Rayman Origins is my favorite 2D platformer ever; it’s probably the best ever made. It comes from Ubisoft Montpellier – a studio that is, by all counts, the least dank and sticky of all the dank and sticky folds of Ubisoft’s titanic corporate mass. Montpellier is responsible for Beyond Good & Evil, as well as the original Rayman titles. I never played the original Raymen, so I’m not at liberty to say whether or not this ‘prequel’ in massive quotes actually tells us much about the origins of Mr. Man – what makes him tick, why he does what he does. Quite honestly I’ve pumped dozens of hours into this game and I’m still not 100% on what he does, let alone why. More importantly, I couldn’t care less – Rayman Origins could be about a man named Billy Forks with forks for hands who fights AIDS with the power of friendship for all I’m interested in the story, as long as it looks, sounds, and plays like this.
The beauty of Rayman Origins is that it doesn’t succeed based on an exciting gimmick or even by cashing in the nostalgia for the original (by most accounts they’re only superficially similar), but by just being so beautifully realised artistically and mechanically. It’s fast-paced, but the controls are smooth and responsive enough that it’s not needlessly frustrating as a result. On a tangentially related note, here’s how the original Sonic games could have held up to this day: by having the camera zoom the fuck out when you’re expected to run at high speeds. Rayman does this. Rayman understands what a good game is, and, as a result, it is one. It’s not just the ways it’s better than shitty games in the genre, it’s the way everything in every level feels as though it’s been tailored specifically to ensure that the difficulty comes from making tricky jumps instead of wrestling with the controls, camera, or physics. It’s exactly the right recipe for a fun time – no archaic lives systems, no ridiculous player collision in co-op, no monotonous bullshit. It’s the kind of game that doesn’t force you to follow the same pattern three times in a row against bosses – instead, you’re expected to follow three entirely separate patterns as the battleground changes for each phase.
The whole thing is inventive in so many ways – each of the first five standard platforming ‘worlds’ introduces a new power that’s crucial to the game’s central complexity, which is juggling these powers to maintain continuous, fluid movement throughout its various levels. Rather than being held back by its linear design, Rayman embraces it, building up the design and depth of each level by introducing new obstacles and tricky jumps that require the expert use of each ability so that none of them feels like a gimmick to be tossed aside once its unique ‘world’ has been cleared. It just ramps up in challenge and quality so rapidly and so expertly that it actually puts classic platformers like the best Mario entries to shame in terms of design.
Design! Did you know that the original Rayman sprite was designed with his hands and feet detached from the body to make animation easier? This may seem a little weird if Origins is your first venture into this franchise, because literally every other aspect of the game is drawn and animated with a fine attention to detail and powerful command of character design, resulting in a visual experience that, if separated from the rest of the game, is still outstanding amongst the best of its ilk. Every character, every level, and every collectible says something through the way it’s designed, whether that be the awkward sliding and crouching animations of the tubby sidekick Globox or the sultry nymphs with their weirdly giant breasts. When I said this was the best platformer ever made, I wasn’t just referring to the platforming. This is one of the most mechanically and visually sound games to come out in actual decades, and one that I recommend with probably as much enthusiasm as I ever have or probably ever will again. Rayman Origins is, at its core, one of the best possible reasons not to kill yourself.
Dylan's Morsels 