If video game
players had longer memories, in five years Rayman 3 would be
remembered. It’s not going to be. Dismissed historically as the
failed follow up to the classic Rayman 2 and prior to the genre
smashing Rayman 4 – there just is not enough room for such a
mediocre game.
Sure, gamers now
read the press today and Rayman is getting respectable reviews
saying questionable things like: “It’s fun for a quick play
through” or “Quick to pick up and quick to put down” and
“Oozing with charm”. There is clearly a division in how the
collective video game players’ memory works. For the most part it is
for immediate gratification. The gamer demands something now and
wants something easy to get into. Over time, however, they forget
about these games and only remember them for what they stood
between. This sort of recollection is unique to this culture. People
remember Television’s Adventure or Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown
for what they are. They are awkward follow-ups after brilliant
masterpieces. They don’t have the universal appeal or the noticeable
genius of the movie or album before, but they have a charm and a
special hold to those people who see it. These types have moments of
greatness in their still formulating bodies. Video games are not
allowed to be awkward or changing and are anything but perfect. They
either live or die – they do not get compilation packages that allow
people to sample their previous works. This is why Rayman 3’s few
moments of brilliance will be forgotten. It is truly a shame that
underneath these drab environments therein lies something great on
the verge of a legacy. The moment of greatness that it does achieve,
will never be felt after its six month life span is up.
Rayman 3 starts
off with an awful introduction that serves also as a tutorial for
the game. It is littered with faux-post modern moments, that some
fresh-faced kid at Ubi Soft thought would blow away kids minds. The
kind of moments where the annoying green talking orb reads you the
manual, and the manual talks back... It’s not funny or original and
it is also not able to be skipped, as it sets up the plot (which it
dismisses in the first screen).
Rayman’s best
friend, Globox, swallows “the Lord of the Dark Lums” and you have to
find away to not only get it out of Globox’s stomach, but also to
stop the army of Dark Lums from ruining everything. This setup of
course has been done a thousand times before and is a carbon copy of
the whole “Us versus Them” mentality that has always been
standard in video games for years. No one honestly expected twenty
years later that the same plot would still be used over and over
again. After all, all other mediums that last must change to
survive. So in reality it’s a good thing that video gamers have
short memories, otherwise developers would have to work harder at
other things rather than designing game engines.
The first thing
you will notice about the game is the blatant humor. It’s very blunt
and very loud. To Ubi Soft’s credit, they recruited real actor’s
voices as they yell one-liners from what always seems like they are
behind you. The humor is darker and more “mature”, which means
“immature” in the context of video games. Those same drinking jokes
that weren’t funny the first time you heard them, overshadow the
background music over and over again; which is truly remarkable. The
game is best played muted and an album of your choice playing in its
stead. The plot points are most never revealed in words, but in eye
motions, so you won’t be missing much.
The graphics are technically very good. They shimmer, pulse
and sparkle and the colors are balanced well. At the same time,
however, the visuals are bland and soulless. These are the type of
graphics that suck the player in like a rainy day that just gets you
wet but doesn’t let you feel cold. One of the best games of last
year, Sly Cooper, is a textbook example of how graphics work in
video games. There has to be logic behind the visuals. Graphics
aren’t just mathematical calculations and whoever thinks of the best
way to add and multiply wins; it is about giving life to these
pixilated creatures allowing the gamer to care about them. In
comparison, Sly Cooper’s worlds were all different from each other.
This included everything from the grounds textures all the way
extending to each individual enemy that differed from level to
level.
Rayman 3 is sloppy
and uninspired. The enemies, for the most part, never change. They
all have the same movements and if you have played other platform
games you’ve seen this before; and have seen it better. The level
design is an improvement over Rayman 2’s pointless sprawling
landscapes, and it feels more like a traditional platformer; which
is the only improvement over its predecessor. The environments fit
close and comfortably around Rayman, with enough room to explore but
not too much to make it frustrating.
Controlling Rayman
is hit or miss and poorly thought out by the developers. For
example: you have a move where you can roll; but you never have to
use it. Sure it looks nice, but serves no purpose. The “lock on”
button simply centers the screen and maybe three times out of seven
locks on to the enemy in front of you. Once targeted the enemy can
be killed by tapping the B button rapidly (the method of choice), or
by holding down the same button to power your fists up for a charge
move. It really doesn’t matter which method is used, because Rayman
can take a lot of damage without fear of dying. Health can be
replenished with great ease. The only noticeable programming flaw is
that Rayman tends to slide when standing still; making it hard to
stand on small platforms. Even if Rayman falls off a cliff he might
lose a little health, but he never dies.
As for the
freshness of the game it’s like a watershed. When you get to the
point where this stuff starts to become annoying you are probably
close to finishing the game; so you might as well stick it out to
the end. This is sign number forty-seven of a “middle of the road
game” that people still get excited over.
In the midst of
all these white walls there are two levels of sheer brilliance. They
aren’t too far in the game and they stand out as some of the best
constructed levels ever witnessed in a video game. The first level
noted starts out, surprisingly in a bland desert. The level starts
off drab and uninteresting, and since Rayman cannot touch the ground
it quickly becomes frustrating. This soon melts away to a genius
concept that makes the rest of the game unimportant. Instead of
having Rayman pointlessly shoot enemies with his hands, Rayman can’t
kill the enemies in this level (save for a few stray ghosts)
nor can he just jump over them. The level is a culmination of all
the gameplay changes and a throwback to the original Mega Man style
platform jumping (meaning the platforms are staggered and often
moving). It is also the only level to use the gameplay changes
in a positive manner. The new power-up system is ill-advised in the
other levels because the puzzles are too spread out for the 30+
second power ups to really serve a useful purpose. This level is
also one of the few times where time actually becomes a factor in
gameplay. For example: one puzzle has Rayman entering a room with
three enemies who don’t see him right away. He lures one of them to
trigger a switch that gets the platforms moving and must accomplish
a series of jumps and tricks to get to the top of a rather large
bird. The whole sequence is flawless and has shades the of classic
Mega Man series. If it had those annoying wind enemies, it
could fit right in with the Wind Man stage.
At one point the
camera, which is generally awful, turns and everything is viewed
from a two dimensional view point. It really changes the way the
game player views the platform genre. It is a transcendent moment
that is brief and sweet, and it shows the importance in the history
and evolution of the Rayman series. These few moments are lost,
however, simply because the game fails to recognize their
importance. The game player will soon forget about them as they
move on to the next average game in order to forge some
satisfaction.
The level ends and
instead of jumping on a rocket ship and blasting through some
brightly colored quasi 3-D levels (this was not a good idea in
Earthworm Jim nor Kingdom Hearts, but Ubi Soft tries anyway);
you enter “The Longest Shortcut.”
Playing on the
weaknesses of the game the level removes all enemies once again and
enters a level with invisible platforms that move in and out of the
wall (think the jail level in Aladdin). This probably the
greatest element in platform gaming. The brilliant twist is that
each section has a mirror that displays the platforms and for the
twenty or so minutes it lasts, it is close to perfect. Sadly, the
rest of the game is forgettable and miserably average (save for
maybe, climbing this one glass building a few levels later).
“When Stars fell On Alabama”, should have been the soundtrack for
that section, but it is only a few jumps and is quickly over. It’s
hard to imagine that these few gems only last one and a half or two
levels existed or if it was actually a fantasy of what platform
games should be.
The developers in
an attempt to extend the reply value of the game throw in some
shoddy shareware games and pointless dull movies. These “extras”
may have been a joke between developers making the game, but there
is no reason for their poor judgment and predictable sense of
humor. For those who just want to play a game “like Mario”, the
“bonus” games are best left forgotten as they add nothing to the
game and none are two player for some reasons. The only exception
is the racing game with the GBA link-up, but it is just a novelty
act, and one that has been done plenty of times before.
Rayman 3 is a
bad game. Not in some Blues Brothers: The Video Game way,
but in a boring pointless way. There is nothing noticeably wrong
with the game but video game players should realize that there is no
point of honoring these games with our time or praise. In the same
breath it should be remembered for it is short-lived brilliance.
Those few great levels should be modeled for Rayman 4. They should
be studied in classes, repackaged and reworked into a greatest hits
package. No one is kidding themselves in pretending they follow
video game plots in platform games it has always been about strategy
and level design. Until developers care enough to make quality
games, there is no reason to purchase or dish out three stars or
mark it “7/10” just because it isn’t an utter failure.
