Recent reviews by Rareware

This is the first looter shooter / extraction game I've played and I'm surprised with how much I love it. I'm a friendly player for the most part so my experience is mostly with PVE while encountering mainly other friendly players. If you DO want hostile pvp lobbies, simply kill a player and you'll be enjoying the sweat fest until you decide to play pacifist again.

The game will be overwhelming at the start, but don't let that stop you from giving the game a chance. It made me question whether I wanted to play it or not, but 40 hours later I've got a full maxed inventory, and managing that has forced me to learn what to keep and what to sell, recycle, or craft.

The last thing I'll add is how incredible I find the music and sound design to be. It makes the game feel cinematic and makes me want to load it up just to hear everything.

Overall there is a ton of content here, and I can't say what the future will hold, but if they keep adding content at a reasonable pace I could see this game lasting a very long time.

I decided to replay YL after the Replayee announcement because it's been so long and I want to be able to compare when the remaster releases. I was a backer for this game on PS4 so haven't been able to play with the updated pause music, rap inclusion, camera fixes etc. (just a bunch of QOL fixes since launch). I 100%'d both times and I will say the game does feel and look a lot better than I remember. In this review I'll be going over mostly the negatives since if you're into 3d platformer collectathons like me, you'll probably know what to expect with the good stuff.

Starting out, the controls feel smooth and quick. The camera although patched up a bit still can feel rough in some areas and not being able to look down in some sections especially in the first world makes it annoying to explore which should never be a thing in a game like this. Aside from a not-so-great camera though, moving the characters actually feels good... Before you get roll move. There is a move in the game where you can roll around on Yooka as Laylee (this games talon trot from banjo-kazooie) and turning feels awful. As if that weren't enough, there is a stamina meter in this game and this move uses it. This means when you mess up and miss quils on a ramp and try to go back and fail cause the controls are rough, you run out of stamina and have to wait for it to refill before attempting again. I don't just mean wait while standing still by the way. You actually have to stand there for like 5 seconds before the stamina bar starts refilling when it shouldn't even be there in the first place. This is very frustrating sometimes but I will say aside from this everything feels good to use (at least to me). I'm hoping they change this in the remaster.

Talking about the actual gameplay itself, there are some moments where you wonder "how do I get that" in world 1 even, only to later come to realise you're not able to do that without a move from world 4 and that's where the backtracking comes in. I feel like a hint or some indication you need a new move would've helped a lot in some areas. As for backtracking itself, honestly, I don't mind it and there isn't a ton but I know some people do so that's something to keep in mind.

In terms of game progression, the way you progress is pretty simple. You need to open a world with Pagies collected from other worlds, and you can also expand the same worlds with the same method. I chose to expand upon opening each world but if you like to take things slow and come back you can do so by expanding later. I like to take everything in all at once so it's nice to have the ability to play how you want. Not only that, but you need a lot less of the Pagies overall (100 out of 145) to beat the game so you can skip some things that you don't enjoy if you don't care about 100%ing.

As for the visuals and polish, the first world has the most polish and looks the best. One thing about this game is it has areas that look amazing, and others that look awful. Most of the game does look pretty but the areas that look unpolished make the overall look feel a bit cheap to be honest. There are also just areas where it feels weird to be able to access them. For example you can climb rocks with tiny ledges around the map making it feel like it is intended, only to find out you went around the map for nothing. Then in the hub you'll climb up rocks at the side of the map and run into a weirdly placed invisible ceiling. A way to fix this would be to not have YL be able to walk on the areas that lead to nothing as a form of polish. This isn't a problem in all of the worlds but in world 1 you definitely feel like these rocks are almost thrown in without any thought put into them, and being able traverse them makes this it feel like a unity project rather than a game at times. There are a few charming characters but most do feel forgettable and this is mostly due to them just standing in the middle of the map looking the same in each world and not actually living in it. Could at least give these characters like Trouser or the octopus a hut or something!

Overall, the game itself though is a fun experience. 100%ing feels satisfying, bosses feel good to play, most pagies are fun to collect. The only gameplay that feels bad in my opinion are the arcade mini-games and minecart sections (basically when you're not platforming. I feel like they should've gone for 2d in these modes and it would've been fine, because the minecart section in 3d is jank and bullets go forward rather than following the minecart path, and the arcade games make 0 sense being essentially mario party minigames rather than 8-bit retro game parodies which I would've prefered. The thing about the rextro arcade games too is you have to play them twice (one to beat it and once again to beat rextro's high score (even if you beat his high score the first time it doesn't count)). Are the worlds big? Yes. I however enjoyed the big worlds because I find it fun to run around and get lost in them. I just wish there were more reward for exploration and things to do with these wide open areas but I'm in disagreement with the complaints the worlds are too barren with not much to do.

My final thoughts: I really liked this game. I hope the remaster and eventual sequel don't change too much but do fix the things people complained about and make the games feel even more enjoyable to play. 7/10.

The game is very unpolished with textures, UI, animation, shadows, camera, design etc. The game does have potential to be good but a lot of work needs to be done if they want this game to take off. As others have said, the npcs feel lifeless and the town feels empty. I'd hope in the future this game is great but as it stands it's not very good.

The game is very addicting and fun to play as both survivor and killer. For as simple as the game seems, it has a ton of depth and replay-ability. I feel like cosmetic prices should be cheaper and the graphics/animations are outdated, but the game-play itself is very fun.

Game is a ton of fun solo but even better when playing with others. Pure chaos.

Surprisingly fun 2hr game for a free april fools release. The music and writing are great.

This game is lots of fun and is a must play for any collectathon fans imo. The worlds look great, sound great and are fun to explore. Enemy variety is pretty good, but they don't function well (I'll get into that later). The boss fights / levels are neat and can be fun when things function correctly, but most of the time they don't (again, gonna talk about the issues below). There are 10 main collectables per world, a TON of mini collectables scattered throughout (like notes in banjo-kazooie) and some easter eggs to find. With 11(?) worlds to explore, 100+ main collectable items and 10,000 of the mini collectables, there's a ton to do in this game. Graphically, It looks real good in some areas but in others it just looks bad. Overall though, I feel like if you're into 3D platformers you should give this a go now or wait for potential future updates if you can.

So there are a lot of issues with this game. Hitboxes that make no sense, a ledge grab glitch that can softlock you and ruin your progress for the save 5 animals type quests plus having to reopen every door. Enemies also feel very weird to hit, as they don't get knocked back so you can get hit unless you run away straight after. Not satisfying at all and makes no sense for them to keep walking to you unaffected. Very bad performance issues. I play on an RTX 3080, Ryzen 3800x, 16gb ram and I had fps dips (bad ones) while playing at 1080p. Cutscenes feel unfinished. They'll end abruptly or go on for too long. The mumble voices activate when talking to an npc and can either stop, reset or keep going depending on when you exit the dialogue and it's very buggy. Plus, it doesn't sound very good. The repetitive lines like "CLIVE" or the humming when you exit to the hub get annoying fast. Speaking of the hub, there is no way to view your totals per world, even in the hub. There is also no way to get to the boss of a world without exiting to the hub, re-entering the world's area in the hub and entering the boss fight. I feel like this would be an easy fix if you could "exit area" and spawn right outside of the world you entered. This would make boss re-fights feel less tedious when achievement hunting.

I know that's a lot of complaints for a game I recommend, but I feel like if they were fixed this would be a GREAT game. Hopefully they update it.

Fun, solid 3D platformer that plays better than Rehydrated. Lots to collect and a couple post-game missions to do while collecting/backtracking for things you might have missed. The dialogue even changes when re-entering worlds post-game so that was neat. I did miss having golden spatulas rewarded to you as you progress but it's pretty much the same thing here without "you've earned a golden spatula!" I do wish the final boss was better. Pretty underwhelming since it wasn't anything special. Just an arena where you hit the boss a few times while dodging projectiles. 7.5/10

This game is fun to play but unfortunately the online isn't very active and it hasn't even been out for 2 months. If you have a couple friends who prefer a more fast moving game than Ultimate and is more similar (though not the same) to Melee, this one is a good pick.

If you're a fan of Rhythm Heaven, get this game. It's about 2-3 hours in length atm but they apparently plan to add a couple more worlds (currently 4) for the full release. The gameplay, music, charm and sfx all remind me of Rhythm Heaven which is why I say if you're a fan of that series, you'll very likely enjoy the experience here. The only thing that you might not like is it's basically one of the Rhythm Heaven minigames for the entirety of the game (a doctor trying to help patients with their hearts), but they change up the way you play and how things function/look so often that it doesn't take away from the experience for me. In fact some of the ways they spice it up put a smile on my face, I was shocked, but I won't spoil anything. The reason I have 10 hours and counting is because there is a create mode where you can make your own rhythm games from your own music, and download them as well via workshop, and that's been fun. It's super customizable and people have created amazing things. Check out the cadence of hyrule one if you get it. There isn't much to download at the moment but hopefully over time there will be plenty to choose from. So far I'd give this game a solid 8.5/10. Could be longer (assuming the next 2 worlds are the same length), could have more to do, could have missions or collectables or something but what it has already makes it great. That would just make it even better.