The year was 2007, and after persuading my reluctant mother to buy me a PS2, I asked her if we could go to Mr. Video to rent a game.
After meticulously considering all my options, I chose Rayman Raving Rabbids as the game I would plunge into that particular week. And the following week. And then the week after that.
I had rented the game so many times that when I finally convinced my mother to buy it, the actual amount of money she had spent on the game was probably double the retail price.
Minigame madness
The premise of the game’s story mode is entirely normal – Rayman and his friends are having a picnic when everyone is suddenly captured by Rabbids, a bunch of strange humanoid rabbits.
The Rabbids regularly spouted absolute gibberish and made chuckle-worthy incoherent noises, like how one would shout “Daaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” as I shot it in the face with a plunger.
After the introductory cinematic, you had to navigate Rayman through a colosseum-like arena with several different archways, each leading to a different trial.
Every in-game day, you had to complete a certain number of trials, after which you got sent back to your prison cell and were rewarded with a plunger for your effort.
Rayman looks woefully at the plunger he is given as a reward for completing a day’s trials.
The trials were just a collection of minigames that kept my greedy goblin brain stimulated, some of which remain memorable to this day:
- Shooting Rabbids in the face with plungers during first-person shooter sequences.
- Standing behind a bar on an island and filling approaching Rabbids’ scuba goggles with carrot juice to stop them from reaching you.
- Launching a Rabbid in a Superman costume across a chasm by running a rail cart as fast as possible into an obstacle at the end of the track.
- Repeatedly smacking a Rabbid on the head with a hammer for 10 seconds to see how high you can get the resulting bump to rise.
- Herding pigs by riding a flying dinosaur.
These trials and the consequent plunger pile-up would eventually lead to Rayman using the plungers to build an escape ladder to his cell window, after which the game is completed.
Looking back, I might’ve underestimated how much Rayman Raving Rabbids has influenced my current sense of humour. The absurd side of life often has me laughing the hardest, and incoherent noises still crack me up way too much.
Writing this article has brought back fond memories, and after searching Steam, I fully intend to repurchase the game – don’t worry, Mom, it will be my own money this time.
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