Rayman 3: Hoodlum Havoc is a platformer from the early 2000’s starring Ubisoft’s neglected limbless mascot.  For whatever reason, the game allows you to collect these gems in order to rack up points, which served no other purpose than to unlock some random minigames (and a hidden room in the Tower of the Leptys, which I wrote about here).  If I’m remembering correctly, you could have just as easily played the game without bothering to collect anything.  But, being the obsessive completionist type of gamer that I am, I scoured the game (with the help of a handy-dandy, old-fashioned paperback guide book) in search of secret stashes of hidden treasure for no other reason than to earn the highest score that I could.  And in the process, I found all sorts of nifty hidden rooms, making me feel like an expert on the game in every subsequent playthrough.

I can’t believe I’ve never written a post about this before, but there’s no time like the present, I suppose.  While there was a strategy for getting the maximum number of points (you got more points when using powerups, plus the more gems you collected in a short time, the more points you’d earn), today, I’m only going to write about actual secret rooms, which tend to be filled with tons of lovely gems, which hold more value for me than real gemstones.  Unfortunately, my guide is packed in a box somewhere, so I will be utilizing a more modern option.  Youtube!

If you’re actually interested in a guide, then the video above is an excellent option.  As for me, I used it to jog my memory of all these cleverly hidden secrets, from various hidden holes in the wall to hidden switches you could shoot with the rocket powerup.  Now, I suppose a lot of those secrets are more exciting to discover than to actually read about, so I’ll stick with the moderately more interesting ones.  For example, at the end of part 3 of the Bog of Murk, you can fly around the side and find a hidden boat, which will take you to a spooky tree filled with gems. (Did you know that the Hoodlums in the hot air balloons in the distance are just flat cutouts?  Because my young self did!)  Or what about this bubble in the Land of the Livid Dead that can bounce you up to a passageway in the wall, where you’ll find a bunch of clear blocks with statues of Teensies inside them?  Weird.

Or in the Desert of the Knaaren, there is a hidden ledge over some acid that leads to what looks like an open coffin with the lid propped to the side.  Who was the former occupant of said coffin?  We don’t know, but it sure is spoooOOOooky!  One rather clever secret can be found in the Longest Shortcut, where you’ll find the reflection of a window on the floor that’s not really there.  Jump through this wall for another secret room!  And in the Summit Beyond the Clouds, you can even find this hidden little mine behind some pine trees when bouncing on balloons!  Isn’t that neat?

But wait, don’t go just yet, because I’ve saved the very best for last!  In the Longest Shortcut, there is a particular painting of a Teensie trying to catch a Red Lum in a butterfly net.  This painting can be moved by hitting a circular disk near the ceiling right before it, and in the room beyond you’ll find a hidden statue of Ly the fairy from Rayman 2: The Great Escape.  And in part 3 of the Hoodlum Headquarters, you can even find a hole in the side of a large machine after jumping back and forth across some platforms moving down from the ceiling.  And inside here, you’ll find a hidden room containing the villains of Rayman 2, the Robo-Pirates, arranged like the famous painting, “The Last Supper”, with Admiral Razorbeard at the center.  Being a huge fan of Rayman 2 ( it’s one of my favorite games of all time, after all), these references to past characters was both exciting and nostalgic.  And a little sad, frankly, considering Ubisoft’s refusal to bring Ly back….

Honestly, Rayman 3 wasn’t quite as good as its predecessor, with its…immature humor and whatnot, but all those secret rooms made the game so much fun to play!  Discovering secret little nooks and heaps and heaps of gems was so dang rewarding!  And when I recorded the game for Youtube many years later, I got to feel like a little genius showing off my extensive knowledge of the game’s many hidden rooms.  (Really should have consulted my paper guide, though, as my memory was just a tad rusty by then.)  For all you game developers out there, that’s a great way to transform a good game into a great one.  Sprinkle in some secrets, and your players will feel special for having found them.  Imperfect though it may be, few games are as rewarding to play as Rayman 3!

Banner image by Flickr User: Danial A