Michel Ancel, the original creator of the Rayman series, is back with Rayman Origins set to finally come out his Holiday season on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii and 3DS. The 2D adventure will see Rayman and his friends in four-player drop in and out co-op goodness as they take on the Darktoons who have overrun the Glade of Dreams.
The adventure will take place over 60 levels throughout the 12 environments in the game. Michel and company created way more levels than initially planned, hence the change from the episodic digital release to retail. Levels will have multiple layers to them, which can be fully explored after gaining new abilities through the campaign.
I saw Rayman Origins recently and the game is just mind blowingly gorgeous. The HD cartoon visuals are simply stunning and it’s just so entertaining watching the characters move in the world. It reminded me a lot of New Super Mario Bros. Wii, in fact. The characters are constantly animated as they move about and give off the sense that they’re all batsh*t insane. They act like crack addicts who are in desperate need of a hit. Odd to describe it like that, but you’ll understand once you see Origins in motion.
What’s more impressive than the visuals is how it was all made. Michel Ancel created the UBlart Framework engine that powers the graphics and gameplay which allowed for a smaller team than one would expect to work on the project.
We’ll have more on Rayman Origins come E3 next week.
