4/5 ★ – Endless_backlog's review of Rayman 2: The Great Escape.

Rayman 2 takes the loveable character from the first instalments 2D side scroller into a 3D environment whilst still maintaining platforming gameplay. There’s several mechanics that illustrate this such as climbing walls, swimming and riding missiles with legs like they’re a horse. The story begins with a dark tone and sees an evil Captain Razerbeard and his robot pirate army invade planets and enslave its inhabitants. The game begins with yourself and your pal Globox being captive onboard his ship, where you quickly escape and spend the rest of the game becoming powerful enough to take him on and free his hostages. Rayman does this by collecting the 4 elemental masks and supplying them to Polokus, a magical being who created Raymans world, who in turn gives him the power and abilities needed to take him on. The levels are linear and require you freeing creatures known as Teensie’s from cages along your journey. Each level has a certain amount of “Lums” which you have to collect to generate enough energy to open gates and progress onto the following section. You are also rewarded with new powers as the game advances such as swinging from floating power rings and flying using your hair/ears as a propeller. The level design is fantastic and does an amazing job of changing up the scenery of interactive elements so the areas never feel repetitive or stale. I personally loved volcanic areas with lava and the spooky themed level with creepy monsters and cobwebbed covered walls. This all builds to a fantastic final boss battle that, unlike other games simply being a tanky health bar, involves multiple fight sequences from battle arena to flying chase. The soundtrack throughout the game is also fantastic changing between techno, rock and other genres. Playing this again in 2024 I’ve got to give it high praise for the game in its own right, but I also can’t help but be impressed with how much it had to offer for a PS1 game and how well executed everything was. After hearing that they cut a bunch of levels out on the PS1 to make room for voice acting I can’t imagine how vast the Dreamcast version was and how much I’m missing out on.