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Rayman
II © Ubi
Soft
Rayman.
When it came out in 95/96 it was probably the best game of the
platform genre on PC. Then again, how many decent platform games were
made for the PC? Rayman easily achieved great sales results for years
to come. Ubi Soft marketing department kept coming out with new
products using the old 2D Engine of the game such as: Rayman Gold ,
Rayman Designer and a few others. We were all growing tried of those
repacks and gamers were demanding something new; at last Ubi Soft
came through just in time for this holiday season with Rayman II!
The
game and the engine are simply magnificent, there are no distinction
between the cut scenes and the game itself, it's just like a Nintendo
64 game (go figure N64 was the first platform on which the game
appeared). The lights effects and graphics are simply astonishing,
the game seemed as real like a Pixar/Disney cartoon reminding me of
"Toy Story" or "A Bug's Life".
Still,
no matter how cool the graphics are, what always matters and what
will interest you the most in the end is the gameplay! Well, the view
is just like in the first Rayman , a nice third person view like Tomb
Raider, nothing revolutionary there, but the little guy is responding
greatly to any solicitation to jump, run or whatever its up to.
Rayman II is a game that definite needs a gamepad as using the
keyboard pretty much ruined the gameplay. To show the power of this
3D engine there is also a dynamic camera that you can choose the
angle from, it's completely free and it really shows the versatility
and quality of this engine that took nearly 2 years of development.
The sounds are greats and to reinforce the fairly tale side Rayman
doesn't speak French or English. He just speaks his own language and
subtitles are telling the player what to do&ldots;
One of
the main asset of the game are the variety of the levels. Some
examples include your typical running in 'regular' 3D jump and run
levels while later on you'll be flying some device in another level
or you'll be doing a downhill near a cliff. Rayman II continues to
amaze you as later on in another level which maybe one of my
favourite would be the wagon race in a mine reminding us one of the
most famous sequence of "Indiana Jones and the Temple of
Doom". I insist on this aspect because it's one of the great
achievements of the game, the fact that every single level is
completely different from the previous one! Also, the puzzles are
always doable, as you never get stuck for a lot of hours at some
point. The makers of the game didn't have to come up with some nasty
puzzle tricks to artificially make the game life expectancy longer,
and that's really pleasant. The game will last you for days and
weeks. This will allow all gamers to enjoy the game, from the
experienced to the beginner. You can adjust the difficulty in the
setup so it will really fits to all players from the 7 years old kids
to the older platform game experts.
Graphically,
Rayman II is an exceptional game with an amazing gameplay. Rayman II
sets a new standards on PC for this type of genre. The Rayman
character is so popular that Ubi Soft will include it in a series of
cartoons developed for the Television and made in SGI. The first
episodes have already been made and will be available in a Deluxe
Edition of the game of the DVD format to be released later in 2000.
Overall, Rayman II is a must for all gamers, young or old, which is
non-violent and that we would recommend to the whole family!
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GAME
TYPE
3D
Platform
REQUIREMENTS
Pentium
II, 200M HD, 32M RAM, 3D Card
PRICE
49.99
REVIEWER
Olivier
INFORMATION
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Published |
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Demo? |
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Release
date |
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95% |
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Quick
Summary:
Rayman
II sets new standards for platform games on the PC |
SCREENSHOTS
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