00:01Dragons!
00:04Dragons out of the bag.
00:06Rayman Legends is getting a remake known as Rayman Legends Retold.
00:11And I got to play it.
00:13And look, to be upfront, I was confused at first.
00:182013's Rayman Legends, I think, is the best Rayman game in the series.
00:23So this remake came as a surprise, or as they're calling it, a retelling.
00:30Because they're adding a whole lot to it.
00:37Now, before I saw the game, I did admittedly think, why remake a game that has aged so well?
00:44Remakes, I think, are best reserved for games that have slipped to the sands of time.
00:49Either A, are no longer commercially available, or B, it hadn't aged with grace.
00:56Which neither is the case for Rayman Legends.
00:59So, when looking back at the original 2013 release, a game that still controls well,
01:04a game that still looks great, and a game that is still commercially available,
01:08I was, yeah, a little confused about the idea of remaking it.
01:13But Rayman Legends Retold is more than just a remake.
01:17And now that I've played about an hour and a half of it, here's the thing it reinstated.
01:21Yes, Rayman Legends is still the best in the series.
01:24And while Retold does have all the Rayman Legends levels just rebuilt with Ubisoft's
01:29engine Snowdrop, there is also a substantial amount of additions that make this game feel
01:35completely anew.
01:37As its title implies, this is a retelling of the original experience, with a lot more
01:42added to round the game out in meaningful ways that isn't just a graphical facelift.
01:50So, let's get the obvious stuff out of the way.
01:52Yes, it is completely remade using 3D visuals, now leading into a 2.5D style with the addition
01:58of full 3D levels to control, and most notably Dragon Rides, which I got to play two of them,
02:05and they're awesome.
02:07The other completely new thing that they're adding to this is an emphasis on giving the
02:11game a sense of adventure, wonder, and narrative that wasn't all that present in the original
02:17game.
02:17There is a story in the original Rayman Legends, but it took a back seat.
02:22This time around, a new story is being put at the front, with the addition of voice acting,
02:26new characters, a new enemy, and it all culminates to a brand new sixth world that is being added
02:32to the game.
02:34Also, the new 3D art direction is fantastic.
02:40It's amazing what your memory can do, because I was so convinced that Rayman Legends looked
02:46incredible, and I still do think it does.
02:48But after I got done playing Retold, the first thing I did was boot up the original, and yeah,
02:53holy shnikes, they put the work in.
02:55There's a heavier focus on foreground details.
02:58Also, the use of 3D now allows them to manipulate the camera in cool ways to show off the environment
03:03in ways they couldn't in the previous game.
03:07Also, this owl.
03:08Big fan of this owl.
03:10The original game had so much life in its characters and its animations, but this time
03:15around, it feels like the world is given just as much character.
03:18It all adds to what this game is hoping to intend, which is a sense of adventure.
03:24In the original game, Between Levels, you'd basically just jump into these canvases.
03:28But this time around, levels are accessed via portals in the middle of this grand, epic,
03:34fantasy-like world where dragons are flying all over the place.
03:37This new addition to the overworld also gives you something more to do, something more to
03:41explore, more secrets to find.
03:43It was, and this is a compliment, distracting.
03:47I wanted to explore that area.
03:49I wanted to go and find all the nooks and crannies throughout it just as I would in the
03:53normal levels.
03:54Even though the normal levels were familiar to me because I had played them all those
03:57years ago, that extra layer of having an overworld that you can explore and interact
04:03with made the experience between level to level feel like I was playing something I hadn't
04:08before.
04:09Rest assured, the controls feel as Rayman as ever.
04:12Easy!
04:13Jumping and wall jumping and punching and hovering in the air and all that stuff feels still
04:18very good.
04:19And when seeing it kind of like in this fidelity with these sort of new character models,
04:23there's something a little bit more punchy about it.
04:27But don't be fooled or expect this game to be any easier than it was in the past because
04:31some of the levels I played, especially in the second world known as Toad Story, are
04:36pretty damn hard still.
04:39Oh yeah, and yes, this is couch co-op.
04:41Don't worry.
04:43In general, the whole thing just has a lot more texture to it, which is aided by the addition
04:49of voice acting.
04:54Now, from the few cutscenes I saw, the voice acting is a ton of fun, as are the characters.
04:59It feels like there's a lot of production value in this.
05:01It has this sort of charm and flair that I felt like I could have been watching a scene
05:05from an animated film in a movie theater.
05:12Now, all the side-scrolling levels I saw were in the previous game.
05:16But the new thing I got my hands on with were the dragon rides.
05:20Dragon rides are these roller coaster spectacle that are now totally 3D, pushing the player
05:27forward instead of side to side.
05:28And they're a ton of fun.
05:29As the dragon, you can barrel roll back and forth and you're dodging all these obstacles
05:33and shooting things on the fly.
05:35Honestly, a few parts of it made my palms sweat because things were getting a little
05:38intense.
05:39And these are contextual because these levels happen when traversing two different worlds
05:43in the game.
05:43There was mention of new music levels that would be played in 3D, but I didn't get to
05:48see those in particular, which is a bummer, but so it goes.
05:54So probably one of the most obvious things I asked myself, and I'm sure many of you are
05:57going to be asking, is why are we getting this instead of a new Rayman game?
06:01This is pure speculation, but Rayman is a series that kind of goes dormant for a while.
06:05We had the first game, then there was a bit of time until the second game came along,
06:08third one following a few years after, and then there was almost a decade before we actually
06:12got Rayman Origins with Rayman Legends just coming a couple of years later.
06:16And now we're up to another decade of silence in the mainline Rayman series.
06:20I imagine Rayman Legends has to be a hard game to follow up, but what it looks like they're
06:24doing here is using Rayman Legends as the foundation for what I assume is going to be the future
06:28of this franchise.
06:30Rayman Legends retold, while a remake, feels more like it's bridging together Rayman's 3D
06:36sequels with its 2D roots.
06:38And this feels like the Rayman team finding its footing on what to do next.
06:43Would a new Rayman game be cool?
06:45Yeah, of course.
06:46But I think there's a lot happening in Rayman Legends retold that makes this experience feel
06:52new.
06:53If this is the direction that a new Rayman game may head in, that's pretty exciting to
06:58me and I'm all for it.
06:59We'll just have to wait until the game actually releases on October 1st this year for $39.99.
07:05And it's also coming to PC, PS5, Xbox Series X and S and the Nintendo Switch 2.
07:10So trust me, if you're a diehard Rayman Legends fan and you're confused as to why this exists,
07:14let's wait until it comes out.
07:15Because based on what I played, it's a lot of fun.
07:18forSet and S corrived to Europeans and the Ninja, Region 1 folded by individuals
07:22You got to go.
07:24Because the power of which were that it was the end of the night.
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