Yooka-Laylee

Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair follows on from its first game in different formats and dimensions where we must once again defeat the fearsome Captain B. At this point we have the option of saving the 48 bees lost in the 20 chapters plus the open world outside them to serve as a shield during this long and arduous battle or going it alone with the determination that despite there being no save points or tonics to save you, you will persist until the end. More challenging than its predecessor, but still nostalgic for the old games like Donkey Kong that have held our hands so much in the past. And yes, Laylee is still as annoying as in the first game (someone should change this character's voice actor...)

Game's okay.... gameplay is plenty fun..... but variety and engagement factor is pretty low after you grind a bit of chapters, first time variants come up is something really cool... but again it gets stomped below all the rest and how repetitive it gets.
To add a sting, difficultly for some very specific things get insanely ramped up (nothing impossible no worries, but enough to make it frustrating). And sadly... there are some specific parts of the game (very few) that are badly designed, to the point that it is clear what you should do but the timing is badly coded so it doesn't really work as intended
In any case, it is still fun for a while and an okay buy

Another game by Rare / Ultimate , the people behind legendary games: Banjo Kazooie, Goldeneye, Blast Corps, Jet Force Gemini, DK 64, Jetpac, atic atac and Donkey Kong Country to name a few classics.
This one belongs in there - not the greatest of the set , but worthy enough alongside them.
The soundtrack is outstanding.
It's a side scrolling platformer of the SNES generation , but modernised.
Googly eyes on everything
Collectables
Exploration
Unlockables
Craftmanship
British banter
9/10 would pay Trowser Snake to get past a paywall again.

Overall more good than bad, however designing a final boss that takes ~30 minutes to complete that is extremely difficult with with no checkpoints is just poor game design. I understand that it's called the Impossible Lair for a reason, but don't have a sudden extreme difficulty spike at the very end; try to progressively build to that throughout the game. The rest of the game is pretty good and would recommend playing if 2.5D platformers are your jam. 15 hours for a sale price of $3 is worth it - you get 40 levels with a bunch of overworld puzzles to solve as well. Overall the developers did a good job with about 95% of this game and that alone warrants the thumbs up.

A well made modern classic side-scroller like no other
There's no shortage of 2D platformers out there, but this is easily one of the more unique and original games you'll find in the genre. It's an absolute blast to play from start to finish.
The controls and platforming feel really good. It's very easy to pick up and play but very challenging to beat, and this game's level design compliment these controls very well. The graphics are really nice with gorgeous 3D environments and character models despite the limitations of a 2D perspective, and is comparable to DKC Tropical Freeze which is great as this is probably the closest you'll ever get to a game like that on Steam. This game is full of the classic 90's Rare humour I've come to know and love, and the comic book presentation for dialogue boxes is a nice touch. Not to mention the fantastic music!
The adventure begins and ends at the Impossible Lair, a level that you could theoretically beat on your first attempt, but that's incredibly unlikely to happen due to all the enemies, hazards and traps in place. You won't last long in there, so you'll want to rescue as many bees as possible by finishing each level before giving it another go. I love this progression structure - technically, every level is optional and it is possible to finish the game without ever playing the first level, but every bee you free grants an extra hit point for the lair so there's still a very good reason to play as much of the game as possible.
The world map is bar none the best I've ever seen in a 2D platformer, and it's not even close. You can access each level from the world map by entering the books you come across, but even when you're not playing the actual levels, there's a ton of puzzles to solve, secrets to discover, light platforming segments and charming characters to meet along the way. It's almost like a game within a game, that's how good it is!
This game also addresses many of the issues I had with the previous game - the world map is just the right size, for one. Exploration never feels tedious or repetitive as they got the most out of the smaller world size, and you can fast travel to any level you've unlocked which helps with both jumping right into the level you want to play and for getting around the map faster.
Each level has two variations, which usually changes based on your actions in the world. Some levels become flooded after letting the river flow with water, covered in ice by freezing the lake, or turned sideways and have to climb up the level instead of going left to right. These changes are usually drastic enough to feel like completely new levels that are barely recognisable from the original. I thought was a brilliant way of using the map to affect the levels.
The game can be a bit hard, but usually it's done in a way that's fair and your own fault for messing up. Lives don't exist in this game, so you don't have to worry about game overs or redoing sections of levels you've already done, which is nice to see given how many times you'll die in most levels. You will finish the level if you keep trying, or you can also skip sections of levels that may be too difficult for you which I only ever did when replaying a level for coins I missed. Instead of granting 1-ups, quills act as currency that can be spent on discovered tonics in the world map which in some ways is an even better incentive to collect as many as possible.
Combat is basic but works for what it is. Most enemies can be stomped on or rolled into like your typical platformer, but some foes may chase you around in a shell, others charge aggressively on sight so you can't take them out with a roll, and some must be avoided altogether. Foes are defeated in one hit so they serve more as obstacles to overcome instead of just being there. It's interesting and doesn't waste your time despite the simplicity.
I really loved the tonic system. As you find more tonics by exploring the world map, you can equip up to 3 tonics in a level which will also either add or subtract quills depending on if the ones you use make the level easier or harder, giving players a reason to take risks by increasing the challenge. There's also a bunch of purely aesthetic tonics that are just there for fun, with some of my favourites being the GB and 8-bit filters. Certainly beats only having one tonic at a time with only one of them being useful for almost the whole game.
There are 48 bees to rescue in total, which means once you've fully completed the game, you'll be able to take up to 48 hits inside the lair which is enough for reasonably skilled players to beat, but even with that, it's still no easy feat and not for the faint of heart. Prepare to have your skills pushed to their limits the entire way through. This final level is so hard, the developers added checkpoints after each section that lets you restart from there with the highest amount of bees you had at that point.
Yes, the Impossible Lair can be very tough and a bit frustrating at times, but I really enjoyed it. There's nothing more satisfying than reaching a certain point last time, only to get to that exact same spot the next time around (marked as balloons) with more bees than you had previously, making you feel like you've grown as a player as you learn the level more and your skills improve each time.
I really enjoyed going for 100% in this game. Each level has 5 coins to grab. If you die before reaching a checkpoint, you'll lose the coin you grabbed and have to collect it again, so you can't just cheese most of these. Each coin is numbered so you'll know if you missed one earlier in the level which is something I wish was a standard for the genre. Some of them are very well hidden, so you may have to look hard to find them all but none are too cryptic to require a guide. These coins are required to progress past Trowzer's pesky paywalls to open up more of the map, but if you're seeking them out throughout the game, this shouldn't be an issue.
That said, no game is perfect, and it does come with a few flaws. One of which being the lack of control mapping for keyboard & mouse and controller users. While I had no issue with the default mapping of the buttons for this game (I used an XBOX One controller), it's something to keep in mind. Also, if you miss a coin in the level, you can't instantly retry a level on the results screen after beating it - you have to return to the world map and go back into the level to replay it.
Despite my praise for the graphics, there isn't that much variety to the visuals as a lot of locations look very similar to each other. There are no desert themed levels in the desert section of the map, and no level in the beach area feels like a beach. I think a bit more visual variety would've been nice to see. There's also no easy way of keeping track of missing tonics throughout the game world, so if you're looking to find every last one, you may wish to keep a guide with you otherwise finding them all may become quite a time sink.
While Yooka-Laylee was a below average 3D platformer that tried too hard to recreate the formula of the Banjo games without understanding what made it work as well as it did, Impossible Lair is a fantastic 2D platformer that, despite using DKC as its main inspiration, takes ideas from other platformers like Rayman and Sonic, while also having plenty of original ideas to stand out in its own way. I'd love to see another attempt at a new 3D game in the future that isn't a remaster or remake, however.
If you haven't played this game yet and are a fan of platforming games, definitely give this a try! The price is fair for what you get with it, and you can regularly get it on sale for dirt cheap. Even if you can't beat the Impossible Lair, I'd say you'll still get your money's worth out of this if you at least manage to beat most, if not every level.

This game is really good! Play this if you like stuff like Donkey Kong Country, or platformers that have lots of collectables like the Kirby games. The concept of the Impossible Lair is pretty nice, even though I suck at it. It's nice to have the option to beat the game from the start.

Also, when Yooka collects a coin he says yummy and I have no idea why he does that but it's become an autism stim for me to say yummy!! as a reaction for everything

A-tier

Pain Points: Very generic level theming, visual design in general that felt like B grade (I just got tired of playing "new" levels), controls *almost* felt great but you retain momentum a bit too much in certain areas (cannon chaining level, parts of the Impossible Lair), the Impossible Lair doesn't scale properly in difficulty so chapter 2 is by far the hardest (easier escape sequence was fine though), Tonic system felt very much tacked on (them being useless in the final level made the strong ones pointless to collect), combat is janky with airborne collisions leading to me taking damage or getting away with a hit for reason I couldn't describe
Overall its pretty solid, but its lacking in charm and isn't mechanically tight enough to justify that. I enjoyed the final level, it is disproprtionately hard though. I'm fine with the difficulty, but the game isn't interesting or solid enough for me to try and hone my skill in perfecting the titural Impossible Lair. Worth on sale, I got it for like 3 bucks, but it made me want to try the games this was inspired by, because they look better and might very well play better too. I had heard extremely high praise of this game, I was disappointed to an extent, but after the first bit I warmed up and stuck out until final completion