Close the World Open the nExt

Decided to move my media twitter thread to short media blogposts instead cause sometimes I wanna say more and I feel like it. Going to limit myself to 250 - 300 words though.

After 7 years of going through the Yakuza series with my wife, we finally finished Yakuza 6 and thus the Kiryu saga. I went into this one not expecting much because I feel like people had a lot of issues with this one on release, but I really enjoyed it. The focus on fatherhood and families as well as both blood ties and non-blood ties I think was a good note to end Kiryu's story on. I do feel that the choice to end the game on Kiryu's letter to Daigo calling him like a son is a bit unearned given his complete absence from the rest of the plot, but I really enjoyed Kiryu's relationships with the Hiroshima crew.

It is a bit disappointing that we don't get to see hardly any of Daigo, Haruka, Majima or Saejima in the game, because of how the story is structured. The structure of the story in general does fray towards the end as the game feels like it has three endings in a row as they didn't quite weave all of their threads together. Still, I think it was a strong finish and I really loved most of the cast, Beat Takeshi did a great job as Hirose and Nagumo was a great Rikiya 2.0. On to Like a Dragon!

4 out of 5 heat orbs

Developer:	Ubisoft Studios SRL
Release Date:	03/29/2000
Platform(s):	Gameboy Color

I really do miss the days where different versions of games would come out on different platforms. It added some interesting variety and sometimes you'd get very interesting takes on the same concept. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater for the PS1 is an amazing game, and the Gameboy Advance Tonky Hawk games were a great translation of that style of game to an isometric perspective that worked on the GBA. Now translating a platformer to a portable system doesn't require the same amount of ingenuity, but Rayman for the Gameboy Color is an interesting downport of what is a more visually stunning PS1 game to the small screen.

The most major change from the PS1 Rayman experience is that there are no boss fights except the final one against Mr. Dark. I am not too torn up about this as I always found the HP sponge bosses of Rayman 1 a bit dull to do after a while. Combat in general is deemphasized in this version, which is good as it does feel a bit clunky when it does come up. It felt like I had trouble making punches connect when it looked like it should have, and similarly I felt like there were some general hitbox issues on receiving damage as well. This doesn't come up too much, but it is frustrating when it does. Overall the controls are a bit muddy, but serviceable most of the time. The GBC version really de-emphasizes combat overall to focus more on platforming.

The level design is overally enjoyable and not as difficult as the original game.. You do still have some of the somewhat maddening "walk somewhere to invisibly trigger a change elsewhere" elements that Rayman 1 had, but I didn't get stuck on those too much. Exploration for electoon cages is the main collectible and each level has a different number of them available, indicated in the HUD at the bottom. Once you beat the game, you unlock a world map that lets you go back to the earlier levels to wrap up your collection. Like the original there are several levels based around rising water that I had a bit of trouble with when hanging from ledges was involved, but I didn't get stuck too much in this game. It's a much easier experience overall than the original game its based on, which is nice and in combination with the smaller set of levels and worlds, lets it be a bit of a breezy play through.

I liked the levels that mirrored the original's Band Land, called Airy Tunes in the GBC version. It captures the same feel and look as that level and has some fun new platforming gimmicks original to this game. My only major complaint is that several of the worlds are varaitions on "forest" as the theme and look a bit samey. I would have liked a few more different-looking zones to play in, but what is there is good. The game also has a secret final world once you collect all the electoon cages that serves as a final challenge as well. I played it a bit using a password to get there, because I didn't enjoy the game enough to 100 percent it.

The graphics attempt to capture some of the detail of the PS1 game, but it can make the screen a bit busy. I think it looks good overall, but there were a few times where I wasn't sure what was interactible or just part of the background. Rayman's sprite looks good, as do the enemies and some of the small "cutscenes" between worlds.

I would reccomend giving it a shot for at least a few worlds if you're a Rayman fan or looking for a platformer from the era you haven't tried before. Not the best platformer, but it was a real pleasant surprise to play a Rayman game I didn't know existed.

Developer:	@Raymanni
Release Date:	06/19/2020
Platform(s):	PC

The original Rayman is a difficult game, with the later levels and most of the bosses causing me a lot of heartache as a kid. Redemption smooths a lot of these out. Rayman starts with most of his powers already unlocked, you do not have to unlock the ability to punch or use the helicopter hair anymore. The most dramatic change to his moveset is in the helicopter hair which now works like in the sequels, letting you slow your fall as long as you hold the jump button down. Additionally, you start off with more lives, have more HP, have infinite continues, and level layouts are made easier for the most part. Despite some of these changes to the difficulty, it is still very difficult in the late game and the bosses still continue to be healthsponges.

Redemption isn't exactly a replacement for the original game, it has a lot more differences than just a simple remake and is more of its own game. The original Rayman has about 18 levels, while Redemption has about 30 and the original levels have quite a few changes. The quality of these vary, but I appreciate it expanding on some of the one-off gimmicks from the original. Features like the super helicopter, bean sprouts, and moskito show up more often, and the Candy Chateau is expanded from the single level it was in the original game. I don't care for the dark level gimmicks where you only have rayman's fist providing light for the most part, but other new gimmicks such as the rainbow paint punches that create new platforms feel like they could have been in the original game.

I do at times wish there were two version of this, one that was a more faithful version of the original with the extra lives and widescreen and one that contained all of this new content. While I do like a lot of the new content — the new world Playtopia looks a bit off in some of the backgrounds, but it does fit in style to the original game — the game can feel a bit unsure of its identity at times. Some decisions, such as removing some of the minor routing choices from the game feel strange, but as a whole I really enjoy Redemption's love for the original game and the series as a whole. There are new collectibles in each level and there are shops you can spend tings in. The shop with its unlockable skins (including the SNES prototype graphics) was a great addition.

If you enjoy the Rayman series, I'd recommend this game whole heartedly. I don't think it's a replacement for the originala or anything, but if you enjoy Rayman 1, this really scratches the itch of more content for Rayman 1. Ryemanni even made a new version of the old PC level editor that includes all of the features of Rayman Redemption and more. All-in-all a really cool fan project that makes me want to play the older Rayman games again.