Even though it’s in three dimensions, this remake falls flat.
Developer: Ubisoft
Publisher: Ubisoft
Release Date: March 27, 2011
Score: 2 / 5
Disclaimer: This game was my first experience with Rayman 2: the Great Escape.
If there’s anything that the Nintendo 3DS has as part of its gaming lineup, it’s remakes of older games. There’s Ocarina of Time, Star Fox 64, Metal Gear Solid 3, Super Street Fighter IV and more, running at about $40 a pop. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, so long as the game in question has been upgraded to the point where it’s worth the asking price. Unfortunately, while Rayman 2: the Great Escape was one of the best platformers of its time, its 3D remake on 3DS isn’t quite up to snuff.
The story is pretty standard stuff, and hasn’t changed from the original game. The evil pirate Razorberad has kidnapped the citizens of the world and stolen the 1,000 Lums that make up the heart of the world. Rayman escapes, and must travel the world collecting Lums and collecting the Masks of Polokus in order to defeat Razorbeard. Nothing special, but platformers don’t need a great story in order to be great.
As far as platformers go, Rayman 2 is absolutely great, and the platforming of Rayman 3D is just as great. The level design is quite good, with plenty of jumping, climbing, hanging and running for your life. What really makes the game special is the number of extra bits the game throws at you. You’ll find yourself riding on rocket shells, flying freely through the air like a helicopter, piloting airships, navigating long and dangerous slides and more. The game has several bosses as well, and while they’re not too difficult, they’re pretty fun to take on. While I’m at it, the game has some great music as well; it’s catchy, memorable, and adds some great atmosphere to the game, even though it has a tendency to cut out sometimes.
As it was before, the game is great fun and will last you arond a dozen hours if you’re trying for 100% completion (and have never played it before). Here’s the thing, though: you can pick up the PlayStation version of this game for $10 on the PlayStation Network. You can even get the original DS remake of the same game for a lower price and play it on your 3DS. Does Rayman 3D bring $30 worth of improvements to the table? Sadly, the answer is no.
The biggest draw this game has is its use of the 3D screen. A common complaint with platformers is the inability to judge depth for things like jumps, and being able to perceive depth should improve playability. So the question is if Rayman 3D uses this third dimension well, and the answer is an emphatic “sometimes”. Most of the time when you control Rayman, the world sinks back into the screen and you really do get a pretty good sensation of depth. You can more easily make tricky jumps and see how far away your enemies are, and if you turn the 3D effect off again you really notice its absence.
There are a couple problems with the 3D effect, though. Firstly, whenever you enter a corridor or something it messes with your vision a bit, since you have these walls trying to pop out at you but they have to just stop at the edge of the screen, and it can be a bit jarring and eye-crossing. What’s worse, though, is that the 3D effect stops at literally any moment where you’re not in control of Rayman, even if only for a few seconds. The entire image sinks into the background as far as it can go, but any text that appears is in the foreground, and it literally hurts your eyes to read. I ended up turning off the 3D for every cutscene. Not exactly a revolutionary use of technology.
Besides that, the game really brings very little to the table. Older versions of Rayman 2 would come with things like mini-games to play, but Rayman 3D has none of that. The graphics have been improved only marginally, if at all; it looks like the old Dreamcast version of the game, and I know the 3DS can perform better. One of the worst offenses, though, is that the game wasn’t even ported completely. Rayman fans will know that in most versions of the game, there was a hidden 1,000th Lum to collect; the team who ported this game, however, did not. You can get to the room with the hidden Lum, but you actually have to damage yourself in order to collect it, and the game locks up when you try to leave. The whole game smacks of a rush job.
While Rayman 3D is based off a really great game, it’s also based off a really great game that you can get elsewhere for a lower price. The improvements to this game only just barely outweigh the omissions, let alone justify paying up to $30 more to own this title. Unless you’re really starved for games to play on your 3DS, you might want to give this one a pass. At the very least, wait until it hits the bargain bin, at which point it might be a much better purchase.
