REVIEW – After twenty years since the release of Spyro the Dragon for the first PlayStation, Activision has decided to reunite its original trilogy as it did with Crash Bandicoot. In the review of Spyro: Reignited Trilogy, we tell you all the details of this huge visual remake of the classic.

Recently, playing Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, I arrived in Athens and contemplated the city-state with its many painted statues. Moreover, although it is well known that the sculptures were painted with colours in detail, we have assumed that marble and white stone characteristic of Greece, to the point that you find it strange to see them coloured, even if you know it. The first PlayStation and in general the fifth generation of consoles had a similar effect. We remember it with love, but with games that today can be rough to play and somewhat antiquated in the graphics aspect, due to being the first games in three dimensions. However, revisiting the original Spyro now that its remake Reignited Trilogy has come out, I realize that the memory failed me. The purple dragon was controlled more than correctly back in 1998. I just needed a little sheet metal and painted to rejuvenate twenty years, and that is precisely what the guys at Toys for Bob have done. Keep intact gameplay and respect the original work, showing that, at least regarding the little dragon, the fun has not aged nor a scale.

Captivated

You just have to take a walk for your first game, Spyro the Dragon to return to be fascinated by this attractive world. Everything is exactly where you remembered it, but at the same time, it is different. Those little-detailed polygons can now pass perfectly through a movie, while the number of animations that give life to Spyro does not hinder or change the same gameplay of the late nineties. It is difficult not to be surprised by the number of details, however, of the environment. From the burned grass left by the protagonist’s breath of fire to the quality of each of the stages, its bright colours and, above all, the detail of its characters.

Each and every one of the dragons that we have to rescue is unique and with a level of detail that is embarrassing even to see them more on the screen. The same goes for the enemies. Their expressions and movements can tear a smile from you, and it’s nice to see them hiding in stores, parading Napoleonically, in uniform and everything, crashing into walls or against themselves while you appreciate the careful work that has been put on their behalf.

Even patterns of movements and attacks are now more colourful and make it more transparent to the player how to act. I do not know how to emphasize enough the great work done in giving life to the whole world of Spyro, except to urge any player to see the detail of any level or enemy in the comparison between Spyro: Reignited Trilogy and the original to discover the hard work printed in work.

The adventure begins…

Spyro has never seemed a difficult game, neither to me nor to anyone, probably, because their genre, halfway between the action and the platforms (or the remake of Crash Bandicoot ), can mislead you. However, that does not mean that discovering all its secrets is easy. Surprise, as perhaps he did not in his time, meet with enemies who save very few occasions do not try to put you in any trouble, and you notice that character that sought above all to dazzle your self of twenty years ago. However, even so, it is still more or more interesting to discover all its corners and find all the dragons, spheres or eggs of each level with some genuinely hidden in the mapping. There is a special charm in this structure of levels that invites us to explore each of its corners, and that still can hide many treasures to discover.

However, I better go game by game than this Spyro, Reignited Trilogy: Spyro the Dragon. It is the most classic and is probably the one that pulls the most nostalgia for those of us who only played one of them in his time. This nostalgic mood invites us also to ignore that it is the simplest of the three, particularly for its repetitive structure, which consists of several worlds with levels to explore in a relatively simple approach, which urges us to look for all the objects on the stage. However, there is a strange pleasure in cleaning each zone until the longed for 100% that only the great games know how to dominate and not reduce it to simple collectables. At the beginning, it is as simple as exploring the level, but it does not take long to discover that many treasures are not at first sight, while the egg thieves try to hide more and more, so you have to pay attention to their mocking laughter to detect them. What to say about the phases of flight, which add variety and are much enjoyed with the challenge of getting all the elements cleaned in one go, and that in each game are becoming increasingly intricate.

Spyro the Dragon is and always will be a charming game that perhaps would not have endured the type in this trilogy if the following parts retained an identical structure. However, both Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage as Spyro: Year of the Dragon are two great sequels that curl the curl to add just what the first lacks. The treasures cease to be pure collectables and have an end, unlock skills and other elements through a character that will require a succulent amount of gems. These skills are also mandatory to advance and access areas of the map that you could not before, delving into the basic structure of the game and encouraging justified backtracking, to get all the juice at each level. The mini-games, puzzles and challenges enrich the experience even more, and its duration is correct. In total, more than twenty hours for the three games that, played often, may end up fatiguing, but well dosed they feedback.

There is not much more in work than what you see and catch on its own. It is a visual remake because Activision and Toys for Bob saw that there was little to add and it was better to respect the product as it was with the graphic improvement. Of course, there are small adjustments in both the control scheme and the options that make the experience more comfortable for modern times. Some extra challenges have also been added, as internal achievements, for those who seek to delve deeper into their intricate jumps and hiding places, but the game focuses on how pleasant it was always to control the Spyro glide, that slight float in the second and third, while we attacked with our dragon’s breath and rammed with the horns.

Camera problems

The camera is, without a doubt, the weak point. It has a particular habit of automatically focusing on the attack that has sometimes taken me out of my box. However, although the game offers some camera option, it refuses to provide adjustments that we can retouch. Surprising how lame it is regarding playable and visual options. Removing the high possibility of alternating between the original soundtrack or remixed, it would not have hurt any extra opportunity in the technical aspect, because turning the camera produces a blur effect somewhat uncomfortable and at times there are slumps in the rate of frames that blur the work put in the remake. Nor does it help that a collection as nostalgic and prone to collecting as this Reignited Trilogy is not entirely included in the physical disk and requires a download. It is something that does not influence my assessment,

For whatever reason, I had not approached Spyro since its launch two decades ago and had a somewhat distorted picture of the past. These remakes help and much both to discover the best works of the purple dragon for the new generations and to shake off certain prejudices. Because some of the first three-dimensional games may have control problems that are difficult to solve by today’s standards, or even quite poor frame rates, but in the case of Spyro, all it needed was a graphic remodelling to show that some styles they do not know the age I do not know why he missed me. At the end of the day, we are talking about an Insomniac that already shone as it does now. How good and important it is to rediscover the past.

Spyro: Reignited Trilogy is a fantastic visual remake that brings us all the gameplay of Spyro intact to discover a work that still has much to say, retouching its visual pillars until reaching the fantastic level of an animated film. Three games that complement each other, adding more and more depth to the base idea. It is not free of problems, such as those produced by the camera or some frame slumps at certain times.

-BadSector-

Publisher: Activision

Developer: Toys for Bob

Genre: platformer

Release date: November 13, 2018