‘Rayman Origins’ tests skills you haven’t used in years

In my run of Rayman Origins I discovered you don’t necessarily need a relationship with Ubisoft’s platform franchise in order to enjoy the newest entry. Although the plot involves Rayman and his friends stopping an army of creatures sent to take over their land, I almost forgot the story partway through and still had a great time. By the way, why are they stopping these creatures? Because Rayman and his friends SNORE IN THEIR SLEEP and it annoyed the granny of the Land of the Livid Dead.

Rayman Origins embodies the spirit of the platform games of yesteryear, like Adventure Island or Donkey Kong Country (and even R-Type). Its bright, colorful, and sharp high-resolution 2D visuals lure you in, welcoming you to what initially seems like a happy romp through some levels, until the difficulty kicks in. Rayman Origins then becomes sixty something levels of pushing your ‘old school’ limits.

Why not commemorate the occasion?

You will jump, punch, kick, swim, climb your way to victory, and along the way you can collect a number of Lums (glowing golden bee-like… things), which help to free the Electoons (magenta-like… Wonka candy creatures…) that help open up new paths to new worlds and treasure. Each new path has a wondrous design with its own elemental theme: sky, earth, water, ice, fire, along with some fun, almost random choices thrown into the mix: there is one level comprised of cooked foods, another with pieces of fruit as the backdrop. A lot of the game’s challenge comes from its requirement of timing and planning. In the beginning, the timing and planning is typically for catching a hidden group of Lums or grabbing a gold medal. The later stages practically require practice, possible memorization, which in turn requires trial and error. Luckily the game gives you an infinite amount of chances to get it right, and even takes pity on you if you have failed repeatedly.

On top of the challenge, Rayman Origins offers a lot to keep coming back: cooperative modes, secret treasures to collect, characters to unlock, and even a time attack mode. It is an amazing package of classic platforming, gorgeous graphics, and also boasting a soundtrack comprised of bluegrass medleys and Afrobeat pieces that set the friendly atmosphere, which would be almost relaxing if not for the whole ‘trying to not die’ thing.

It’s ‘Resident Evil’ Day! (Update: Now with trailer!)

Well, sort of.

Starting today, if you head over to the eShop on your Nintendo 3DS, you’re bound to find the demo for Capcom’s upcoming Resident Evil: Revelations, due for North American release on February 7th. Fan favorite Jill Valentine will be the main (playable) character, and it is set in 2005, taking place between Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 5. The game will also release bundled with the controversial Circle Pad Pro accessory, which is exclusive at GameStop. In a rather strange decision, 3DS users are limited to 30 uses of the demo. The demo itself uses 1,146 blocks of memory.

Perhaps the bigger news today is this image that sprang up like a wild Pokémon:

Resident Evil 6 will see a release date of November 20 of this year, available for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Perhaps we’ll see Resident Evil 6: Wii U Edition some time in the future. The game will feature Chris Redfield and Leon Kennedy, debuting in the first two games respectively, together for the first time in a series entry. Ada Wong supposedly plays a role also and will be a playable character.

Credit to IGN for the image. They have more details here:

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Update! The first trailer for Resident Evil 6 has been released via Capcom Unity!

In the midst of Microsoft’s customer “service,” we find a heroine.

Happy new year, everyone. This is not the first post I intended to open 2012 with, but this a very interesting development:

Back in late September, I had written a piece about my friend whose Xbox Live account saw unauthorized access and unauthorized charges to her credit card. What followed was an aggravating attempt to communicate with Microsoft, who claimed to have suspended her account in order to investigate the matter even though she was still able to access her account. They came up short. Furthermore, they flat out refused service on the basis that she used an alternate, shortened form of her name which violated their terms of service.

Yet according to Xbox Live Director of Policy Stephen Toulouse, no such policy exists. So, what’s up?

No solid answer has yet to surface. Some are claiming it is a Windows Live ID issue, according to at least one testimony in this article from Joystiq. Microsoft has denied otherwise. Their response is akin to running around like headless chickens or perhaps like an ostrich with its head in the sand.

I mean, Christ, there’s yet another NeoGAF thread about it made on January 6 of this year. In this entire mess, though, someone has gone the extra mile.

Her name is Susan, who was victimized and had her Xbox Live account stolen and sold overseas. She went above and beyond and tracked down where her account ended up and eventually made contact with the person who bought the account. She got all the information Microsoft failed to do.

You can read her story and the plight of other frustrated customers on her page: Hacked on Xbox

So thank you, Susan, for all of your efforts. I wish I could have helped out my friend more on the matter but hopefully Microsoft sees that this is not a problem to be swept under the rug.

To a productive year!