Delays could not hold back the quality of Ubisoft Montpellier's masterpiece, Rayman Legends. This game was the reason I bought a Wii U and it lived up to my expectations and more. Rayman Legends is platforming fans dream come true. The pacing is excellent, the speed and responsiveness of the controls is spot-on and the level design is genius. While all versions of Legends are great, the Wii U version stands as the definitive edition of the game. Legends for the Wii U is built from the ground-up with Nintendo's system in mind. The Wii U game pad is integrated perfectly as it is used to easily zip around the game's interactive menus and for special Murphy levels. In these Murphy levels, the player with the game pad controls the fairy-like Murphy while another player or the computer controls another character. As Murphy, the player creates a safe path for the other character by interacting with the environment through tilting the game pad or swiping the screen. I cannot talk about Rayman Legends without mentioning the superb music levels. These levels will push your platforming skills to their limits as you run, jump and bash enemies to the beat of remixed versions of Eye of the Tiger and Black Betty. Legends is so amazing that it even trumps Mario's recent efforts in the 2D platforming space. Nintendo's mascot could learn a thing or two from Ubisoft's limbless hero and this must-own title.
People have been clamouring to see Pokemon make the true jump to 3D for ages. With Pokemon X and Y, those prayers have been answered. A fully 3D world has brought on the biggest changes for the series in years. The 3D models bring new life to world of Pokemon as they make battles much more dramatic with new camera angles and attack animations. Seeing an actual Flamethrower or Bubblebeam come out of a Pokemon's mouth is an incredible sight especially when compared to the limited attack animations of past entries. Aside from choosing your gender, Pokemon X and Y offers a whole suite of customization to your avatar. You can buy new clothes, accessories and even change your haircut. This freedom allows players create an avatar that truly reflects their personal tastes. The major changes come with the addition of Mega Evolutions and the online offerings. Mega Evolutions are temporary forms that can only be used in battle. Once you have a Mega Stone for a certain Pokemon and the Mega Ring, you can unleash these powerful new forms on your foes. These new evolutions add an interesting new strategy to battle, but are limited to one Mega Evolution per battle. The online offerings for X and Y are incredible as you no longer have to go to certain locations to connect with Pokemon fans across the globe. Just enable the 3DS's wireless connection and you can connect with anybody at anytime. Trading and battling online is the same as before but the addition of Wonder Trade is just amazing. Wonder Trade may scare a few because it is anonymous trading with anybody in the world, but it is incredibly addicting and thrilling. While I can easily go on for days about the greatness of Pokemon X and Y, there are some shortcomings in the story and post-game content. Aside from those shortcomings, these games are the next big evolution for Nintendo's venerable monster hunting series.
As a sequel to arguably one of the greatest games in Legend of Zelda history, A Link to the Past, A Link Between Worlds had a lot to live up to. Funny enough, Link's first original adventure on the 3DS easily surpassed these titanic expectations by usurping tradition. For the longest time, The Legend of Zelda has been a rather linear affair. Find dungeon, collect item from dungeon, use item to beat boss, rinse and repeat. There is more to this franchise than my over-simplified explanation of its linear nature, but you get the gist of it. The first few entries in the series allowed the player to explore and complete dungeons in any order; a design choice that A Link Between Worlds fully embraces. After the first dungeon, you gain access to Rovio's shop. Through this shop, the player can buy or rent any item they need to complete whatever dungeon they want. Outright purchasing items is not available right away so you are forced to rent items. The risk of renting items comes with death as you lose all those items. It is a risk-reward system that makes the game much more intense. Early on in A Link Between Worlds, you get a bracelet that allows Link to merge with any flat surface. This bracelet opens up the game to tons of mind-bending puzzles which forces you to think in a whole different way. All-in-all, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds is a worthy successor to A Link to the Past, an outstanding entry in this series and easily this writer's runner-up for best game of 2013.
While gaming's favourite plumber may have stiff competition on the 2D platforming front, Mario is the king and ruler of the 3D platformer. Super Mario 3D World had a horrible first showing as many were expecting the next evolution of Super Mario Galaxy rather than a console sequel to Super Mario 3D Land for the 3DS. While the later trailers and gameplay footage did a better job of showing off the greatness of 3D World's gameplay, once people got their hands on this game the rest was history. Super Mario 3D World takes the excellent blend of 2D and 3D Mario gameplay introduced in 3D Land and expands on it in new and creative ways. There are a plethora of power-ups both new and old, but the one that stands head and shoulders above them all is the Cat Suit. Although this new suit makes Mario and company look all cute and cuddly, it adds the integral ability to climb walls for a set period of time and the lunge attack, which serves both as an extended jump and an offensive move. 3D World's other main feature is the four-player multiplayer. While I personally played 3D World as single player experience, the time I did spend playing multiplayer was a blast. Super Mario 3D World perfectly balances working cooperatively and competing for top honours (and that damn crown!) as players have more room in a 3D space to avoid constantly running into one another like in Super Mario Bros. Wii and U. It is incredibly hard to summarize everything that Super Mario 3D World has to offer from the brand new overworld map to the great amount of challenging bonus levels. Hands down, Super Mario 3D World is THE reason to own a Wii U.
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