Yooka-Laylee

I’d been meaning to play this game for a long time but with multiplayer and co-op grabbing my attention so thoroughly it got left by the wayside for a very long time. But then- It continued to get left by the wayside for even longer because the prior statement didn’t change. But THEN, a massive thunderstorm came along, very cross with my inability to focus on diminishing my single-player backlog and zapped my internet provider so hard they exploded! Although I can’t confirm the validity of this story, I do remember my internet being gone for about a month so on that basis it must be true.

I was trying to stave off boredom for a couple of days with games I’d played many a time before, but I was starting to crumble. Lazily scrolling through my PS4 game collection, the cursor rolled over Yooka-Laylee. I paused for a moment wondering if I wanted to play something else before remembering the situation I was in and decided now was a time as good as ever to sit down and play it and see what had become of the kickstarter campaign. Especially considering upon its release it was a hotbed for arguments and it was trendy to hate the game on YouTube for a small while.

I must admit my first impression left me pretty worried, especially since I’d had a great time with the Toybox+ demo for backing it. For a start I asked for a PS4 code instead of one for PC. I wanted to talk to friends on PS4 while playing it in comfort, slouched on my bed instead of being sat upright in a chair wrapped up in both PC and PS4 gear just so I could play a slightly prettier version. See, the thing is I wasn’t expecting the console port to only run at 30fps. For a platformer that’s pretty disappointing. The PS4 should have no issue running a Unity game at 60fps but whatever, I could overlook it if the game was good.

It felt sloppier than the smooth time I’d had on PC thanks to the slight input lag, but I soon got accustomed to it. The intro is a lot of slow trekking essentially and only the witty sense of humour in the dialogue was keeping me optimistic. Fortunately, after an entertaining reveal of the stereotypical (yet very self-aware) cartoon big baddy, you make your way to the hub world and leap into the first of the grand tomes, giant books containing the worlds you’ll explore. Here is where the journey begins proper, especially since you can meet up with Trowzer in each grand tome and trade him quills you find in exchange for moves!

As soon as I had a few more moves under my belt from the first and second world, the game felt so much better. Being able to traverse the world faster, being able to make jumps or reach areas I couldn’t before, each move is an invitation to view the environment around you differently. Sometimes you’ll be missing something you need and it won’t hit you until you pick up a new move in the future and it’s exactly that point you have the “Aha!” moment and rush off giddily back to an older level to test it. It makes old levels feel fresh again once you have an extra dimension to play with. Speaking of making old levels feel fresh again, you can expand the levels using pagies you find. (Often the reward of puzzles or other tasks you complete.)

Upon leaving a grand tome for the first time, you’re given the option to make the world you just left bigger. After this moment you can perform the expansion immediately if that’s what you’d prefer. This leaves the choice up to the player, whether they’d like to explore a more compact world then expand it or have a massive world to explore from the get-go is up to them. Personally, I liked having a small world and exploring as much as possible before cranking it open all over again. Some areas I’d explore before the world expanded by abusing invulnerability frames just for the fun of it. Then when it became available I knew how to traverse it perfectly.

Some people complain about the lack of collectibles acting as breadcrumbs like in Rare’s earlier titles, such as Banjo-Kazooie, but I enjoy the flexibility of being able to go anywhere and there not being an “expected path” for the player to follow. I liked hopping around a big world and blazing a trail of my own trying to find new areas yet to be explored properly. It led to genuine exploration as opposed to being led by the nose on a predesignated tour. The only real downside to this approach is when you’re missing a handful of quills and have genuinely no idea where they could be. That can be troublesome.

I love how you can go anywhere. Because of the open-ended level design the developers didn’t have to funnel the player. So what does this mean? What it means is there’s no bloody invisible walls ANYWHERE which is so damn refreshing. Provided the angle isn’t too steep and you don’t slip off the edge to your death, you can clamber on and over anything you see, even on tiny millimetre thin edges. If you’re crafty enough you can even access parts of the map or complete challenges far earlier than you should be able to. It’s practically a game in itself to try to crack through the intended barriers and claim the reward by your own merit.

Is it flawless? No, not even close. Sometimes the camera can be janky, those rail cart sections are horrendous, a few mini-games can be frustrating (Whoever designed the casino minigame may DEFINITELY deserves to be shot in the kneecaps) and the boss on the fourth world made me so damn angry I wanted to maul something or someone with my own damn teeth.  But overall? It’s good. Just good. But it’s solid, old-fashioned fun that doesn’t hold your hand and I can really appreciate that. I enjoyed my time playing through Yooka-Laylee, even if it wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea.

Technically, there’s five super secret collectibles as well, one for each grand tome! I found them all… With a smidgen of help mind. I found one genuinely while bumbling about in the dark. After googling what the hell it was I realised I’d found a secret. I then went on a quest for true 100% completion but got tired of searching for hours fruitlessly for something the size of a football in a map the size of a county. So, I mended this problem by getting my little brother to find the exact locations on my computer, then have him guide me by playing a game of hot or cold while I ran, rolled and clambered around the map. Hell of a lot more fun and a good laugh that way…  Thanks, buddy!