Compared to the old-school video game kings, such as Sonic the Hedgehog or Mario the, ...er, plumber, Ubi Soft's Rayman is still new to the video game world. He's only had a sprinkling of games on the various consoles. Thus, while Ubi Soft's team is very good, Rayman's 2-D game has not developed to its full potential.

So anyway, this is a port of Rayman's 2-D game. The result is something that shows off some good talent, but still unrefined.

The game is a big toss up. Some people will really enjoy it, and deal with the flaws, such as myself. Other people will get aggravated and throw it down on the first stage (such as my friend, Dan). You might ask, "Is it right for me?" which is exactly why I'm writing this and you're reading it. Talk about being redundant, silly you.

STORY
---
Classic Platformer Story. The bad dude, Mr. Dark, has locked away all of the Protoons (little helpless guys) of Rayman's world. The faeries go to Rayman to ask for his help, and of course he jumps into action. Nothing else can be written about the story, as there is nothing else to the story.

Controls
---
Controls in Rayman are pretty solid, and they improve as he learns new moves. When you start off you have nothing--just walking and jumping. However, after you pass a few levels, you can start to throw your fist out like a boomerang, hang off ledges, run, swing, and even fly with Rayman's helicopter hair. I never found that the controls got in the way of something that I wanted to do, and that many of the moves, such as hanging on to ledges, really help out the game.

Gameplay
---
The concept behind Rayman, which makes it different and much harder than most other platformers, is the fact that it is more or less impossible to anticipate what the level will throw at you. Often the game presents an obstacle and gives you zero response time to absorb it and figure out what to do next.

What does this mean? It means you'll be dying... a lot. Enemies, Boulders, Spikes, pits and all sorts of contraptions wait for you giving you zero warning time about their presence.

So instead of something like Super Mario Advance 2 where you either have to refine your timing, or find a way to get around a certain obstacle, in Rayman Advance, you just have to memorize where all the obstacles are. Needless to say, this is a game for the patient.

To make things more complicated; there are little triggers within each stage that usually set off the obstacles. These triggers are represented by a TINY dot on the screen-- I would be surprised if it was more than 3 pixels. When you get near this dot, it makes enemies, objects, and sometimes even platforms appear on the screen. So in one instant there may be nothing at all, in the next second there are a mound of spikes. Or you've reached then end of the stage and you accidentally jump off, instead of seeing the very small trigger that would let you exit.

STAGES
---

One thing I really like about Rayman Advance is some of the creativity that they put into the game. In one stage you have to climb up faster than the stage is flooding, and to help, you can plant and sprout bean poles to give you a lift. In another stage a giant rock is being dragged down a vertical slope, and you just happen to be under it. In the final stage of the game, things really get wacky, such as the controls are reversed or you can't stop running. These parts really add a lot to the game, and they are the prototype of the creative challenges found in Rayman 2: The Great Escape.

The bosses also carry on the spirit of the game. Not only do you have to memorize each boss's attacks, but the attacks change constantly. One particularly tough boss, Space Mama (stupid name, I know) uses a different set of attacks every time you take away a single life point, and she has about ten or twelve. Yowch.

Thankfully, the developers realized that it might be a little TOO much to ask you to memorize all of these different attacks, and so they threw some kind of loop hole. It goes as such: if you die on your second to last life and have reduced the boss to half of his/her life or less, then on your last life the boss will only have half his/her normal life.

Sound a bit confusing? It is. Furthermore, they don't tell you that they've put it in, so the first time I saw that the boss was halfway dead from the get-go, I thought the game had glitched up. However, I've tested it over and over again, and sure enough it comes through. Its nice to give the player this extra breathing room, but I was disappointed that after I won I could not challenge the boss again to see the rest of his/her moves. It made it feel like winning against the boss was a bit cheap.

Getting back to creativity, I enjoyed the different levels. Although there is the regular 'Grass-type' world, Rayman also gets to explore the less-than-common place, such as Music land, Art world, or Candyland. There are also a goodly number of 'cave' worlds as well. It was nice to get a break from the usual platformer which has such predictable places as a fire world, an ice world, a water world, and so on and on.

GRAPHICS AND SOUND
---
Rayman Advance's graphics are a big mixed bag. Rayman himself is done very well, with each body part moving somewhat with the rest of him and somewhat by itself. It’s a very cool effect if you pay some attention to it.

Most of the levels are either very beautiful or very cartoony-vibrant. I really enjoyed the atmosphere the game gives off on the cave levels, as that it seems to be more similar to Rayman 2 than the rest of his crazy adventure.

However, because the game is a port, some of the larger objects the developers didn't bother to clean up. Its similar to when you expand a picture on the Paint program--the pixels enlarge, and you get a very blocky looking picture. It seems such a shame that for a game that looks so incredible, and for a series that is known for its artistry, that they would leave something so unclean. After all, it even appears on many of the boss fights, which I would think would be the very best thing to clean up.

Sound wise, it’s just the standard video game. Rayman shouts "Yeah!" from time to time, but there isn't any of the voice acting found in Rayman 2, which is understandable on the GBA. The music really didn't appeal to me much, although it wasn't really bad.

REPLAY
---
Rayman Advance has eighteen 'groups' of levels, with the ending groups having about five different places each. Needless to say, there are plenty of levels to keep you busy. Also, in each group of levels there are six cages to find and bust open. I found it was at first annoying to go through the levels, being that I had to start over so many times. As I got better, it became fun to just play through the levels and look for the cages. Eventually the cages start become more and more scarce, and although you haven't beat the game, it becomes boring looking for that last cage you've skipped over three times.

So while Rayman Advance certainly has replay value, perhaps there are a few too many cages to open. In order to access the final level, you must open every cage, which seems like too much work for me. After all, in nearly every good platformer- Super Mario 64, Banjo-Kazooie, and even Rayman 2, you are allowed some room in case you cannot find everything. Rayman Advance simply expects too much.

PROBLEMS
---
I've listed plenty of problems that the game has from being so unrefined. In addition to those, the screen is zoomed in way too much. This makes Rayman unnecessarily big, and creates a larger amounts of 'leaps of faith' where you cannot see where you are jumping to. In fact, a number of cages you have to open require you to make leaps of faith, and offer no hint or alternative way to get there.

To sum the problems up: The camera is zoomed too far in, you can't replay the boss battles, memorizing the levels won't appeal to a good deal of people, the game doesn't give you enough breathing room on accomplishments, some of the graphics weren't cleaned up when they really should have been, and you die a lot. In addition, you only have a limited number of continues on your game, before you actually have to go 'life hunting.' Without a continue you start from the last time you saved, and if it happened that you were on your last life, then you start with only that life. That's a lot of problems that could have been addressed.

Overall
---
So, what is the final verdict on Rayman Advance? You really will have to decide for yourself. The game is a completely different creature than Rayman 2, so don't expect to like this one just because you liked the other one. This was my first GBA game, and although tough, I did enjoy it. Other friends of mine couldn't even get past the first stage without giving up. Here's my advice: if your tired of all these super-easy platformers that you can beat in a day, and just want something to challenge you, look into this. Otherwise, you're better off without it.


Recommended: Yes