Positives:
- Manages to bring the spirit of Spyro over to the Game Boy Advance very well.
- Good presentation when it comes to the music and graphics.
- Spyro himself controls good, as indicated by his playstyle barely changing throughout the next games.
Negatives:
- The isometric perspective and clashing background colours of some levels causes severe depth perception issues.
- Generic level goals that are part of every level, only very rarely changing up.
- No memorable set pieces to levels which makes getting lost a very common occurence.
-----------------------------------
''Spyro the Dragon was a massive hit on the PlayStation 1, having a total of three beloved games on the system. The franchise, although commonly associated with Sony, was never first-party, which meant that there was no problem bringing it to other systems. Many studios back in the day also saw potential by transitioning their franchises to a handheld system, as it was a completely different market full of potential new fans. In comes Spyro the Dragon, having a total of 6 games on the Game Boy Advance alone. Though out of those 6 games, the most known ones are the... Advance Trilogy? Seasons Trilogy? The trilogy never got an official name, but are canonically seen as an alternate ending to the first three games on PlayStation 1. The one I'm talking about today, Spyro: Season of Ice, is the first game in this trilogy.
Of course, the Game Boy Advance is a 32-bit platform, so full 3D was never really considered as an option aside from specific cases like racing games. To keep in the spirit of Spyro, the logical decision was made to transform it into an isometric platformer. It's perhaps not everyone's favourite perspective when it comes to platforming, and Season of Ice is arguably a good game to list as an example why people don't like it. As much as I have fond memories of the game, I can't deny that there are multiple levels that have terrible clashing backgrounds while the stage itself is random floating platforms, occasionally at different heights which is something that is very hard to make out; Hummingbird Ford and Twilight Bulb Factory are prime examples of this. Furthermore, jumps of faith are also often part of the levels, some where even the moving camera can't help out. And it really is a shame because it makes some levels unnecessarily hard. And these unfortunately aren't the only issues with these levels, as there are only a small handful of levels that have interesting set pieces in them for easier navigation. I got lost way too often because the levels didn't have memorable locations to indicate if I've already been there or not.
But to not sound too negative, there are enough other levels that don't deal with either the perspective issue or the memorability issue, like Market Mesa and Panda Gardens which are both two of my more favoured levels from this game. Also because both of them are slightly more original when it comes to level design philosophy as it has a few more original missions. The levels overall feel like a mix of the first two Spyro games on PS1, taking the goods of the second game by having a more characteristic feel to them because of the residents, but the bads from the first game by most levels also feeling a bit more on the generic side; find crystals, kill every enemy, and hit various things scattered through the level without dying, rinse and repeat. Placing a lot of emphasis on that last point by the way because god, that was so annoying with how easy it is to die and some levels being so confusing. And that's ultimately what it comes down to: the level design is decent overall, but hard to remember due to no set pieces and generic level goals. Let's put it on a 25% pretty good to 75% just decent scale, and the end result isn't looking that good.
Buuuuut it is still a Spyro games from the golden age, and it controls well overall. Given that it's one of my favourite platforming series ever, being ''just decent for Spyro quality'' means it is still a game I personally really enjoyed despite its shortcomings. And hey, it did try some original stuff as well, like converting speedways to a Space Harrier-like gameplay (which I personally actually really enjoyed), and Sparx is also back with his top-down shooter segments from Spyro: Year of the Dragon--not as fun, but still decent overall. And all in all, the game just really suffers from that ''first-game syndrome'' which, spoiler alert, the next two games will fix in one way or another. But that is something we will be finding out next time!''
- Manages to bring the spirit of Spyro over to the Game Boy Advance very well.
- Good presentation when it comes to the music and graphics.
- Spyro himself controls good, as indicated by his playstyle barely changing throughout the next games.
Negatives:
- The isometric perspective and clashing background colours of some levels causes severe depth perception issues.
- Generic level goals that are part of every level, only very rarely changing up.
- No memorable set pieces to levels which makes getting lost a very common occurence.
-----------------------------------
''Spyro the Dragon was a massive hit on the PlayStation 1, having a total of three beloved games on the system. The franchise, although commonly associated with Sony, was never first-party, which meant that there was no problem bringing it to other systems. Many studios back in the day also saw potential by transitioning their franchises to a handheld system, as it was a completely different market full of potential new fans. In comes Spyro the Dragon, having a total of 6 games on the Game Boy Advance alone. Though out of those 6 games, the most known ones are the... Advance Trilogy? Seasons Trilogy? The trilogy never got an official name, but are canonically seen as an alternate ending to the first three games on PlayStation 1. The one I'm talking about today, Spyro: Season of Ice, is the first game in this trilogy.
Of course, the Game Boy Advance is a 32-bit platform, so full 3D was never really considered as an option aside from specific cases like racing games. To keep in the spirit of Spyro, the logical decision was made to transform it into an isometric platformer. It's perhaps not everyone's favourite perspective when it comes to platforming, and Season of Ice is arguably a good game to list as an example why people don't like it. As much as I have fond memories of the game, I can't deny that there are multiple levels that have terrible clashing backgrounds while the stage itself is random floating platforms, occasionally at different heights which is something that is very hard to make out; Hummingbird Ford and Twilight Bulb Factory are prime examples of this. Furthermore, jumps of faith are also often part of the levels, some where even the moving camera can't help out. And it really is a shame because it makes some levels unnecessarily hard. And these unfortunately aren't the only issues with these levels, as there are only a small handful of levels that have interesting set pieces in them for easier navigation. I got lost way too often because the levels didn't have memorable locations to indicate if I've already been there or not.
But to not sound too negative, there are enough other levels that don't deal with either the perspective issue or the memorability issue, like Market Mesa and Panda Gardens which are both two of my more favoured levels from this game. Also because both of them are slightly more original when it comes to level design philosophy as it has a few more original missions. The levels overall feel like a mix of the first two Spyro games on PS1, taking the goods of the second game by having a more characteristic feel to them because of the residents, but the bads from the first game by most levels also feeling a bit more on the generic side; find crystals, kill every enemy, and hit various things scattered through the level without dying, rinse and repeat. Placing a lot of emphasis on that last point by the way because god, that was so annoying with how easy it is to die and some levels being so confusing. And that's ultimately what it comes down to: the level design is decent overall, but hard to remember due to no set pieces and generic level goals. Let's put it on a 25% pretty good to 75% just decent scale, and the end result isn't looking that good.
Buuuuut it is still a Spyro games from the golden age, and it controls well overall. Given that it's one of my favourite platforming series ever, being ''just decent for Spyro quality'' means it is still a game I personally really enjoyed despite its shortcomings. And hey, it did try some original stuff as well, like converting speedways to a Space Harrier-like gameplay (which I personally actually really enjoyed), and Sparx is also back with his top-down shooter segments from Spyro: Year of the Dragon--not as fun, but still decent overall. And all in all, the game just really suffers from that ''first-game syndrome'' which, spoiler alert, the next two games will fix in one way or another. But that is something we will be finding out next time!''