daTRUballin
Member
So previously I made a thread asking whether I should check out Rayman 2: The Great Escape on the N64 and there was an overwhelming number of people who praised the game and suggested I should. I only briefly played the beginning of this game as a kid, but I remember not being too impressed with it and gave it back to the store. I played a bit of the beginning again years later at a friends place. Thankfully, my friend still has his copy of the game, so I borrowed it to try it out and do a full playthrough this time. So Ive decided to make my first ever LTTP thread on the game to share my thoughts on what I experienced. Overall, my experience with the game was an enjoyable one, although there were some frustrating moments I didnt really enjoy that Ill talk more about.
Note: Since its not always easy to find good pics of a particular version of the game (in this case, the N64 version), you may see pics of the other versions of the game on other platforms. From what I understand, they are all mostly the same thing, with some slight differences.
Unlike Mario 64, Banjo Kazooie, and other platformers on the system, Rayman 2 takes a more straightforward and linear approach to its gameplay. You still collect things as you do in other platformers, but in this game, the levels are set up in a linear fashion and each level has a certain number of lums you can collect and a certain number of cages you have to break open to free......uhh.....something. I forgot who or what is trapped inside those cages exactly. The Teensies, I guess? I dunno......Anyway, if you manage to collect all the lums and break all the cages in a level, it grants you a bonus level.
Since I wasnt really aiming to 100% this game, I only ever unlocked one bonus level in the entire game, and it turned out to be a racing level on par in terms of frustration and annoyance with Banjo Tooies Canary Mary (Canary Marys probably still worse though). Ugh. And according to my friend, all the other bonus levels are basically the same thing except the levels get harder and harder as the game progresses. How lame if true, but oh well.
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In addition to the platforming, there are lots of vehicle/flying/riding/running segments, and these make up a large portion of the game. Some of these remind me of Crash Bandicoot a little bit.
I gotta say, I didnt really like these parts of the game all that much at first. That is, until I experienced the final boss (more on that later......*shudder*). Now, looking back, these segments dont seem nearly as bad, but there were many times where I would fail over and over again and the game would make me do a certain part of these segments over and over and over again every time. These parts tended to be pretty lengthy, so the whole process became pretty annoying pretty fast. These segments were still fun at times, but there were times where I wished these segments would just end.
And now to the one part that almost ruins an otherwise fairly enjoyable game: the final boss. Holy hell, what were they thinking?! The battle is a bit too complicated to explain and I dont want to get into all the details and drag this post out even further, so Ill try to find a good video of the battle and post it here.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=u202_wTifAM
Sorry to any potential fans of this battle, but its kind of awful. Dont be fooled by how easy the player in the video is making it seem. Its not easy. At all. I have no idea how anybody could beat it so easily. It mustve literally taken me about 3 hours to beat this. It was by far one of the hardest and most frustrating bosses Ive ever fought, bar none. I almost considered giving up on it, but I was determined to beat it, and I did. You see, the thing is, the game is fairly simplistic and easy up until this point. Those vehicle challenges were by far the most challenging things about this game until this part. The normal platforming levels were almost a little too easy. But then why would you go and make the final battle as insanely hard as this to the point of bullshit when the rest of the game is fairly easy?! Am I playing Rayman or am I playing Dark Souls here?! My friend did warn me the final battle would be a bitch. I didnt think it would be THIS much of a bitch considering the rest of the games fairly simple levels!
Overall though, the game was fun and I mostly enjoyed it. The atmosphere was great, the characters were fairly likable, and the soundtrack is pretty decent. I still get the Teensies theme song stuck in my head from time to time. And even though Ive complained about the vehicle segments and the final boss, I still found these parts to be mildly fun and I liked the challenge, even if they were a bit frustrating (VERY frustrating in the case of the final boss). Though one other thing that I do wish was better in this game was the amount of moves Rayman has. I found that Rayman essentially has a very limited moveset and I wish the developers wouldve done more with it (his helicoptery floating move reminded me a bit of Conkers tail spin from Conkers Bad Fur Day). And I guess I should also mention the camera can be a bit problematic as is traditionally the case with many N64 games. But if youre used to playing N64 games, I reckon you wont have too much trouble with handling the camera. Its certainly not the worst camera to ever grace an N64 game at least.
But with all of that said, I liked the game well enough. It doesnt compare to other N64 platformers like Mario 64 or Banjo Kazooie or Conker, and I do feel that some people overhype it a bit and rate it more highly than it probably should be, but I still found it to be an enjoyable game for what it was and what it was trying to do, and Im glad I got to experience it for myself.
Note: Since its not always easy to find good pics of a particular version of the game (in this case, the N64 version), you may see pics of the other versions of the game on other platforms. From what I understand, they are all mostly the same thing, with some slight differences.
Unlike Mario 64, Banjo Kazooie, and other platformers on the system, Rayman 2 takes a more straightforward and linear approach to its gameplay. You still collect things as you do in other platformers, but in this game, the levels are set up in a linear fashion and each level has a certain number of lums you can collect and a certain number of cages you have to break open to free......uhh.....something. I forgot who or what is trapped inside those cages exactly. The Teensies, I guess? I dunno......Anyway, if you manage to collect all the lums and break all the cages in a level, it grants you a bonus level.
Since I wasnt really aiming to 100% this game, I only ever unlocked one bonus level in the entire game, and it turned out to be a racing level on par in terms of frustration and annoyance with Banjo Tooies Canary Mary (Canary Marys probably still worse though). Ugh. And according to my friend, all the other bonus levels are basically the same thing except the levels get harder and harder as the game progresses. How lame if true, but oh well.
In addition to the platforming, there are lots of vehicle/flying/riding/running segments, and these make up a large portion of the game. Some of these remind me of Crash Bandicoot a little bit.
I gotta say, I didnt really like these parts of the game all that much at first. That is, until I experienced the final boss (more on that later......*shudder*). Now, looking back, these segments dont seem nearly as bad, but there were many times where I would fail over and over again and the game would make me do a certain part of these segments over and over and over again every time. These parts tended to be pretty lengthy, so the whole process became pretty annoying pretty fast. These segments were still fun at times, but there were times where I wished these segments would just end.
And now to the one part that almost ruins an otherwise fairly enjoyable game: the final boss. Holy hell, what were they thinking?! The battle is a bit too complicated to explain and I dont want to get into all the details and drag this post out even further, so Ill try to find a good video of the battle and post it here.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=u202_wTifAM
Sorry to any potential fans of this battle, but its kind of awful. Dont be fooled by how easy the player in the video is making it seem. Its not easy. At all. I have no idea how anybody could beat it so easily. It mustve literally taken me about 3 hours to beat this. It was by far one of the hardest and most frustrating bosses Ive ever fought, bar none. I almost considered giving up on it, but I was determined to beat it, and I did. You see, the thing is, the game is fairly simplistic and easy up until this point. Those vehicle challenges were by far the most challenging things about this game until this part. The normal platforming levels were almost a little too easy. But then why would you go and make the final battle as insanely hard as this to the point of bullshit when the rest of the game is fairly easy?! Am I playing Rayman or am I playing Dark Souls here?! My friend did warn me the final battle would be a bitch. I didnt think it would be THIS much of a bitch considering the rest of the games fairly simple levels!
Overall though, the game was fun and I mostly enjoyed it. The atmosphere was great, the characters were fairly likable, and the soundtrack is pretty decent. I still get the Teensies theme song stuck in my head from time to time. And even though Ive complained about the vehicle segments and the final boss, I still found these parts to be mildly fun and I liked the challenge, even if they were a bit frustrating (VERY frustrating in the case of the final boss). Though one other thing that I do wish was better in this game was the amount of moves Rayman has. I found that Rayman essentially has a very limited moveset and I wish the developers wouldve done more with it (his helicoptery floating move reminded me a bit of Conkers tail spin from Conkers Bad Fur Day). And I guess I should also mention the camera can be a bit problematic as is traditionally the case with many N64 games. But if youre used to playing N64 games, I reckon you wont have too much trouble with handling the camera. Its certainly not the worst camera to ever grace an N64 game at least.
But with all of that said, I liked the game well enough. It doesnt compare to other N64 platformers like Mario 64 or Banjo Kazooie or Conker, and I do feel that some people overhype it a bit and rate it more highly than it probably should be, but I still found it to be an enjoyable game for what it was and what it was trying to do, and Im glad I got to experience it for myself.
