Future Rayman games

[Earth Gwee]

Well, if this topic is about future Rayman games, I would like to mention that a new 3-D platformer for Rayman may be in the works, as Michel Ancel twice stated that such a game was in the planning stages. I'm really intrigued and hopeful that those plans will go somewhere. I'm even more hopeful that it will be akin to what Rayman 4 was originally going to be, but let's not awaken that sleeping giant again.

[Shrooblord]

as Michel Ancel twice stated that such a game was in the planning stages.

Seriously? When? Show us the source, please!

[Minor-T5]

Well, if this topic is about future Rayman games, I would like to mention that a new 3-D platformer for Rayman may be in the works, as Michel Ancel twice stated that such a game was in the planning stages. I'm really intrigued and hopeful that those plans will go somewhere. I'm even more hopeful that it will be akin to what Rayman 4 was originally going to be, but let's not awaken that sleeping giant again.

Hello, I'm French, a French site has published an interview with Michel Ancel, the creator of Rayman, who said that Beyond Good & Evil 2 would be started immediately after Legends, Rayman 4 will follow.
But we have still no info on these two games.
We just know that apparently, Beyond Good & Evil 2 would be available on Wii U.

[Raven_Guardian]

a random guy on youtube is not a reliable source.

[Minor-T5]

Just sayin'

[Master]

From past ordeals, I recommend you don't make those kind of claims without a reliable source, otherwise, there's a high likelihood there'll be some hostility.

[Earth Gwee]

"During the development of Rayman Origins, Michel Ancel confirmed in an interview that a new 3D Rayman platform game was planned. In another interview which took place in December 2011, Ancel reiterated this, and hinted that the new game may be based on the Rayman 4 prototype that was cancelled in 2006. It is not clear whether the game will still feature the Rabbids, despite the lengths the developers have gone to in order to separate the two series, or if the game will be reworked to feature different enemies. "

Taken straight from the article describing the cancelled prototype of Rayman Raving Rabbids. https://raymanpc.com/wiki/en/Rayman_Rav ... ototype%29 Hope that helps.

Although I will admit some fault on my part. I don't know where this information came from to make it into the article. The last thing I want is hostility.

[Haruka]

If I remember well it was during a Rayman Origins interview that he declared that.

[Master]

Wasn't it the interview Droolie translated?
Ah, here we go, here's the thing in it's entirety:

Alright, I'm doing this for the 1 ting per word deal:

INTRO
Ancel: Uhm... I have to tell you something: I'm absolutely not comfortable speaking in public, I -
Mr Bald: Oh but don't worry, there's no audience in our show.
Mr Serious: It's actually recorded.
Mr Bald: Yeah the audience is recorded, it's a fake one.
Ancel: Oh, that way. Then it'll be okay, because really... *sighs*
*camera turns to audience, audience clapping and cheering*

I'll LOL at your graves! ("J'irai loler sur vos tombes")
Announcer: We're receiving Michel Ancel, one of the masters of French videogames, the creator of Rayman, the Raving Rabbids, Beyond Good & Evil and much more!
[more uninteresting stuff about Mario 3D Land, etc] Here we go!

[5:40 - INTERVIEW]
The audience of this week is not added in later on, nope! It's real, and here in Toulouse, it's the audience of TGS (not Tokyo Game Show obviously).
Mr Serious: As I said in the news section, we've had a great month for games - and one of the biggest games was Rayman Origins, so we invited him to our show. Michel Ancel, welcome.
Michel Ancel: Hello and thanks.
Mr Serious: Michel Ancel, creator of Rayman, the Raving Rabbids, Beyond Good & Evil, and so much more. Oh, and you also received the medal of a Knight in the Arts and Letters, at the same time as Frédéric Reynald et Shigeru Miyamoto... did the guy who gave you that understand your job?
Michel Ancel: Well yes, it was star-shaped, and there is a game where you collect stars...
Mr Bald: And it's the best game of the month, right? [reference to the news section of the show, he really liked Mario 3D Land]
Michel Ancel: And he gave it to me too, so he definitely knows that [gaming] world.

Mr Bald: Alright, so we'll already go back to the beginning of your career: What made you want to step into the videogame world?
Michel Ancel: Well they gave me the choice: I could become a doctor, an astronaut, ruler of the world... and ruler of the world was a bit complicated, but I kept that in the back of my mind. And sure enough, those jobs are nice, and lots of people practise them.
Mr Bald: What, ruler of the world?
Michel Ancel: A lot of people stand on their heads to get there...Well there's not much room there. You'd have to change planets.
And, the great thing is that in the videogame industry, there weren't much people. And only nice people! But it was terrible, there were no schools or anything for videogames, we had to go to game shops were we total geeks would gather and trade games, demos, etc.
Mr Bald: Games like what?
Michel Ancel: Like uh... yeah I played Barbarian for example, a game where you had to hit people on the head. It had those sounds like "YAK!", "OUCH!" etc, and we actually found that on the diskette. So we took a microphone and replaced it all with crazy noises, that was a lot of fun. So you see, we were already videogame creators.

Mr Bald: And Rayman? The character?
Michel Ancel: Well Rayman happened because when you make a game, you need a main character really quickly. You have to go through all the worlds you have made. The character that was the easiest to use was Rayman because he didn't even have arms or legs.
Mr Bald: Why?
Michel Ancel: You can draw him really quickly.
Mr Serious: Some people say Rayman originated from a drawing you made a long time ago, as a kid. Is it real or not?
Michel Ancel: Ah, that's the legend. In fact the legend is that you really never know who's right and who isn't - and even I don't know anything!
Nah, just kidding. It was indeed a little drawing I made, and I animated it by just moving the mouth behind the face - you know, like a marionette. And the character turned out to really come to life! It became the mascot that allowed me to take my first steps in the videogame industry on computers that don't exist anymore. *laughs*
Mr Bald: Nostalgia!

[9:30]
Mr Serious: And now you just released Rayman Origins, which is a real little gem - we have to say it at some time during the episode.
Mr Bald: I'm a real fan of platforming games.
Mr Serious: And to create this game, you wanted to work worked with a really small team.
Michel Ancel: Exactly, because Rayman 1 started when I was all alone, then a programmer joined me, then an artist, then a decorator, etc.
And with Rayman Origins, I wanted to have almost the same organization. So there were 5-6 of us and we quickly produced many levels and many characters. After some time, Ubisoft said "Wow, what you're doing is really good. Better than we thought!"
Mr Serious: That's... very nice of them. *laughs*
Michel Ancel: Yeah, well it's okay too. They said they wanted the game sooner than we'd planned. We were going to make episodes, but we had to speed up and make a full game. So lots of people joined our team - but it was nice as we kept the spirit from before.
Mr Serious: Is it because the creation process of the game went so well that you wanted to share the UbiArt Framework with others?
Michel Ancel: Yes, the idea is that you can create games with it in not so much time.
Mr Serious: That's rare, normally people who make games don't share their tools...
Michel Ancel: We're working out who would be interested now, and adapting our tools to that. But yes, we really want more craziness to come from everyone who uses the tools. We demonstrated what can be done with it with Rayman, and there's a lot more to be done with it. It's only the beginning.
Mr Bald: What a beautiful game. Damn.

[11:20]
Mr Bald: So anyway, how did you feel about the creation of the Raving Rabbids?
Michel Ancel: *gulp* *in a quiet and serious tone* So... the Raving Rabbids...
Well, people ask me this question a lot. It's true that it all began with an idiocy [in French it's "crétinerie", so it's associated with "les lapins crétins"]. It's definitely not a marketing product or anything of the like. On a train between Montpellier and Paris (for a reunion), I drew a rabbit. We were in need of a new enemy quickly. Plus, a really big American magazine - Nintendo Power - wanted to cover the new Rayman... because, well... it was a Rayman game. So we were under a lot of pressure to come up with enemies super-quickly. We couldn't think clearly anymore, so we just took the first thing we came up with. And the first thing we could come up with as the super evil ruler of the world was a rabbit. And even though he was ruler of the world, he was very dumb and really evil. That's why he has those light blue eyes, he looks like he doesn't think of anything at all, his brain is just empty. And suddenly, he breaks because he doesn't understand a thing of what's going on.
Mr Bald: Can the audience do it?
Audience: BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
Michel Ancel: If you ever move furniture and it doesn't work, you can scream like that! It does you good!
Mr Bald: But they were characters for Rayman 4.
Michel Ancel: That's right.
Mr Bald: But Rayman is in fact just a really awesome platform game, right? And what happened? And that Rayman 4, where is it?
Michel Ancel: *laughs* That's a lot of questions! You'll have to choose. The genius will just answer one!
So yes, we wanted to make a platforming game in 3D, and I was really happy about that. But then, we were told "No, there's a new Nintendo, look!". Because there's a really close relationship between Ubisoft and Nintendo. So, we received one of the prototypes of the Wii, that means Nintendo sent us their stuff before it was commercialized. It was a bunch of electronics but a really incredible - you'd say something Russian, like their satellites - and we were like "don't touch that button because you'll be electrocuted!" *laughs* You'd say it came from Gaston Lagaffe.
And everyone said "Whoa! It'll be super, it'll be genius!" Well no, they didn't talk like that. I was just translating. They actually said this: "それは素晴らしいものだ！" Oh and they were really small people, too. *lowers his chair so he's at the same height as Mr Bald who is really small as well*

[13:45]
Michel Ancel: So in the beginning, we were working on Playstation 2. Then, we had to port everything to this new console we had trouble understanding. That was the Wii. At first, the Wii stuff didn't really work and we were wondering why we had to do this. It was just like a gadget made by some crazy inventor like Nintendo. So first they sent us some stuff that didn't work yet, later they replaced it with something else because the first thing was missing batteries. *laughs*
So we wondered what games we would make with this, because it didn't fit classic adventure games at all. Completely different controls! So I said to myself: I have one week before the interviewer comes here. We stop with the platforming adventure game and we'll make it a party game instead. We have to use the new controller fully, not just port a game we'd made before on it. We have to invent a new game for the motion controls. So after one week, we were able to show Nintendo Power a completely different game.
Mr Bald: But didn't you lose levels by doing that?
Michel Ancel: Yeah we lost LOTS of stuff: some characters, some... well it's not lost, of course. It could... come back. *smiles*
Mr Bald: Yes, that was the question.
Michel Ancel: Sure! There's just been a separation between Rayman and the Rabbids. The rabbids went their own game in party games, Rayman will definitely be back in 3D and - *Stupid Mr Bald interrupts him when he's maybe about to give away more info*
Mr Bald: Rayman 3 on Gamecube was really excellent.
Michel Ancel: Yeah... thanks!
Mr Bald: The first week I was first in the Hall of Fame on the internet.
Michel Ancel: Ah, that's interesting! Very nice. *claps together with the audience*
Mr Bald: No, that's not what I wanted to say, but the idea of replaying the levels for getting bonuses in the score was really awesome.

[15:30]
Mr Serious: Michel, what is Rayman Origins for you, is it a tribute to 2D gaming or is it a reaction to the new "standard" of 3D gaming?
[More coming soon!]

I think that's as far as Droolie got, it's a translation of the video below:
http://www.ankama.com/fr/video-j-irai-l ... chel-ancel

I was also running through the topic and I found this:

maybe we get Rayman Origins 2

That was actually one of the questions that made it into the interview. Wait and see.

You guys are legends.

[Shrooblord]

Oh yeah, that exclusive interview with our own questions in it. Good times.

[Master]

'Twas one of the reasons I was compelled to join after skulking 'round here for quite some time.

[skellydude7]

Ugh. Okay let's get to a new topic "FUTURE RAYMAN GAMES"
Hears a start "Rayman 5 ..."

[Xenon]

Rayman 5 will probably never exist. Nor Rayman 4. I suspect the series will evolve and the games will continue on with names rather than numbers.

[Master]

I do wonder what happens post-Legends, personally, like I've said before many-a-times, I'd like for Beyond Good and Evil 2 to finally see the light of day, before any sequel, we're fast approaching the next console generation (though PC's still seem to be at the forefront), and I think one of the setbacks to BGE2 was the technology, though I'm not 100% on that.
I'm holding out for a 3D Rayman title eventually, not that I have any problems with Rayman in 2D, but the last true 3D Rayman game was 10 years ago, with todays technology, worlds like those in Rayman 2 and 3 could look spectacular.

[Rayfist]

Rayman 5 will probably never exist. Nor Rayman 4. I suspect the series will evolve and the games will continue on with names rather than numbers.

I share this same opinion. I just can't see a 'Rayman 4' happening, not to say though we still can't expect an awesome 3d Rayman game in the future, I just don't see it being titled 'Rayman 4'

[Minor-T5]

the series will evolve and the games will continue on with names rather than numbers.

So instead of 'Rayman 4' it will probably be 'Rayman Four'.

[Xenon]

My thoughts are that Ubisoft are too worried to spend a lot of money on a completely new platformer game, and I don't blame them. They are a company looking to make a profit, after all. The games have moved on progressively over the years and the current genre is what the current market wants and requires. Why change a formula with the knowledge that the current one performs well and brings in good results?

As I said, I believe the games will evolve with technology and changing gaming patterns and I think one day we will indeed see the return of the Rayman platformer, but I think it will be incomparable to R2 and R3. At this stage though to expect Ubisoft to start working on a new platformer would be neither realistic nor desirable in terms of the game's profitability.

[GNineify]

What I'd like to see on the next 3D Rayman is a better storytelling. There's so much potential in an universe like this to write an epic, well-written story about. I sure would love it if they'll get good writers for the next 3D Rayman.

[Raven_Guardian]

still waiting for the game that will get rid off the wackiness the series suffers from since R 3...

[Haruka]

My thoughts are that Ubisoft are too worried to spend a lot of money on a completely new platformer game, and I don't blame them. They are a company looking to make a profit, after all. The games have moved on progressively over the years and the current genre is what the current market wants and requires. Why change a formula with the knowledge that the current one performs well and brings in good results?

As I said, I believe the games will evolve with technology and changing gaming patterns and I think one day we will indeed see the return of the Rayman platformer, but I think it will be incomparable to R2 and R3. At this stage though to expect Ubisoft to start working on a new platformer would be neither realistic nor desirable in terms of the game's profitability.

That's true. The gaming market changed a lot in these last 14 years, and something I've been noticing in platformers is the fashion of co-operative gameplay, super guides and "kid-friendly level designs" (to not make them cry of frustration). I think RO/RL uses the same formula.