Like many of you, I read and kept up with the torrent of news coming from this year’s E3.

While Sony had a great press conference this year, with a surprise appearance from David Jaffe’s “Twisted Metal” and a very welcome speech from Kevin Butler, that wasn’t the only thing that excited me this year.

The game that got my attention the most was return to one of Ubisoft’s earlier franchises: Rayman.

"It took a while for Rayman to realise he wasn't racing against anyone."

The last we saw of Rayman, he was being tortured by a bunch of sadistic rabbits, in a slightly disappointing collection of mini-games. His two previous outings on the PS2 were colourful and stylistic 3D adventures featuring depth of gameplay, a long twisting narrative and lots of replay value all tied up in a neat, if a little bizarre, bow.

However, Ubisoft’s announcement of “Rayman Origins” seems to be visiting the 2D PlayStation roots. Using the “UBIart Framework, a complete ‘homemade’ solution for creating and editing levels and characters” the game is lusciously illustrated in 2D, evoking long-lost memories of the original game, and yet feeling fresh, original and just what the series needed.

Before saving the world, Rayman had other things on his mind...

The episodic format also feels natural as well. To be released periodically starting this Christmas, it is appearing on HD Consoles with the Wii, PC, iPad and 3DS “to be considered”.

From the trailer recently released, “Rayman Origins” is looking to be a gorgeous game, with slaps, great music, a friend which hints to co-op and most importantly, fun. After all, thats why we play games, isn’t it?

Are you looking forward to Rayman Origins? If not, what are you looking forward to?