I got into the gaming scene just when the Sony PlayStation got big. I’m a 90s kid, and I was there when the SNES was dominating the market, but somehow I had completely missed the generation of the SNES, and also the SEGA Saturn. No, back in my day, it was all PlayStation for me. Together with games like Rayman, the system nearly took over my entire childhood. I managed to pick this game up at a retail store not too long ago, let’s get into it and see how much this little gem from 1995 holds up.
First thing I saw when the game loaded (well, after the copyright screen and language selection, that is) was a very crisp cartoonish introduction video of a wizard-like character explaining what has happened to the world of Rayman. Soothing flute music starts to play, as the guy tells you about the lush world, filled with joy and creatures who live together in peace and harmony. Then, an evil wizard, appropriately named ‘Mr. Dark’, captured the Electoons and kidnapped all the fairies, stealing he world’s magic. It’s up to the hero Rayman to defeat this villain, and restore peace to the world.
Let’s get this outta the way first – Rayman looks amazing. The artwork is beautiful, with gorgeously rendered, varied environments. There’s something to be said about 2D graphics, they generally age so much better than 3D polygons that a lot of PlayStation games have. If I have to nitpick a little, in my opinion Rayman’s movement animations are lacking a little in terms of frames, but it isn’t much worth mentioning. In terms of presentation, everything looks incredible, even by today’s standards.
The music is lovely. The levels in Rayman are divided into several different ‘areas’, such as Dream Forest, Band Land, etc. All these areas have their own main theme music, which all fit the levels’ themes nicely, and help give the levels their own personal feel and atmosphere. Aside from the areas’ main themes, there’s also the standard action- and tension-oriented tunes. You’ll be hearing awesome electric guitar riffs, to loud riveting drum beats, indicating imminent danger. The first time I heard the tense, rhythmic drum beats while being chased by Mr. Stone in Blue Mountains… The music is often cleverly placed, and makes for some moments you won’t forget anytime soon.
Something Rayman is quite notorious for, is it’s difficulty. It’s a children’s game but believe me, it’s tough-as-nails, making it enjoyable for grown-ups to pick up and play as well. You start the game with three Lives and five Continues, and even though you’re able to pick up plenty of 1-Ups by either finding pickups or collecting 100 toons, there is no way to increase your Continues. Throughout the game, you’ve got five times. Better make ’em count. What’s more, the enemies are relentless, and when you defeat them, they respawn almost as soon as you leave the screen. Finally, the only time you can drop out of a level, is at the very start of it the first stage, at the rewind signs. When you progress to another stage of a level, you won’t come across another one so once you start a level, again, make it count. This means for each level, you have to prepare. Don’t worry though, grinding for lives is pretty easy. You can always revisit early levels to get toons, and raise your Live count and once you beat a level, you can proceed through the game with all the stuff you’ve collected so you can begin the next level with all the power-ups you had at the end of the last level.
Throughout the game, you’ll unlock various powers such as swinging from rings, using your hair as a helicopter to hover for a while, etc. These make it worthwhile to revisit early levels, as a lot of them have areas which are inaccessible to you until you unlock a specific power. This really helps adding to the replayability of Rayman.
Verdict
Does Rayman hold up since 1995? Yes. Yes, it does. The artwork looks amazing, the game plays away nicely, and it’s tough, but not unforgiving. It’s one of the older games on the PlayStation, but still one of the system’s best.
Pros:
- Challenging, but certainly beatable
- Gorgeous presentation and varied level design
- Lots of replayability
Cons:
- A way to drop out of a level whenever you wanted to would’ve been nice I got into the gaming scene just when the Sony PlayStation got big. I’m a 90s kid, and I was there when the SNES was dominating the market, but somehow I had completely missed the generation of the SNES, and also the SEGA Saturn. No, back in my day, it was all PlayStation for me. Together with games like Rayman, the system nearly took over my entire childhood. I managed to pick this game up at a retail store not too long ago, let’s get into it and see how much this little gem from 1995 holds up.
First thing I saw when the game loaded (well, after the copyright screen and language selection, that is) was a very crisp cartoonish introduction video of a wizard-like character explaining what has happened to the world of Rayman. Soothing flute music starts to play, as the guy tells you about the lush world, filled with joy and creatures who live together in peace and harmony. Then, an evil wizard, appropriately named ‘Mr. Dark’, captured the Electoons and kidnapped all the fairies, stealing he world’s magic. It’s up to the hero Rayman to defeat this villain, and restore peace to the world.
Let’s get this outta the way first – Rayman looks amazing. The artwork is beautiful, with gorgeously rendered, varied environments. There’s something to be said about 2D graphics, they generally age so much better than 3D polygons that a lot of PlayStation games have. If I have to nitpick a little, in my opinion Rayman’s movement animations are lacking a little in terms of frames, but it isn’t much worth mentioning. In terms of presentation, everything looks incredible, even by today’s standards.
The music is lovely. The levels in Rayman are divided into several different ‘areas’, such as Dream Forest, Band Land, etc. All these areas have their own main theme music, which all fit the levels’ themes nicely, and help give the levels their own personal feel and atmosphere. Aside from the areas’ main themes, there’s also the standard action- and tension-oriented tunes. You’ll be hearing awesome electric guitar riffs, to loud riveting drum beats, indicating imminent danger. The first time I heard the tense, rhythmic drum beats while being chased by Mr. Stone in Blue Mountains… The music is often cleverly placed, and makes for some moments you won’t forget anytime soon.
Something Rayman is quite notorious for, is it’s difficulty. It’s a children’s game but believe me, it’s tough-as-nails, making it enjoyable for grown-ups to pick up and play as well. You start the game with three Lives and five Continues, and even though you’re able to pick up plenty of 1-Ups by either finding pickups or collecting 100 toons, there is no way to increase your Continues. Throughout the game, you’ve got five times. Better make ’em count. What’s more, the enemies are relentless, and when you defeat them, they respawn almost as soon as you leave the screen. Finally, the only time you can drop out of a level, is at the very start of it the first stage, at the rewind signs. When you progress to another stage of a level, you won’t come across another one so once you start a level, again, make it count. This means for each level, you have to prepare. Don’t worry though, grinding for lives is pretty easy. You can always revisit early levels to get toons, and raise your Live count and once you beat a level, you can proceed through the game with all the stuff you’ve collected so you can begin the next level with all the power-ups you had at the end of the last level.
Throughout the game, you’ll unlock various powers such as swinging from rings, using your hair as a helicopter to hover for a while, etc. These make it worthwhile to revisit early levels, as a lot of them have areas which are inaccessible to you until you unlock a specific power. This really helps adding to the replayability of Rayman.
Verdict
Does Rayman hold up since 1995? Yes. Yes, it does. The artwork looks amazing, the game plays away nicely, and it’s tough, but not unforgiving. It’s one of the older games on the PlayStation, but still one of the system’s best.
Pros:
- Challenging, but certainly beatable
- Gorgeous presentation and varied level design
- Lots of replayability
Cons:
- A way to drop out of a level whenever you wanted to would’ve been nice |