A good platformer is like a shark, it needs to constantly move forward or it dies. Rayman Legends is a platformer that has no problem with momentum. It's a game that's been meticulously crafted to keep you moving. Every jump leads precisely onto the next water-drenched slope which slides down to zip-line before the checkpoint. At times it moves with the agility of a slickly produced Sunday morning cartoon, when in actuality it's a video game. A video game that leaves others looking like dead sharks.
If you've played 2011's Rayman Origins this will all sound very familiar. This is ostensibly the same game, and not just reminiscent of Origins but of all platformers that came before it. Rayman makes no attempt to hide what it is, it's an honest to god platformer. No indie gimmicks in sight. They'd be wasted here.
What Rayman Legends has going for it is charm. Characters exuberantly animate across a greater variety of richer environments. A Ukelele-laden score sets an appropriately joyous backdrop. It's stunning, goofy and polished to the nth degree.
The limiting structure from Origins, gone. In its place an efficient hallway of levels and bonus mini-games. This has freed up Legends to explore a wider range of aesthetics and mechanical concepts.
Each level still has a unique hook of its own, with only a handful feeling recycled from Origins. The balance between comical romps where the heroes are transformed into ducks and the more onerous escape-the-wall-of-fire stages feels just about right. The latter of which demand split-second precision and can be some of the most rewarding in the game.
Musical levels are a standout where every action is choreographed to jubilant covers of tracks like Black Betty and Eye of the Tiger. There's just not enough of them.
There's also a greater emphasis placed on boss fights now presented in 3D. While they appropriately convey a grand sense of scale, the 3D models used for bosses feel too visually disconnected to the illustrated world they're in. Also expect a lot of repetition.
Finally there are levels that reveal game's since cancelled Wii U exclusivity. Touchable switches and swipeable platforms would feel right at home on Nintendo's touchscreen controller. On Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions of the game though this is relegated to pressing a button when an onscreen character hovers above the previously tactile element. They feel as incongruous to the platform as they sound but the level to level variation stops them from being dreaded.
These minor gripes, however, are surmountable when everything else feels so adept. Rayman Legends feels more polished and looks even richer than its already stunning predecessor. As far as pure platformers go this generation, you'll be hard pressed trying to find one better than this.