"Kawa brew stew."

When people talk about classic platformers I don't hear nearly enough people talk about Rayman 2 which is a classic dag nabit.

I admit it does take a different approach from most of the 3D platformers of the time by having start to finish level design rather then a open sandbox one for each level but I don't really think this works against the game since the levels themselves are still fun to play through and for the time gorgeous to look at and I still find myself stopping to enjoy the starting area in Woods of Light.

Rayman also controls like a dream in this with nice animations for all his movements including a roll for he's landing from a jump at top speed which is just for looks admittedly but Rayman does have plenty of other moves in the game that the game does take full advantage of with only one or two of them only being used for one and done deals.

The soundtrack is also a real banger full of criminally underrated tracks when compared to the also great Rayman Origins and Legends which have, or I feel they have, sadly overshadowed 2 it seems.

As on story I think it's actually pretty nice and told well for it's simplicity with the robo pirates being a well established threat as you see their complexes set up around the world sometimes even seen to have cleared away whole forests to build them. The world is even better once you start collecting the surprisingly deep lore which is done through collecting the collectibles in the game the Yellow Lums which I always thought was cool as a kid and still kind of do even if its been done plenty of times since.

The game was and still is one of the best 3D platformers in my opinion able to hang out with Super Mario 64 and Banjo & Kazioo and I'd love if Ubisoft tried for this style of Rayman again but without all the Ubisoftness that most of their non Rayman games have.

Habiendo jugandolo en el peor port pude disfrutarlo un monton.

Si, tiene reduccion de niveles y downgrade de graficos pero lo conpensa con un estetica visual muy oscura y cartoon, jugabilidad exquisita, musica fantastica y dialogos en voz bastantes decentes.

Me gusto mucho mas que Crash Bandicoot 2

As a heads up, apparently the rating can't change per log so the overall rating for the PS1 rating that I would give it is a 3 out of 5.

Lemme just say for the record that I really love Rayman 2, heck, I just recently completed a recent playthrough for the copy I have had ever since I was a kid, for the N64, for the first time in a while. So I went into the PS1 version completely blind, as I got further into the game I was more so fascinated by how much stuff was cut from this version. The levels are not only shorter, but also feel smaller, the visuals look rough, all the bonus minigames are taken away, heck they even got rid of two levels completely, it's pretty astonishing. I imagine this was because the PS1 discs had more limits compared to the other versions of the game, so I can't really fault the developers for any of these changes. I wouldn't say it's entirely bad, I still have fun with this version and in its defense there are a few things this version did better than at least the N64, but I do think other changes they did make, like having full-fledged voice acting among many other things, wasn't worth the cuts and the things that this is better at are, well like I said, very few. So if I were to recommend one over the others, I'd say go with the N64 and even the PS2 versions over this one (can't say anything about the Dreamcast version since I haven't played that one). Out of all the console versions of this game, it's easily the weakest one.

For reference, the N64 version would get a 4.5 out of 5 while the PS1 version gets a 3 out of 5.

This is a pretty early attempt at a linear, story based 3D action game while also being a pretty solid crack at making a linear, tight platformer in line with the 2D greats.

As a transition to 3D some omissions and additions might give you pause but it's a pretty loyal effort overall. The fluid mix of shooting and platforming is here. There's a lot of the nuance of Rayman 1 missing, but considering the time it's a wonder they even got it working at all.

The remarkable thing about this one is how much better the pacing is than most of the games in the genre. It really knows how to find the fun and keep the player glued to that fun with as few interruptions as possible.

I...don't have that much else to say about it. It's polished, tight, and well made.

The thing about "Childlike Wonder" is that it accounts for both the beautifully earnest, warm, yet often unsettling and traumatic experiences of early life. Despite the game's general lack of challenge, Rayman 2's world perfectly walks the line between lush, comforting sentimentality and supernatural peril. It captures the bizarre, wholesome yet visually disturbed imagination of an adolescent kid. Only a handful of minutes traversing the dimly lit, melancholic Glade of Dreams is enough to lure the player into a false sense of security, preying upon the childlike naïveté the game’s atmosphere promotes. This is used to toss them into a blind pit of jarring sounds and visuals crafted from the most chaotic recesses of a child’s creative mind. Whether they’re the unintelligible mumblings of a limbless marsupial-dog hybrid, or the horror of escaping the clutches of a toothed monster from within its maw, these striking visuals, much like the memories and thought processes of a child are seen as erratic or hard-to-follow in the eyes of a more jaded adult. This is why, in a meta sense, it feels almost poetic that this game has no definitive version, having been re-released on all but your TI-84 X Calculator over nearly two decades, each platform offering a somewhat different interpretation on the game's vision.

Aside from a few aggravating points (mainly near the end), man, this is still a fun game! It's still one of my favorite games and one of my favorite 3D platformers several years later after playing it again for the first time in ages. It's so surreal how different this game is compared to the first game. How dark and even terrifying some aspects of the game are, the atmosphere can be cheerful and bright but also dark, grim and scary, it's surreal! Definitely a must-play for anyone who wants to get into the Rayman series!