![]() The answer, he said, is logistics: "Simply, the 3D platformer takes more time, money and people to make than 2D ones, and thats why you see less of them. I asked Edmund McMillen, one of the creators of the 2010 Super Meat Boy, one of the new classics of the genre, why 3D platformers have fallen off to such a degree. It is much less painstaking, as a result, to make a 2D game that feels artistic, painterly. Building a 3D world has so much more to do with creating a set of physical rules and making them cohere it is architecture, if you will, and not painting. Finally, when a developer is designing the setting of a 2D platformer, he or she is only limited, in a certain sense, by his or her imagination, the same as any other artist working on a flat canvas. When you're a two-man indie studio, that's, obviously, important. Second, 2D games are cheaper and easier to make. When the basic gameplay unit of your genre is the jump, that's, obviously, important. First, 3D platform games, even at their very best, have never approached the precision in control of 2D games. Why? Well, let's start with the obvious reasons. Leaving out the Super Mario Galaxy games (and possibly the first Epic Mickey), it is difficult to think of a 3D platformer in the past half-decade that even approaches the polish, quality, and ambition of the aforementioned games. We are also, concomitantly, a very long way from the golden era of three-dimensional platform games, which was inaugurated by Mario 64 in 1997 and produced such classics as Banjo-Kazooie, Psychonauts, Sonic Adventure, Ratchet and Clank, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Jak and Daxter, and in a limited sense, Crash Bandicoot. Between Nintendo's iterations on the 2D Mario and Donkey Kong games, breakthrough indie platformers like Braid, Limbo and Fez, and hundreds of jumping games good and bad for mobile devices, we are in a stunningly diverse era for 2D platform games. These two games feel in some ways like the AAA capstone to the past five years of platform gaming. In the same way a writer of contemporary literary fiction needs a structural reason to employ traditional narrative techniques-a frame narrative, or found text, or something of the sort-to gesture at their own knowingness, these games each seem to say: We know what we're doing is in some ways no different than Super Mario Bros., and we know you know too. In Puppeteer, the entire game is set on a stage, a set of red velvet curtains at the edge of each frame. In Rayman Legends, each level of the game is set in one of a row of paintings in a gallery to start a level you have to literally leap into a flat canvas. In 2013 that's, obviously, a choice, and both games address that choice-to be flat-through a framing device that is both clever and a little self-conscious. Rayman and Puppeteer have something else in common: They are both flat, set in two dimensions, in the style as old as Donkey Kong. These are consistent and skillful games that feel personal, authored. Both games have a gorgeous and idiosyncratic presentation, a rich and subtle score, a winning sense of humor, and many hours of varied play, all of which bespeak an underlying sense of quality. Last week it was Rayman Legends this week it was Puppeteer, by Sony's in-house Japanese development studio. Your work will always be published with full credit and any relevant links to personal websites and/or social media.For the second time in as many weeks, a beautiful new platform game came across my desk. ![]() If you are interested in volunteering reviews (positive, neutral or negative) for any 3D platformer games you have played, please get in touch. ![]() Especially to who has contributed a staggering 100+ titles to the list, the inimitable Pixel Prospector, who has assembled an incredible video listing of upcoming 3D platformers here and here, and who kindly suggested creating a changelog for the list. A huge thanks also goes out to all the people who have helped the list grow. I would like to personally thank every single developer who dedicates themselves and their teams towards the creation of new 3D platformers. Please note that while remasters and remakes are included, ports of older games are not. Consult multiple viewpoints to properly evaluate which games should earn the title ‘3D platformer’.Comprehensively archive the history of the genre.Track the development of emerging 3D platformers.With the creation of the 3D Platformer Watchlist, my ongoing objectives are to: That’s why I’ve built a new home for it, right here. But it grew much larger than I anticipated. Since then, I have continued to maintain the project on my personal blog. ![]() I originally started cataloguing 3D platformers in 2018 while writing for Gameranx. This project was born from a seed of passion. ![]() Welcome to the unofficial 3D platformer watchlist! My name is Katrina, and I’m a big fan of 3D platform games. ![]()
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