Favourite Rayman Game Survey

[Master]

Well, we're nearing the end of the year, and thus, the end of this year's survey. So far, it looks like it's between the two 3D titles, though Rayman 3 seems to be edging out again. I think at some point soon, I'm going to have to start figuring out how I'm going to present the results, and also what changes I'd make for the 2018 version of the survey. Ideally, I'd like for the surveys to allow for us to see if fan opinion shifts. For instance, I have been intrigued of late as to how Rayman 3 has gotten the majority, given how it was Rayman 2 that got all the praise a few years back. Hence why I'm going for a yearly cycle.

As for changes, I'm wondering if I should ask respondents to order the games in difficulty. I'd imagine Rayman 1 probably would top that list, but I'm not so sure about what would follow.

[Haruka]

Yeah, and it also feels like parts of Rayman 2, especially the original versions, and despite the great atmosphere, had some emptiness and lack of excitement. Revolution did help fill the void with additions like voice acting, more interactions with different characters, free roaming and extra battles, but it wasn't enough in my opinion. I honestly don't play the PC version much anymore. I don't have as much fun with it as I do with Revolution.

The music though I favor Rayman 2 over Rayman 3. R3 for sure has its moments but Rayman 2 has the more memorable music.

That's a feeling I've grown in these latest years: I see myself playing much more the PS2 version than the other versions now for the same reasons you've pointed. Rayman 2 is a game that would benefit a lot from a ground-up remake, it could recover its 1999 glory if things were done right. A combat more of the kinds of R3 would be quite welcomed.

Music is probably the main reason why I prefer Rayman 2 over Rayman 3. Here's why.

This track and many, many other tracks that sound more or less the same and when combined, take up 75% of the entire game.

Rayman 3 uses combat themes way more often than Rayman 2 does, and they aren't even very good IMO. R3's exploration themes are good to great, but they're constantly interrupted by... ugh:

In some worlds the devs just decide to throw Hoodlum after Hoodlum at you, making that music last longer. Because of that I find it a slog to play through many parts of Clearleaf Forest, the Bog of Murk, Hoodlum Headquarters and the Tower of the Leptys. That's almost half the game. I always liked the other worlds more, but my recent playthrough made me realize how much I hate that every fight completely breaks the atmosphere of the level, and I think that happens most in the worlds I named. The Land of the Livid Dead also suffers from it quite a bit, but that world's exploration music (when it plays, at least) and nice environments make up for it.

I also prefer R2/Revolution for most other artistic aspects like world design, character design (R3's power-up forms look awful) and script (wasn't really a fan of R3's humor, I prefer a simple plot like R2's to it), but R3 has the best Rayman combat. It's certainly much better than R2's. I like the curved punches, and I like having to fight each type of Hoodlum differently. As for overall gameplay, I feel like R3's gameplay is well thought-out, but R2 had more puzzle-like challenges and a larger variety of minigames that were integrated into the main game, as part of Rayman's adventure. So I think I still prefer R2 for gameplay as well.
Anyway, music is the main thing I like about games, and it not being good enough or not being used well enough for my tastes has kind of made me not like R3 as much as I used to. I think I might even prefer RL over it now.

+1

That Muddibog music is one of the worst they have brought up in Rayman 3, without doubt.

As for changes, I'm wondering if I should ask respondents to order the games in difficulty. I'd imagine Rayman 1 probably would top that list, but I'm not so sure about what would follow.

I would say that Rayman Designer is much more difficult than Rayman 1. It carries new event elements that were not present in Rayman 1 (like the balloons) and the 24 levels in general do put the players into a test to their skills. Rayman 1 was more like a training in my opinion. A lot of people wouldn't survive Rayman Designer, modesty apart. Rayman By His Fans doesn't win because it wasn't really designed by Ubisoft but yes by fans who somehow won the contest with very confusing level designs.

[PluMGMK]

Not just confusing, occasionally broken. I recall being on an oscillating pencil on whose path the designer had stupidly placed falling types. Next thing I knew Rayman was doing his falling animation while still on the pencil, so he couldn't move, but the pencil prevented him from reaching the bottom of the screen and actually dying. Result: had to quit the game.

And yes, Rayman Designer is extremely hard. I didn't actually complete all the levels until I was 19!

[hogsy]

Just completed the survey, gotta say that despite Rayman 2 certainly having a greater impact on my childhood I did find myself enjoying Rayman 3 considerably and it's certainly been my favorite title thus far. The gameplay and the soundtrack were for sure the stand-outs for me.

By the way, the final remarks on the survey, while probably pretty childish, made me chuckle.

[Master]

Wow, I can't believe this has almost reached a year of running.

Right, as I think I've mentioned before, but I'll mention again, my intention for this survey was that it was to run annually, so that we could see how attitudes shift in the fandom. As such, once New Years arrives, I will be closing the 2017 survey, and will open a new 2018 survey. Once that happens, everyone can answer the new survey again, and if all goes to plan, we'll be able to compare results from this year and next years survey, and see how attitudes have changed.

I've also added some new questions to this new survey, just for the fun of it. I'll see if I can't calculate a few statistics also for the results for this year's survey, though be warned that I'm not a statistician. The results and spreadsheet will remain open to view, if anyone is interested in looking at results.

[PluMGMK]

Nice. I suppose I should try to replay the series between now and then to see if my opinions change.

[Adsolution]

I totally agree with you 502, Rayman 2 has not aged greatly despite my past constant attempts to fanboy the hell out of it. The combat is really bad, the games constant use of similar color choices through out levels, and the lack of enemy variety. Although I still find a good amount of enjoyment out of it, I feel like I've had a hard time enjoying it as much as I've used to. And despite Rayman 3 not having much of Ancel's involvement, it's level variety feels far more diverse and it's combat feels far more fluid.

To me, the artstyle (including the "similar colour choices") are superbly pleasing. I think it's one of the prettiest-looking games I've ever seen - a feeling only grows every time I revisit it - and it manages to achieve that without relying on environmental tropes and flashy colours. I have no complaints regarding the art direction, personally.

The platforming mechanics I think are also some of the most fluid I've ever felt, even to this day. Rayman runs pretty fast and jumping from platform to platform without using the helicopter makes you feel like a momentous acrobat. He's flexible and easy to control mid-air.

I'm also not sure what "empty areas" are being referred to, since I can't really think of any; the game is very conservative with its level design. In almost every case you can run across the wider-open areas in seconds, and there's usually some kind of puzzle or platforming challenge right next to you. As a result, I think one of Rayman 2's greatest strengths is its ability to remain engaging with so little combat to pad it out. The game is almost purely focused on simply navigating the environments, something actually quite unusual for 3D platformers which usually focus on prioritising enemies as obstacles, and is one of the most faithful 3D adaptations of the concept of a linear sidescroller out there.

I do agree Rayman 3 has more replay value from a gameplay standpoint, largely because of the combat and scoring system, but that's no longer looking at the game from a fresh point of view.

[Master]

As a heads up, I intend to close the 2017 survey in less than 24 hours from now. If you wish to take the survey before the new one opens, I suggest you do so quickly. I'll look into tidying up the spreadsheet and I'll post some basic stats.

Once New Year's hits, I'll open the 2018 survey for all to fill in. With any luck, we'll see if there's any shift in fan opinions come this time next year.

[Serza5]

I haven't been able to play much of Rayman this year, as much as I do know own the GoG versions of 2 & 3 (Which annoy me due to my inability to play fullscreen games anymore but alas). Back in the day a lot of people favoured R2 for it's general atmosphere, and as much as I agree that R3 has the most superior 3D graphics of all titles and a good soundtrack I still find myself far more attached to R2 partially for the previously mentioned atmosphere. On top of that part of R3's personal downfall for me is that I don't have that much replay value with it since I am not that much interested in the score system due to finding the whole thing tedious. I would definetely place R3 in among my top 15 games of all time but unless a sudden replay of either does happen to change my mind my heart still lingers for R2.

[Master]

Right all, the 2017 Survey is closed. You can find the results here, and the spreadsheet here.

So, we end with Rayman 2 and Rayman 3 with an equal share of favour, with 42.4% each, which makes a whopping 84.4% favouritism towards the 3D titles in the series. After that, we have Rayman 1 with 11.9% favour, and the UbiArt titles with 1.7% each, totalling 3.4% of preference.

While Rayman 2 and 3 are equally favoured, Rayman 2 remains king when it comes to user scores. Having a greater average score compared to Rayman 3. It's also interesting to note that only the 3D titles average scores were above 8, all the 2D game's average scores were between 7 and 8. Guess the calls for a new 3D title makes sense with these preferences in mind.

I've generated a Box Plot of the scores, and have also calculated some averages and other stats:


For Rayman 1
Mean: 7.368421
Mode: 8.000000
Median: 8.000000
Standard Deviation: 1.828657

For Rayman 2
Mean: 8.728814
Mode: 10.000000
Median: 9.000000
Standard Deviation: 1.297617

For Rayman 3
Mean: 8.457627
Mode: 9.000000
Median: 9.000000
Standard Deviation: 1.343208

For Rayman Origins
Mean: 7.847458
Mode: 8.000000
Median: 8.000000
Standard Deviation: 1.436153

For Rayman Legends
Mean: 7.857143
Mode: 8.000000
Median: 8.000000
Standard Deviation: 1.688771

----

Thanks to all who filled in the survey, and I hope you'll all be sure to give the 2018 survey a shot when it's up too, and perhaps newer faces might also give the survey a shot. And let's see if attitudes have shifted come this time next year!

[Serza5]

That difficulty question was mean because I find the games difficult to compete against each other since most titles only had 1 thing I found difficult-

For Rayman 2 I rated that the easiest since it's generally not hard unless you have a bad port like Rayman DS.
Next one would be Rayman Origins since finishing the story was pretty easy but completing it is hard- especially on the treasure hunt sequences which is a nightmare on wii version due to controls.
Rayman 3 is barely above RO because I remember replaying it a while back and trying to complete the very last level was really hard due to one particular platform element. I also added points for the score system increasing the difficulty if you're trying to go for that too.
Next two games I haven't completed which is why they ranked highest- only R1 takes the cake as the one I didnt complete since I actually found it hard.

[Pirez]

Dayum, some niggas rating Origins and Legends 0/10 in this year's survey? That's harsh, even knowing what kind of trolls dwell in here.

[Master]

0s are meant to indicate "no opinion," and I don't count them in the average score calculation. The lowest score counted is 1.

[Pirez]

Ow, okay. If this info is in the survey I sure have missed it ^^"""

[Master]

Ow, okay. If this info is in the survey I sure have missed it ^^"""

I did mention it in the text introducing the rating section of the survey. I've gone and added some All-Caps text and a note to emphasise that point.

[Hunchman801]

Great job Master, I've just filled the new survey! I was surprised to find that the original game was given such low scores, though I now remember that some of our (previous) members have very strong opinions on the matter.

[Master]

Well, it looks like we've got quite a few responses, already at 30, which just over half as many responses we got for last year's survey. With the survey still being filled in, I wanted to take note of potential improvements for next year's survey. I never did properly jot down potential avenues for improvement for when I was working on this years', which has led to some haphazardness, I feel.

• Change the difficulty rating system to a score rather than ranking
• Ask if surveyees have played each title, and prevent them from giving ratings and answers to games they've not played
• Possibly scrap the favourite aspect questions, and replace with scoring each game's aspects, and find a way to prevent cop-out answers like "everything"
• See if I can't find a way to calculate stats and box-plots within the spreadsheet
• Give better explanations for the future approach question. One asking about gameplay, other asking about lore.
• Questions about how players play each game (DualShock 3/4 Controller, Xbox 360/One Controller, KB+/m?)
• Use game specific sections to ask specific questions, such as the favourite version of R1/R2, MIDI/Recorded etc.
• Question on RL:DE? Is it worthy of the Definitive Edition moniker?

Also, blimey, the UbiArt titles certainly don't resonate, over 50% of respondents at present have said they don't want to see any inspiration from a UbiArt title in a future game.

[Ray502]

So I was going to do the 2018 survey, then...



First RayTunes, now this.

EDIT: These are the errors I discovered when the page was loading.

Code: Select all

Loading failed for the <script> with source “https://www.gstatic.com/_/freebird/_/js/k=freebird.v.en.6MD8j25xDoE.O/m=viewer_base/rt=j/d=1/rs=AMjVe6iqsoZy5KjN77O50xKKxOrO5U4kKA”.
viewform:496

Loading failed for the <script> with source “https://www.gstatic.com/recaptcha/api2/v1517207450225/recaptcha__en.js”.
viewform:1

Can anyone help out? It didn't used to do this.

[RayCarrot]

Have you tried doing a full refresh by pressing CTRL + F5 ? That usually solves these type of issues.

[Droolie]

First RayTunes, now this.

It's the same error too I'd bet there's something wrong with your Firefox installation because in all my years of using Firefox I've never had scripts randomly not loading.