Just a Peek - Fun Four From Feral (Part III): "Rayman 3"

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I'm back with part three of this four-parter. In the previous review I waxed technical about XIII, the graphic novel turned first person shooter with interesting graphics with a good story behind it.

In this installment I'll be looking over a platform game that is at once familiar and new. So... "I wan cho to say allo to my leetle friend!" Rayman 3: Hoodlum Havoc

I was first introduced to Rayman on the ill-fated Atari Jaguar game system back in 1995 (remember those?). Back then the odd little main character hopped, skipped, and jumped through colorful side-scrolling platform world, grabbing power-ups and dodging bad guys. It was a cool game back then, but Rayman 3: Hoodlum Havoc turned a pleasing platform game into a wild 3 dimensional world of puzzles, power-ups and more bad guys than you can shake a stick at.

The action in Rayman 3 is quick, but your wit must be quicker to succeed in this pleasing platform player. You get Rayman, a little guy with hands and feet but no arms or leg to connect them, to jump kick, and run his way through a set of nicely rendered worlds full of eye-catching oddities. Turtles check out your action, butterflies flitter around you, and giant mushrooms abound as you travel collection gems and other goodies.

Bad guys abound as well, and Rayman has many ways to deal with them. One of most unique objects for duking it out with the unsavory citizenry in the worlds of Rayman 3 is his hand, which he doesn't have at the start of the game; they must be earned. Once you get them, however, you can get Rayman to do all sorts of neat tricks them and the other weapons he can then get. I thought it was a bit strange, at first, that I had to find the little guy's mitts, but I got through the early levels well enough without them.

The graphics in Rayman 3 are not bleeding edge, but then, they don't have to be. Each world I visited was nicely rendered and chock full of movement. Rayman could interact with nearly everything , and some of the fun is seeing what happens when you get the little guys to kick or punch one of the neutral objects and characters that inhabit each world. Sometimes the reaction is benign, sometimes not, but it's usually interesting.

Handless Rayman check out an early level

Who's In Control Here?

If there's a nit to be picked with Rayman 3 it would be the controls: Rayman 3 begs for one of those nifty USB game controllers. I got a bit frustrated trying to get Rayman to hop to the right spot using the keyboard; on narrow, elevated platforms; one misstep could force you to retrace your steps over and over again. It's a small nit, because the keyboard and mouse controls are adequate to enjoy the game.

One nice feature, however, is that Rayman 3 will recognize a game controller, if you happen to have one plugged in, and it will allow you to reconfigure keys so that you can set it up however you'd like.

Rayman 3 ran well on my 800mhz iMac G4, with 500MB of RAM, and loading the game was a snap. Beyond the minor annoyance I've just mentioned, Rayman 3 would make any platform gamer a very happy camper indeed.

In the next and final part of this four part review I'll be seeing you at the races as I check out Total Immersion Racing.

See you then.

is a writer who currently lives in Orlando, FL. He's been a Mac fan since Atari Computers folded, but has worked with computers of nearly every type for 20 years.

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