syltefar.com: Rayman Origins (Xbox 360)

2012-01-08

Rayman Origins is an experience of pure joy, beautiful, silly, and with finely tuned gameplay reminiscent of smooth playing modern platformers like Donkey Kong Country Returns. The style of the first world actually reminds me a lot of DKCR, with its lush tropical island landscape and waterfalls. Rayman Origins is its own thing, though, with a crazyness of design that is very unique; in the game, Rayman is trying to restore the sanity of The Bubble Dreamer, a mysterious man, who is flapping his arms like a chicken and pulling his own eye out of its socket (the eye rapidly pops back in, though - cartoony logic), all the while levitating naked.
The music is uplifting and great, with a relaxed organic groove and instrumentation that reminds me of the great Spyro the Dragon soundtrack by Stewart Copeland.
Completed Jibberish Jungle (world 1/11). Loved the music for the Moskito level, an epic track, with silly mosquito buzzing as the lead instrument.
Completed Desert of Dijiridoos (world 2/11).

2012-07-08

Completed Gourmand Land (world 3/11) in a fun and extremely confusing session with Jauert and Jonas.

2012-07-14

Completed Sea of Serendipity (world 4/11). The underwater song is one of the best of those I ever heard. It's right up there with 'The Great Bath' from Turrican II.

2012-07-15

2012-07-19

Completed Ticklish Temples (world 6/11). Epic boss chase and battle with Daisy, a humonguous (Ray) man-eating plant.

2013-01-01

Put Rayman back in the old 360... Things are getting more difficult now, and I'm starting to learn how the jump, hover, wall jump, and air dash work together to enable Rayman to climb a sheer vertical surface. Pretty cool, but I still find time to admire the details of this wonderful game, such as the camera subtly avoiding panning towards secret areas until you enter them.

2013-01-02

Completed Luscious Lakes (world 7/11). The lead-up to the Top Chef Dragon boss fight in the previous levels was really cool, seeing this dragon dude eat an entire city, and the boss fight has a great premise, but after having died *a million* times, it felt a bit too abusive.
There is a cool mechanic where Rayman can activate shrinking discs of light, either stationary or moving, outside which he is eaten by horrible claws or swarms of flies. An interesting way of constraining the player, and it is used to great effect.
Completed Angsty Abyss (world 8/11).

2013-01-03

Using snake enemies as reflection angles for your shots in the mosquito sequences is positively inspired.

2013-01-05

2013-01-06

Argh, those beam robots are SO ANNOYING!
It get's hard and kind of frustrating in a Super Meat Boy-esque way, with rotating slicers and razor sharp jump timing..
OK, this chase sequence at the end is one of the most frustrating things I have experienced for a long time...
Holy shizzle! I did it .... must have tried 100 times or so.
Completed the game. I did it! Super hard at the end, but otherwise an awesome platformer, right up there with Donkey Kong Country Returns.

Rayman Origins (Xbox 360)