Super Lucky’s Tale

Now if I was reviewing this game based on the original version, I would say that while I love it, it isn't perfect because it does have a somewhat clunky control scheme. Fortunately, the remake fixes this control scheme and since that doesn't have its own page on this site, I'll be combining both versions in this review of mine.

The only bad thing I have to say of the original are the controls, this is because lucky is a quadruped protagonist (meaning he walks on all fours as opposed to most heroes which are bipedal and walk on two legs.) This wouldn't be a problem if the game was like Spyro where the environments are wide open to accommodate for this control scheme, however its clearly emulating the gameplay of Mario or sonic, meaning the spaces aren't built for this control scheme. It doesn’t make the game unplayable by any means, rather it's simply more frustrating than it needed to be as lucky needs to run up to make a jump rather than simply jumping on the spot like most platform's mascots. Something I don't like about the remake on the other hand is that some of the content from the original is cut, particularly in the final hub world as the lady meowmalade dlc is now part of the main campaign, which of course means the last stage had to be reworked to remove her red herring as its main boss and instead focus on jinx as the main boss. There are other changes such as the removal of the lucky statutes in each home world, however they're not worth commenting on here as they admittedly didn't add much in the original.

Time to talk about what both versions get right, first off, the game looks gorgeous thanks to a great art style and presentation. It's clearly a throwback to classic nes and Sega games but with a 3d environment which the developers did a good job with. While this is clearly a kid’s game, it isn't too childish that you would be embarrassed playing this as an adult thanks to clever puzzles and a decent challenge (more so in the original for the latter due to the control scheme.) It does borrow from the Disney formula by having letters to collect that spell out our hero’s name as well as there being side quests to earn clovers that are needed to progress through the game, however this is clearly taken from banjo Kazooie as that was that game’s main mechanic (it even has the obligatory coin collectathon mechanics most 3d platformers have.) The game also borrows from crash bandicoot (mainly twinsanity) as the levels are a mix of side scrollers and more open world areas, this spicing up the gameplay from stage to stage. Also, this is a personal indulgence, but since foxes are my favourite animals (if you couldn't tell by my username or fox avatar) and cats are my least favourite, the premise of our fox hero defeating the evil cats looking to destroy this world is an obvious winner for me even if that's as complex as the story gets here.

It’s a fantastic entry point into 3d platformers that I highly recommend, although maybe go with the remake first before returning to the original if you want a more solid experience.