While there's nothing wrong with mini-game collections - they can add a lot to any system library - there was an over-abundance of them in the Wii era. Major franchises were reimagined for the genre, with a particularly early example being Rayman Raving Rabbids, which brought Ubisoft's mascot onto the last-gen system and kickstarted the Rabbids' own series.
That title was 'codenamed' as Rayman 4, but that's not the whole story for what was supposed to be a major entry in the franchise. In fact, the original Rayman 4 was supposed to draw on the earliest games for platforming inspiration while taking an altogether more creative and meta approach.
As reported by Unseen64 (originally on Patreon but now shared with everyone else) a company called Phoenix Studio spent 10 months working on its project, a commission it had won through the originality of its idea. Planned for the GameCube, PS2 and Xbox, it was a rather unlucky project, with the announcements of the Wii and Xbox 360 contributing to a change in direction for the mascot.
The full lowdown is in the video below and it points to an intriguing game - it's a pity it never saw the light of day.
[source youtube.com]
Comments 29
Raving Rabbits was an abomination of a game.
@Xaessya no it wasn't. Not saying it was good but abomination is over the top.
And instead—we got Raving Rabbids.
I'd rather fall in love with Rayman 4 than origins or legends even.
That sounded like a cool game concept. Shame it never came to fruition.
That's a shame. I loved Rayman 1 and 3 (never got around to playing 2), so I would have likely enjoyed this. I'm not sure about the story though. It sounded like things could get too serious or convoluted in the game.
I think the real shame is that a bunch of people lost there jobs over this piss poor decision.
They made up for everything after legends and origins. Those are great games.
This is just plain depressing... As a massive fan of the Rayman franchise, especially 1, 2 and 3, it's really upsetting to see what could've been an incredible sequel to those three platforming classics become a (quite frankly, awful) party game which wound up getting milked for all it was worth instead of being a one-off (or having one sequel, if they must) then going back to the original plan or something similar... At least we got Origins and Legends, I guess, even if Origins is also nothing like the amazing and innovative game we saw at E3 before it went multi-plat and lost its namesake (aside from it borrowing the original visual style) and innovation...
@FierceRagnar He was sane in Rayman 1?
Edit: Come to think of it, he wasn't all there in 3 either.
Despite the crappy party games Rabbids Go Home was a fantastic action/adventure platformer-ish game. Forgotten gem.
Yes, Rabbids Go Home was good and it was great to the use the Balance Board with Rabbids TV Party too. Every game that used the Balance Board was a good game at least in effort.
All I saw was:
"Video: Learn More About the Experimental Rayman 4 That Ancel Was Considering Instead of Beyond Good & Evil 2."
Man....I wish the Rabbids had never been a thing. I hate them. They're extremely irritating and stole Rayman's spotlight, preventing potential BETTER games from seeing the light of day...like this one.
Hey, C'mon, guys... the first two raving rabbids games were fun, and while not masterpieces, they were fun party games.
Everything afterwards has been mediocre and worse. Now they're just as bad as the minions,
I love Rayman 3! Rabbids Go Home, and Raving Rabbids were also good games. It's sad that this game was never released.
Interesting stuff!
@crimsontadpoles
You should play R2 - pretty much the best of the series (aside from possibly the original, since it had a level editor on PC)
@Xaessya
However, Raving Rabbids: TV Party IS an abomination as it showed Rayman to be a TOTAL WUSS.
@Blue_Blur Off-topic but I love your avatar. I have the exact same image on my PC.
@BigDaddysPizza Yeah, I didn't mind the first two games, but the third didn't deserve the Rayman name to me. I'm glad Origins came around and put him back in the spotlight.
As for this, I definitely would have loved to see it happen. But I'm happy with Origins and Legends.
The Rabbids weren't bad, they were actually pretty funny at the time. Don't get me wrong though, I would take Rayman 4 over Rabbids. Still hoping for a Rayman 4 that's plays similar to Rayman 2.
@kamifox1 Thanks! I love it too; Sonic's so cute!
This would probably have been much cooler than those Rabbids games. Until they announced Origins I feared Rayman had been left to die.
Now I knew of the Rayman game that Raving Rabbids used to be, I remember that trailer with Rayman taking on the Rabbids had me rather hyped and I remember being very disappointed when it ended up turning into a mini-game collection. I did not however know of Phoenix Studio's prior Rayman 4 ideas. It's a real shame how the company came to a close then, though as interesting as their ideas sounded, I think I preferred what Ubisoft showed off with the initial Rayman Raving Rabbids idea (though it likely helps that Ubisoft have a video showing off their planned concepts).
Again, it does sadden me to see what Rayman Raving Rabbids turned into, as whilst I do find Raving Rabbids 2 fun, I certainly would have preferred the original idea, particularly as a fan of Rayman 2.
Only Rayman games I have ever played are Rayman 2 (N64, was ok), Origins (wii, quite good) and Legends (wii U, pretty fun, needed more music levels tho).Not a massive platforming fan, however Rayman usually provides a solid entry in my experience, especially the newest game, it was dripping in fun.
@FierceRagnar Ok, I must've imagined that insane laugh he did in Rayman 1 and the assorted insane moments on his part in 3 then. He's only really been sane in Rayman 2 and, as much as I love that game for its story, he was a boring, 2D character in that one.
This would have been fantastic.
Ressurect this Ubisoft.
And then delay it/cancel it for all Nintendo systems.
weeping
Well, I'm sure they had their reasons, but this was a promising project the way it was presented here. I also don't see why Raving Rabbids couldn't have existed along side this game. :/ Especially since the GameCube architecture was so similar to Wii and — maybe they didn't feel this at the time — conversion to Wii would have been pretty easy.
It might have been too ambitious for the studio, though. All these plans are great and the concept art and ideas look fresh even now, but did they have the chops to bring the final game anywhere near those concepts? I guess we'll never know.
No reason this concept couldn't be picked up for a return to 3D and Rayman. The concept has a good hook to it, I think.
Overall, though, it's sad. Would have rather seen them get the chance to finish it so we could judge it that way. I think the industry is even worse off for bigger games now and I can't imagine how horrifying stories from Unseen will be in a few years with the projects that could have been.
Ah, Rayman Raving Rabbids. That was an awesome game. I had a lot of fun playing it with my brothers.
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