The backstory for Rygar: The Legendary Adventure is so convoluted, I'll spare you the details, suffice it to say that Rygar has to rescue his beloved Princess Harmonia while preventing the evil Titans from taking over the Greece he knows and loves. As you get farther into the game, you'll dig deeper into classical Greek mythology while being immersed in a somewhat confusing storyline that is doled out to you as you discover ancient texts and hieroglyphics. But never mind the story, it's the overall game we're interested in, and as far as that goes, this is game is a lot of fun.

Gameplay

Rygar is a simple game at its core; you just fight your way through a multitude of levels while solving some basic puzzles, unlocking secrets and fighting with bosses. The bosses are generally somewhat modified characters from Greek mythology, possessing insanely nasty powers which you'll find very challenging to say the least.

Your main weapon in Rygar is the Diskarmor, which is basically a spiked shield on a chain. The Diskarmor starts out as a basic close to mid-range combat weapon. You can swing it out on its chain to smash or slash enemies, or,  you can fling it to an extended distance and get it to stick into an enemy. Once an enemy is stuck, you can actually pick them up and swing them around lasso style before finally slamming them into a wall. The basic Diskarmor lends itself well to combo attacks, as you can use it to deliver multiple hits from various angles, or swing your enemy into his buddies to build up more hit damage. The more hits you can deliver from one combo, the more points you'll earn.

As you continue through the levels, your Diskarmor will gain magical powers and more enhanced attacks. The Hades Diskarmor for example; allows you to summon Cerberus, the Hound of Hell to attack targets for you. Along with being an effective weapon, the Diskarmor can be used as a grappling hook to help you cross chasms quickly and easily.

During your quests through the levels, you'll fend off nasty little monsters with very little intelligence. To compensate for the lack of intelligence, the monsters attack in large packs, attempting to overwhelm you with force. It's quantity over quality when it comes to Rygar's enemies.

Along with the general combat of Rygar's levels, there are some platformer elements which have you swinging over chasms, hopping between platforms and unlocking hidden areas. Rygar has some special moves, like the sideways slide, which will help you get into those tight spaces and hidden places.

Graphics

Rygar offers up a good bit of eye candy, with its well-textured environments, fluid animation and overall polish. Rygar himself looks great and the monsters are no slouches either. The effect of the Diskarmor flying around cutting through walls (and enemies) is a bit generic at times, but overall it looks better than you'll see in most adventure games on the PS2.

My main gripe with Rygar's graphics has got to be the camera, which uses a fixed perspective that changes at certain points in the level and can drive you absolutely insane. There are certain times when you need to shift the camera angle to see the enemy that is beating on you, yet you can't, and so you end up taking a ton of unnecessary punishment. The only way to shift the camera angle is to run away and turn back around quickly which sometimes forces the camera to shift angles. There's no manual camera control, which can make for some infuriating moments in the game. It seems that the developers did at least plan out the fixed camera locations, so while it can drive you insane, most of the time it works out ok. I've seen a lot worse cameras than Rygar's , so I can forgive this oversight, since it doesn't make the game impossible to play.

The cut-scenes in Rygar look great, allowing you to see the some of the PlayStation 2's better graphics capabilities.

Sound

The soundtrack in Rygar does a good job of helping you maintain the tempo of the game without overwhelming the game sounds. The sound effects themselves are quite good, especially those of the Diskarmor smacking into a soft-bellied enemy or bouncing off of a wall. The pitter-patter of Rygar's footsteps can get a little old in really long levels, and the grunts of the centipede-like monsters gets really old, but all in all, Rygar's sound is quite good.

There's a lot of speech in Rygar, and thankfully the voice acting is very well done. While you'd expect a game based on classical mythology to have some over-dramatic voice work, Rygar avoids taking that route, and thus avoids that cheesy and overdone quality so common in adventure titles. You won't find yourself turning down the volume every time a character speaks, unlike in so many other adventure games.

Replayability

If there is one glaring weakness in Rygar: The Legendary Adventure, it's the replay value. There really is almost no replay value to this game, which is really unfortunately considering how short the game is. Most players can finish this game in under ten hours, and once you're done, there's nothing there to make you want to go back and play the game again. Make sure to get full enjoyment out of the game the first time you play it, because you won't be coming back for seconds. It's not that this is a bad game in any way, it's just that it's so linear that once you've finished Rygar's little adventure in mythology, you won't try it again.

Overall

While Rygar lacks in the replayability department, the overall package is so good, it's a game you really shouldn't miss for the PS2. Even if you've never played a Rygar title before, you'll certainly enjoy this one with its lush graphics, unique gameplay and good sound. Rygar: The Legendary Adventure is a worthy purchase for any fan of the adventure genre.