Yooka-Replaylee

More than a straightforward remaster or remake, Yooka-Replaylee reimagines the original game, adding new challenges and gameplay elements while tweaking and improving others. Ultimately, it's a much-improved experience, with its worlds densely packed with things to do and its gameplay finely-tuned. This is easily one of the best 3D platformers currently available.

Yooka-Replaylee fixes the main flaws of Yooka-Laylee, offering a much better experience in basically everything: graphics, soundtrack, gameplay, content and fun.

Yooka-Re-Playlee is a vibrant 3D platformer that reunites the chameleon-and-bat duo for their biggest adventure yet. Packed with colorful worlds, 300 Pagies, and a variety of collectibles, the game moves at a thrilling pace and keeps players engaged from start to finish. With nonstop surprises, playful characters, and fantastic energy, it’s a joy to explore and nearly impossible to put down.

Yooka-Replaylee revitalizes the 2017 platformer with the care it always deserved. The remaster enhances visuals, refines controls, and introduces quality-of-life improvements that finally make exploration a joy. Its world is colorful, dense with secrets, and full of charming NPCs, though the main duo still lacks charisma. Some frame drops on PS5 keep it from perfection, but the smoother gameplay, cleaner camera, and added features make this the definitive version and a strong reminder of why 3D platformers still matter.

As a great remake, Yooka-Replaylee is a well-deserved second chance for a game from 2017 that hadn't quite reached its true potential. Besides the graphic improvement, Playtonic has successfully modified the campaign for the better, removing obstacles for a more fluid, open, and fun progression.

Yooka-Replaylee is a confident reimagining of Playtonic’s original 3D platformer, transforming a once-mixed debut into a polished and rewarding experience. With smoother controls, compact world design, and vibrant presentation, it confidently steps out from the shadow of its inspirations. Though not without flaws, this remake captures the joy of the genre with thoughtful updates and satisfying progression. Not every choice lands, but Yooka-Replaylee is a commendable labor of love that stands apart from its inspirations, and it deserves a spot among the greats of modern 3D platforming.

Yooka-Re-Playee takes the solid, if flawed foundation of Playtonic’s original game and enhances it in just about every way imaginable. A good game in 2017, Yooka-Laylee has become a great one in 2025.

Yooka-Replaylee is full of lighthearted platforming goodness that keeps it old-school while also managing to feel fresh. If you're a genre fan or simply want to explore and complete fun challenges at your own pace, you absolutely need Yooka and Laylee in your life.

Yooka-Replaylee is a solid remaster that preserves the charm of the original, improves visuals and accessibility, but still suffers from a few technical hiccups. The game is ideal for fans of 3D platformers looking for a light and nostalgic adventure.

Yooka-Laylee was a platformer I wanted to love, but struggled with because of the controls and camera. Many also hated the backtracking and linear structure. Those issues have been addressed in Yooka Re-Playlee, making it the superior version. I actually really enjoyed unlocking abilities and levels in the original game. And feel like some of the attempts to make it more open, and to have more collectables, don’t work super well. I wish there was a choice to play Yooka Re-Playlee with just the improved visuals, camera, and controls. It would be a dream come true for me if Yooka Re-Playlee offered an in-game choice between an original version and a Replay version. Although flawed, Yooka Re-Playlee is the best version of an excellent N64-style 3D platformer.

Playtonic Games has taken Yooka and Laylee to new heights with Yooka-Replaylee, cleverly addressing past criticism with meaningful upgrades. Not every tweak lands perfectly, but platformer fans will find plenty to love in this revamped collectathon.

Yooka Replaylee provides the definitive way to experience this spiritual successor, thanks to highly welcomed changes in gameplay and a graphical presentation that further enhances its colorful levels. However, it still retains certain issues from the original, such as a camera that occasionally hinders play, a limited number of levels, and a sense of prolongation due to its extensive array of collectibles.

If you want to play a title reminiscent of the N64 era, this is definitely the place to lose yourself for hours. If you missed it at the time, now's the time to give it a try; that goes for those who left it unfinished, too.

The new and improved Yooka-Re-Playlee takes cues from other modern platform games like Mario Odyssey, successfully turning a janky and awkwardly designed platformer into a bingeable collectathon that feels more packed with platforming challenges. A full overhaul to the graphics, controls, and UI modernises Yooka-Laylee and makes it appealing to more than just classic Rareware fans, but it comes at the expense of the game’s identity as a spiritual successor to Banjo Kazooie, something that was so central to the game’s original pitch. However, taken as it is, this remake transforms Yooka-Laylee into, if not a masterpiece, at least much less of a mixed bag.

In short, Yooka-Replaylee is a brilliant remake of the original game. It expands and improves upon so many areas that it leaves the original release in the dust. It took a long wait, but Yooka and Laylee finally have a 3D platformer worthy of the Banjo-Kazooie comparisons.

Yooka-Replaylee is an oasis of play and joy in the crowd of grey action role-playing games and Dark Souls clones that we get in abundance and even though there are still some issues with the camera and the game doesn't revolutionise the genre, this is one of the best games you can get in 2025 if you miss the old classic 3D platformers from a bygone era.

Nostalgia is the fuel that burns constantly through Yooka-Replayeein the same way it did with the original. There are many examples of games that aim to pay homage to their forbears, but they usually include twists and clever complements to the works they take inspiration from. Yooka-Layleealways appeared to prioritize Rare’s platforming classics over its own identity, and as such it can feel like a parody or a pastiche rather than a game with a unique voice. If you didn’t like Yooka-Laylee, you might diminish Replayleeas merely polishing a turd, but that’s not a fair assessment to make. It’s a true effort to correct a game that was divisive upon its initial release, and the result is a platformer that is sparkly and has been polished well. Yeah it’s still a nostalgia trip riding on the coattails of Rare’s finest, but Yooka-Layleewas always meant to be a tribute rather than an innovator in the genre. Replayleeis definitely the best way to play this game and you should definitely check it out, but you better love Rare platforming classics and gratuitously incessant character voices.

Despite imprecise and frustrating controls in many sections, Yooka-Replaylee has a lot of charm. A must-play for those who enjoyed the original game, or for anyone who loves collecting items in a colourful world.

Playtonic's remaster of its 2017 platformer offers a litany of improvements, but its level design still barely passes muster.

Blow for blow, Yooka-Replaylee is a quality 3D platformer. It does what it needs to do and does so in a way that’s inoffensive and pretty bogstandard. My issues with the game come from its existence as a replacement for a game with genuinely interesting ideas. Replaylee does away with every interesting wrinkle in favour of an experience that, unfortunately, falls far too close to certain other games for me to want to prioritise this one. It’s a bizarre exercise in overcorrection that misses what the original game was literally made for. Is it a better game than the original? Probably. But it's a lesser imitation of its far more modern inspirations.