Spyro: Reignited Trilogy Review (Nintendo Switch)

Rating: ★★★★☆

When Crash's N'Sane trilogy was revealed to be ported to the Nintendo Switch, the main question on my mind was: "Okay so when is Spyro following suit?"

After being delayed for home consoles a couple of months, it was natural to expect a delay on the Nintendo switch port, but thankfully Spyro landed on sunny Nintendo shores this September.

An incredibly rendered nostalgic field trip of a game, Spyro Reignited kept everything we loved about the original Spyro trilogy - even down to that ridiculous trolley coaster - and breathed new 1080p life into them.

With Spyro already available on the Playstation 4, Xbox One, and PC, how does it compare on the Nintendo Switch? Is having a dragon in your backpack really as great as it sounds, or should you expect to be burned this time around?

It's no secret that the little Switch's strengths are not in its graphical resolution or frame rate. (All screenshots attached to this article were taken from the switch version).

Handheld, the dynamically adapting resolution will always prioritize maintaining a steady 30 frames per second, but does not quite reach 720p. It's a little more detailed in docked mode, thankfully, although still looks very graphically stunted when compared to the Playstation 4 and Xbox One versions.

At least the smaller screen of the handheld mode means that a lower resolution doesn't exactly pose much issue. Particularly intense particle effects such as fire and electric obstacles are basic as bread on the switch, with this actually posing as a frustration when you are licked by flames that look like they were burning an inch to your left.

The gameplay is smooth, with the frame rate only really suffering during loading screen times, which are not much longer than the Playstation 4 Pro's. In fact, they even felt somewhat faster.

What really stands out as a distracting negative that was hard to ignore was the shadows, especially in handheld mode. Assumingly in order to optimise the performance, shadows are not done through transparency, but rather through a distracting dotted pattern. This looks especially ugly when it appears on characters' faces in cutscenes, seen below.

However, as distracting as these shadows and laggy loading screens can be, any negatives melt away as the overall elation of being able to play Spyro on the go takes precedence.

The Switch's innate strength of being a pick-up-and-play console matched with a game that features short, rich levels with plenty of collectibles to gradually uncover is truly a joyful combination.

A nostalgic spectacle with gameplay that excels in handheld mode's pick-up-and-play-ability.

Rating: ★★★★☆