PlayStation Game Recommendations | mariteaux

[#] Spyro the Dragon (Sony, PlayStation, 1998)

Thank you for releasing me!

Usually paired up with similarly colorful PS1 protagonist Crash Bandicoot, for as far as I can throw him, Spyro the Dragon is just all around the more fun game. A typical 3D platformer collectathon for sure, as you rescue much larger dragons from their crystalline prisons, gather gems, and use your horns and flames to torch that Gnasty Gnorc and all his many minions, but it's one that's just done really well, and it's such a short game with so little backtracking that it's honestly hard not to go for 100% no matter what.

Spyro's lands are lush and surprisingly sprawling for a PS1 game (aided by a highly-touted level of detail system not usually seen on the PlayStation), and all of Spyro's glides and Supercharges let him cover some impressive distances. The inventive level design recognizes that you can always hide stuff on the other side and finds interesting ways to loop and link islands together. There's just a lot of magic in their visual language, from the emphysema deserts of Peace Keepers to the night terrors in the world of Dream Weavers.

The first Spyro, above all else, is distilled dopamine. The final level recognizes that number going up is the greatest joy in gaming, as is a perfectly done flight level. Nothing's perfect (you're probably going to go through a few lives getting to grips with the Supercharge ramp mechanics on the foggy Tree Tops level), but Spyro perfectly encapsulates why I take Insomniac games over Naughty Dog's any day. Naughty Dog might be more technically inventive, but Insomniac gets why I play games way better.

(I have 100%ed this game three times, twice on the American version and once on the Japanese version. The Japanese one is uniquely wonky and makes things, from the static camera to Sparx not changing color when you take damage to nerfing the advanced Supercharge mechanics that make Tree Tops way easier, a lot harder than they need to be. It's an interesting challenge version of the game. Try it if you think you're too pro. Keep a translator app handy.)