Yooka-Laylee

Crowdfunded hit will drive you batty – in good ways and bad.

- Chris Schilling

The two-and-a-bit-million-pound question: is Yooka-Laylee a joyous echo of the past, or a reminder that games have moved on since the late ’90s? Predictably, it’s a little bit of both. Playtonic’s spirited debut certainly owes a debt to the past of its many ex-Rare staff, but in successfully evoking the feel of those early 3D platformers, it brings with it a few unwelcome holdovers and some rough edges besides.

That isn’t to say Playtonic has treated the genre’s history with undue reverence, nor that it hasn’t attempted to modernise the old-school 3D platformer. And the benefits of revisiting the genre with current tech are soon obvious. It’s there in the early moments of the hub world, as you move from the home of the titular twosome (a laid-back chameleon and a sarcastic bat respectively) to Hivory Towers, the home of antagonist Capital B. But it’s most apparent when you plunge inside a thick tome and emerge into Tribalstack Tropics, a vast jungle world. Boasting finer detailing, smoother animation and sumptuous lighting, these are environments of a scale and scope that wouldn’t have been possible in the N64 era, even if there are technically superior games on PS4. But with a smart HUD that retreats from sight when you’re exploring, you can take in gorgeous views completely unhindered, from a snow palace that could have been ripped from Frozen concept art to a space harbour with purple skies and laser-blue seas.

TWO LOVE