At long last, we finally get to enjoy it. Spyro the dragon is now remade, remastered, and here for some nostalgic goodness. Developed by Toys for Bob, responsible for Skylanders content, this new Spyro title is not only a remaster of the series’s first three games, but it is an entire remake! Not long after the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, which saw a full remake and remaster of everyone’s favorite bizarre mammal, it was decided that our most beloved Spyro deserved the same treatment. Enter Toys for Bob with the Spyro Reignited Trilogy! Not only do we get to see our favorite video game dragon take on Gnasty Gnorc in an HD Spyro the Dragon remake, but we get to follow him through his first three games, including Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage and Spyro: Year of the Dragon!
Since this is a remake of three games that have already been designed and made, I won’t be doing this article like a normal one. Instead of boring y’all with a bunch of game design stuff, instead I’ll be diving into what makes Spyro Reignited Trilogy worthy as a remake. What does it bring to the table that the original games couldn’t? How faithful is it to its source material, and is that even a good thing? Let’s find out!
Diving into the Spyro the Dragon portion of the Spyro Reignited Trilogy, the very first thing that jumped out at me was the new and improved graphics style. And boy, do things look good! Spyro is pretty, the environments are pretty, and every single one of the game’s enemies and NPCs are re-imagined to fit this game’s new visual style. This is our first HD Spyro, and he’s never looked better!
On top of the new and improved graphics, the animations are sleek and smooth, as well. That’s because Spyro Reignited Trilogy is not just a remaster, it’s also a remake! In order to offer us such a magnificent version of Spyro, the developers at Toys for Bob painstakingly analyzed all of the minute details of the first three Spyro games in order to recreate them from the ground up. That means making new models, new levels, and completely reprogramming the entire game for a revamped version of the original trilogy that invokes nostalgia in magical ways.
And, from a basic standpoint, all of these features are implemented rather well. The new-and-improved character models looks great, even if some of them, particularly in Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage, are reimagined in some rather strange ways. All of the animations look great and the environments have gotten such a beautiful overhaul, particularly in the first game, that I am truly impressed and awestruck. On top of all that, Spyro looks better than ever; a lot of work went into capturing Spyro’s original sass and scrappy appearance in an updated format. His simple running animation is so enjoyable that I often found myself jogging from place to place rather than charging my way through all of the levels, just so I could see him merrily canter from place to place. Other tiny details, such as grass that burns after you shoot flame, add that little oomph of character that really make this game worthwhile as a remake.
Taking the cake, though, would be the attention lavished over the 50 dragons that you rescue in the first game. While the original Spyro the Dragon was rather sparse in its details and all of the dragons looked rather basic on the classic PlayStation engine, the Reignited Trilogy versions of each of these dragons are ripe with distinct costumes, appearances, and animations that add rich characterization. I’m especially impressed by this fact because the dragons don’t even take up a lot of screen time during a playthrough, yet you can tell that the developers at Toys for Bob really wanted these dragons to pop. And boy, do they. I mean, just look at this guy.
Aside from a full graphic overhaul, the developers also saw fit to reignite the sounds of the Spyro series, as well. And this is when we start to get into a bit of rocky water. For one, the original composer, the great Stewart Copeland from the reggae-inspired 80s band The Police was brought on board to write a new theme song, while the games’ original tracks were remastered. And they sound great…most of the time. While the synthesizer was a staple of Copeland’s style in the original games, the new-and-improved Spyro Reignited Trilogy features plenty of live instruments that add a very welcome sense of texture and nuance that wasn’t there before. And don’t get me wrong; the soundtrack for Spyro the Dragon is still one of my all-time favorites, but I would be lying if I said these newer versions weren’t a right breath of fresh air. Of course, if you don’t like the remastered soundtrack, this game gives you the option to listen to the older versions instead, so it’s a win-win for everyone.
That said, there were a few choices made during the production process that leave me scratching my head. While Toys for Bob was able to recapture the notes and basic composition of a lot of Copeland’s songs, some of the original pizzazz gets lost in the mix. The most notable example I can point to is the song for the level “Dr. Shemp.” You can hear the original version here and the Reignited version here. In the original version of Dr. Shemp, the jangling keyboard and sauntering bass line are accompanied by a drum track that is very present in the mix, so much so that it is as much as a lead instrument as they keyboard is. When Stewart Copeland starts rattling on that snare to wind up into the next measure, you really feel that energy. In the Reignited version of Dr. Shemp, the drums are doing about the same thing, but the mix is a bit messier with a lot of other stuff going on. On top of that, the drums are straight up buried in the mix, and they blend in so much with the rest of the instruments that you can’t even tell that the drums are ripping straight fire if you’re not paying close attention. This is a shame, because Dr. Shemp used to be one of my favorite songs from the original title. Of course, I’d be remiss without mentioning that there are some titles that have actually been greatly improved by the remaster, and some of the sleeper hits that I didn’t notice during my childhood absolutely slap in their newer versions. If anything, the Reignited Trilogy showed me how good the soundtrack for Ripto’s Rage really was this whole time.
Not only does the Spyro Reignited Trilogy feature an all new remastered soundtrack, but a fresh crew of voice actors is here to give life to the franchise, as well. A lot of the voice actors here are newcomers, or at least new to their specific roles. Other voice actors, such as the great Tom Kenny of Spongebob fame, as well as Gregg Berger, have returned to reprise their original roles as Spyro and Ripto, respectively. Even though Spyro the Dragon featured Carlos Alazraqui as the voice of Spyro and Tom Kenny didn’t get involved until Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage, Kenny really embodies the spunk and energy of our favorite neighborhood dragon. The rest of the voice actors are really good, adding new flair to some roles and doing others more or less by the book.
Of course, not every facet to this remake is quite as thoroughly polished. For example, on more than a few occasions, I would find gems that would fall off ledges or get themselves wedged in strange places, making them harder to retrieve. And, more annoyingly, I encountered a few invisible objects that I would run into, probably from bits of the map that were programmed in and not given a texture. One of them was directly in front of the entrance to a level, which seems like a gigantic oversight to me. Thankfully, none of these glitches were game-breaking and all of them could be fixed with a patch in the future, but little moments like these can add up, drawing away from the player’s enjoyment of this beloved trilogy.
Now, time for what we’ve all been waiting for: The games, themselves. My favorite remake of the three, hands-down, is the remake of Spyro the Dragon. When playing this title, you can really tell that the developers at Toys for Bob were very passionate about their source material, as every single nook and cranny is lavished with loving detail. On top of that, as I’ve already stated, this game features 50 unique dragons that you can rescue, and they even went out of their way to give every single one of them unique animations and costumes that fit their roles and the locations you find them in.
What went wrong?
Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage is also a fair remake, though a few more liberties were taken with this one. Some of the NPCs, most notably the friendly characters, are downright weird and sometimes ugly looking. Hunter the cheetah’s face looks rather squat, and Elora the faun is just downright terrifying compared to her original version. It feels almost like an entirely different team worked on this game, and they made some…decisions. Ripto’s Rage also features quite a few cutscenes, and these were done rather faithfully as well. Aside from that, this game gives plenty of opportunities for the fresh voice acting to really shine.
Depicted: Spyro in his kangaroo form.
Spyro: Year of the Dragon is also a pretty well-done title. Granted, it’s probably the weakest title of the original trilogy, but the developers at Toys for Bob bit the bullet and dove right in anyway. This is the game that I was expecting to encounter the most glitches in, but I was pleasantly surprised. Of course, I found this title to be the least enjoyable of the three, but that’s not the fault of Toys for Bob, is it? They really did the best with what they could.
Spyro Reignited Trilogy by Toys for Bob is quite possibly the most passionate–and most definitely the most nostalgic–title to come out in 2018. Featuring all new remastered graphics, an all new remastered soundtrack, and all new voice acting alongside three whole games that have been given an entire overhaul, the Spyro Reignited Trilogy does the best possible job at capturing that childhood nostalgia while remaining faithful to the source material. Everything that you remember from your childhood, even the really annoying parts, are all there, given quite a few layers of polish to make them really shine and sparkle like a gem. This remaster is enhanced nostalgia at its finest, as each game features tiny details added in that simply weren’t possible on the original PlayStation. The Spyro Reignited Trilogy looks great, feels great, and sounds great. I don’t think we could have asked for a better remake of our favorite dragon.
