from being melted to death and worst of all, eaten by a
huge, scary monster.
Other than the Halloween-like part, you must collect
beautiful and bright orbs, called Lums. There are different
type of Lums in this game but you need to collect the
important Lum of all, yellow Lum, which allows you to access
to the other worlds with the help of the odd characters, the
Teensies. These Lums is said to hold the whole world before
but shattered and destroyed by the evil, lurky pirates. So,
this means you need to collect all 1000 Lums, scattered all
over the world. There will be also a story which you can
always look that will be revealed more and more if you have
enough of those yellow Lums.
The red Lums will heal your life little by little and these
are essential to your success. The green one will act like a
save point and every time your pitiful Rayman dies, he will
return to the place where you last touch the green Lum. The
blue one is only useful underwater, which acts like a
bubble. It contains air and will let you stay longer down
the water (if you played the game Sonic the Hedgehog before,
you're bound to know that you'll need to collect some
bubbles for him to breath).
There will be also lots of cages for you to hit and free the
creatures inside. To find them, you'll need to hear the
agony cries of ÒHelp me! Help me!Ó which shows you that
you're getting near to them. Most of the cages will also
contain yellow Lum so be sure to look out for them. Bosses
are also prepared for you to fight and defeat, so don't fret
that the game is too boring for you. Most of time, you'll
need to use your thinking skills as well as your talent as a
gamer. The bosses won't be at the end of every single level
but only at certain stages, the more important one that is
essential to Rayman's progress.
Story - 8
The story is plain simple as you may have heard on thousand
of other games series. The pirates are now terrorizing the
world and they have broke up the main hold which breaks into
1000 yellow Lums pieces. Rayman's friends are also trapped,
some of them in cages so Rayman must rescue of all of them
and defeat the evil guys, espeacially the head of the
pirates, Captain Razorbeard. Simple story line, isn't it?
Replay Value - 9
Adventure games like this is always fun to play, so I'm sure
you'll be coming back for more. As there are more than 10
levels, each of them are tremendously long, I'm sure you'll
be taking a long time to complete every one. Other than
that, you'll also need to search every nook and cranny for
to complete a grand total of 1000 yellow Lums. The
interesting secret levels that lie ahead in the game adds
even more replay value to the game.
Overall - 10 out of 10
Rayman 2 is another interesting adventure game to play but
at some levels, the difficulty is so intense that you feel
as if you're killing 1000 zombies in a time. As there are
simply tons of things that you could do, as well as explore,
this game won't really be a boring to you. Enjoy the
incredible graphics that UbiSoft has bring you, as well as
every single aspect that you certainly will enjoy.
Rayman
-----
+ Huge, gigantic levels for you to explore!
+ Expect yourself to be totally addicted!
+ Graphics, perfect. Music, perfect. Gameplay, super
perfect.
Pirates
-----
- Some levels are too hard!
- Storyline is not really that exciting, except for the pirates part.
- Err... any more?
OR
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