SPYRO 2: GATEWAY TO GLIMMER / RIPTO'S RAGE (1999) REVIEW

Back and better than ever before.

Playstation exclusive.

The War Z (Infestation: Survivor Stories) is a survival game published by OP Productions and developed by Hammerpoint Interactive for the Playstation, Playstation 3 and PSP.

GAMEPLAY

Levels now don’t all look and feel like their hub worlds, you can go from the peaceful Autumn Plains to the lava filled pre-historic Skelos Badlands. Every level feels far more unique, as well as a bit longer, while also filled with more things to do other than charge and flame down your enemies, as now there are plenty of mini events within the levels, such as finding someone’s lost pet, protecting baby turtles from being turned into soup, and growing plant to reach new parts of levels.

Some people didn’t enjoy the bosses in Spyro but the sequel improves these too. There may be fewer fights themselves, but they are much more fun. The fights aren’t just about chasing one enemy though a level, but strategic battles that will test how good you can really be as Spyro, the fights excellently utilise all of Spyro’s regular abilities and even some new power up ones. Without spoiling much the final fight is particularly excellent, using many of the games mechanics flawlessly.

Flight levels, or as they are now called, Speedways, are another vast improvement over the first game.

My largest complaint with Spyro 2 would have to be the obviously cut content, levels are unevenly distributed among the hub worlds, and the final hub world even forgets about the supposedly important talismans completely, as well as being a very small world in comparison to the other two.

STORY

GRAPHICS

SOUND

Stewart Copeland returns with another amazing soundtrack, although I personally felt it was a tad bit worse than the first, that’s no bad thing, as it’s still fantastic. They also went part of the way to fix the repetitive voice actors appearing, and while fewer characters sound identical, many characters still sound very similar.

VALUE FOR MONEY

The game feels a bit longer than the first game, although not by much. The bigger variety in content certainly makes it feel fresher though, and the game has a few things you can enjoy for a while on end, like Ice Hockey.

OVERALL
Spyro 2 takes the formula from the first game and improves it in almost every way, making this a must own for anyone with a Playstation.