Rayman Raving Rabbids 2

Ubisoft's Rayman released alongside the Wii last year, acting as the antithesis to Nintendo's Link; whereas Twilight Princess provided the lengthy and serious solo adventure, Rayman Raving Rabbids brought humor and mini-games. Something must have worked, as Rayman has become one of the most successful titles on the console.

One year later, Nintendo has brought back Link and gave him a crossbow to help validate the Wii Zapper, while Ubisoft has brought back Rayman and the Rabbids for a trip around the world. The Hyrulian hero and the limbless hero are more alike this year in that they are not as successful in their respective endeavors.

Cower in fear, ye mortals.

The game opens with a quaint CG scene of the Rabbids invading the world's greatest locales in flying yellow submarines and Rayman infiltrating their "super secret" headquarters (a shopping mall). However, this motivation seems under developed. While Rayman played along with these Rabbid games to earn his freedom in the original, now he just seems to be here for the sake of keeping his name in the title. There's no real story for him to act as a protagonist, no use of his skills from past games, no acknowledgment of his world or his hero status, and no expansion of his character. He might as well just be a warmly colored Rabbid.

The mall replaces the coliseum of the last game, and instead of physically moving from one mini-game to the next, players select from a number of trips. Each trip contains a series of mini-games set on one of the continents, but the the continents are mainly a loose umbrella term, since very few of the mini-games in a given set tie into their location.

At least North America has American football.

"Easy" and "Normal" difficulty settings can be chosen before each excursion, but only the youngest and most inexperienced players would need to select easy, as normal is hardly challenging. Like the original game, players will receive an instruction screen before the start of each mini-game, with a CG Rabbid demonstrating how to perform the motions.

The goal is always to earn the highest score before time runs out, and beating the pre-set high scores will reward players with new costumes and other unlockables. The costume choices are far better this time around, with the game even drawing from Ubisoft's other titles like Assassin's Creed. At the end of each mini-game, players can upload their scores using the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection to see how they compare with others from around the world. While this feature is an improvement over the original game, the lack of a full online multiplayer just seems lazy - especially for Ubisoft, which has had more time and experience with the system than any other publisher.

I cannot yet confirm the inclusion of all these parodies.

The on-rails shooting game that ended most of the stages in the original Raving Rabbids has been made into a separate attraction in the mall's plaza. Beating trips will unlock new shooting missions. The twist here is that the environments are literally photorealistic - think of interacting with a video tour of New York City during a Rabbid invasion. While the scenery change is interesting, and the shooting is as silly as before, the action simply doesn't feel as engaging. Pressing a button to reload rather than flicking the Wii Remote is less satisfying, there's no rumble for tactical feedback, and I can only wonder why reloading five plungers take the same amount of time as reloading one (which can cause unwanted point loss).

With the shooting mini-game removed, the trips instead end with a performance by the 'Rabbid band'. The Rabbid band replaces the dancing mini-game of the original, with players now able to choose from one of four instruments. Playing an instrument is no different from dancing - both require players to flick the Wii Remote and Nunchuk in time with the beat - but it is far less engaging for the single player. Flicking the controllers made practical sense when moving to a dance rhythm, but not as much when performing a guitar, drums, keyboard or vocals.

Cos-playing Rabbid musicians, how cute.
But where is the dancing?

That, and whole presentation just isn't as exciting; the dancing in the first game was fun enough to warrant getting up and shaking it, but I feel no such motivation here. The song selection is decent, featuring Rabbid-ified versions of tracks like "Smoke on the Water", "Satisfaction" and "Celebration". It's almost more entertaining to just listen to the song in the plaza's jukebox and watch as Rayman and his dressed-up Rabbid group dance away.

The other mini-games are amusing enough, but the majority are forgettable by themselves, especially with no real novel uses of the controller. That said, all of the controls in each game work well, providing a good pick-up-and-play experience for gamers of any level. For what it's worth, I've yet to encounter any frustrating mini-games like the ball mazes from the original. On the same token, this sequel contains nearly twenty fewer mini-games than the first Raving Rabbids. If Mario Party can pull off a consistent amount of mini-games over eight iterations, one would think Rayman could do the same.

Using Rabbids for batting practice is kind of fun.

Like the Mario Party series, however, Raving Ravids 2 makes little attempt at improved presentation values. The cute and comical art style is plenty intact, but the game looks almost identical to the first, and in some spots visually worse. Each mini-game takes place in a unique location, which does at least add to the variety. The sound effects are humorous and varied, like before, but I cannot figure out why Rayman makes the same noises as the Rabbids. Why bother having him sound like a Rabbid when he's not even (normally) dressed as one?

Ubisoft calls Rayman Raving Rabbids 2 the "craziest party game ever", so come back for Stage 2 to see how well that claim holds.