Ratchet & Clank

[gunswordfist]

Ah, Metal Storm. I played some of that because Spark praised it. I need to add Nexus into my most anticipated list.

[Foggle]

Watching videos of the Japanese version out of boredom... Ratchet is voiced by a woman and Clank sounds like he's on helium. what were they thinking

[Foggle]

YES

[Spark Of Spirit]

I'm going to do a post every few days on the R&C games to lead up to me playing the most recent one. I'll try to keep it straightforward and fun.

Ratchet & Clank (2002) - PlayStation 2


Insomniac and Sony were both coming out of the successful PS1 generation with Insomniac's Spyro titles helping the company long in the platformer market. So of course people were excited to see what they would be up to next. What ended up happening was the strange combination of three platformer franchises coming out all at the same time. Naughty Dog's Jak & Daxter, newcomer Sucker Punch's Sly Cooper & The Thievius Raccoonus, and Insomniac's Ratchet & Clank. All three were fairly highly regarded at the time, though only one was supported long enough to make the transition to the following generation. That would be the original Ratchet & Clank.

While I will go on to compare the three series for being part of the same genre and coming out oddly close to each other, I will refrain from direct comparisons except where applicable. Ratchet & Clank is it's own thing and there really isn't much like it. What does it do, you might ask?

Ratchet & Clank has a very simple idea. It wants to be Spyro, Super Mario Bros., and Contra, with a dose of sci-fi comedy to give it flavor. As far as presentation goes, it's a success. The music is funky and catchy, the art style is cartoony yet realistic enough to work together, the voice acting works, and the general tone of the game is fun and challenging. Level design, too, is quite the challenge when it comes to platforming. All in all, for a first effort of a new series, it does quite a lot right.

However, though it gets a solid bedrock, the whole package just quite isn't there. The problems add up to be irking, though never game breaking.



Where it stumbles is in the fact that the team isn't quite sure of everything and the execution misses some things. The first I'll go over is the controls, the most fundamental aspect of every platformer. Jumping and platforming work fine, as does swimming, so you'd imagine that would be enough. Well . . . that's only half of this game.

The problem is that the game was heavily advertised and billed over its weapons. And the weapons aren't very good. For one, shooters require ways of dodging while still maintaining ways of continuing to attack the enemy you are dodging. Put this together with a platformer where you also have to leap platforms while doing this dodging and hitting targets, and you've got your work cut out for you. The problem is there is no way to reliably dodge while shooting in this game, basically making the two halves very incompatible with each other.

The secondary issue is that since you can't aim in a firefight, this makes most weapons useless outside of a small selection that have seeking capabilities. It's not gaming breaking aside from the endgame when you need those weapons, but it is something to be wary of. The guns are supposed to be a big part of the game and they simply aren't very good.

Finally, the game is a bit long in the tooth. There are several points where you have to revisit planets to do some mundane task or another and begins to wear thin. The endgame is also overly punishing being that it plays by platformer rules of low health yet your enemies all have guns, so they have ranged attacks while you are stuck with un-aimable weapons. Not really playing fair. Also, the final boss is needlessly long and, if you don't know about a specific item that replenishes stock, can end up with you out of ammo in the thick of it.



All that said, as far as first efforts go, it's a solid and fun platformer. There's good challenge, varied level design, goofy humor and story, and a solid presentation. In my opinion it is not as strong a first effort as the other two studios put out for their 3D platformers, but it is worth a try nonetheless. But even though I don't feel it is a particularly amazing game, it is well worth your time and a solid foundation for what is to come next. Insomniac had a good idea here so seeing how they would expand upon it was what everyone was interested in seeing.

But that's for another time.

In conclusion, I would like to end with a tier list of weapons for the game. Why? Because that is what these games do so well. Make weapons so creative and unique. So here is how the first game's weapon list stacks up. I don't bother ranking the RYNO. It's either OP or terrible in each game, so there's no point.

R&C Tier List

Top Tier
Visibomb Gun
Devastator
Glove of Doom

Medium Tier
Bomb Glove
Tesla Claw
Drone Device
Suck Cannon

Low Tier
Blaster
Taunter
Decoy Glove
Morph-O-Ray

Don't Even Bother Tier
Mine Glove
Pyrocitor
Walloper

[Foggle]

Sounds like we've had completely different experiences with the first game, honestly. The Blaster is actually one of the best guns in the game IMO. I usually use it to fight Drek if I don't have the Tesla Claw. Also, while the Pyrociter and Walloper aren't great, they're invaluable against the swarmer enemies that can't be one-hit killed with the wrench. Gaspar and Pokitaru can be insanely difficult if you don't have either of those weapons.

Also, this might just be because I've played the game so many times, but I don't really think you need to move while shooting. The enemies are programmed to only attack you in short bursts to make up for your inability to move and shoot, so as long as you know when to jump and how to efficiently set up shots, it isn't difficult at all. Also, if you have trouble hitting enemies from the third person perspective, you can switch to first person mode, which lets you aim like in an FPS. The lack of strafing can be annoying, yes, but it's designed around this flaw like RE4 was.

Personally, while I enjoy all three, I think R&C1 holds up much better than J&D1 and SC1 because it isn't a total cakewalk like the former and has more actual platforming than the latter. I'd rather put up with the lack of strafing in Ratchet & Clank than suffer any of those godawful mini-games from Sly Cooper again.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I've played it a bunch and it never really clicks with me. I enjoy the platforming, but the action stuff doesn't sit well with me. They nailed it in Going Commando, but it never really works for me here.

I also considered listing the blaster higher, but I thought the other weapons above it were far more useful. That said, in narrow areas it is quite useful.

[Foggle]

I mean, I understand why the action doesn't work for you. It's more like a platformer where you have guns than a platformer-shooter hybrid. The combat system is very rudimentary and not too impressive, but it's still a lot of fun IMO.

My problem with Sly Cooper is the same as my problem with Tools of Destruction. I find it very uneven on the whole, and I absolutely detest the final portion of the game. Playing all three back to back, I actually think R&C1 has more pure platforming than SC1 and even J&D1. So even if the shooting isn't as good as it could be, the sheer amount of things to jump on at every moment always brings me back for more, while there are parts in those other games where I find myself getting kind of bored. That said, I still love Jak 1 and 2, and Sly 4 (seriously, is it just me or did Sanzaru do a much better job with the series than Sucker Punch ever did?).

But I think I'm biased, because Ratchet & Clank is probably my most beloved game of all time. It was one of the first video games that really spoke to me, and I honestly have more fun with it to this day than pretty much anything else on the market. I've played it countless times over the past 11 years and yet I still find myself smiling at how much I love the platforming, world design, and music.

[Spark Of Spirit]

It's a good game, but I think Insomniac dwarfed it with later installments. Hopefully I'll get to play some ACiT this weekend. Such a great game.

Then onto the last one.

[Foggle]

I started playing ACIT again recently. It really is one of the best games ever made. Insomniac completely outdid themselves in terms of everything but music, which is still pretty dang good if less fun.

I also replayed QFB and I'm still pretty wishy-washy on it. I love the platforming (the first half of the game is amazing), but I find the combat segments to be even more boring than in TOD. I'm honestly not sure how I'd rank the series at this point; I just know that ACIT and the original trilogy are my favorites. Though, of course, they're all at least occasionally excellent.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Yeah, everything up to escaping the cavern is awesome as is the pirate island and the final sky pirate romp. Didn't care for the enemy boxes, though I rarely do. One more island of platforming would have done it so much good.

That said, ACiT is just stunning. No matter how many times I play it, I can't quite understand how they hit they mark so hard with it.

[Foggle]

The enemy boxes are my least favorite thing about the PS3 games. Thankfully, they (for the most part) dropped them in ACIT and ITN.

Every time I lose faith in Insomniac, I remember how amazing A Crack In Time is and hope they can finally manage to surpass it with their next Ratchet & Clank title. I have a good feeling about the upcoming PS4 re-imagining.

[Spark Of Spirit]

You know, I just thought of a question. What is your favorite weapon in the series? There are many to choose from, but I'm just curious as to what your favorites are.

[Foggle]

That's a really good question! I love so many of them... I'll just post a top 5 (in no particular order):

HK22 Gun (Going Commando)
Heavy Bouncer (Going Commando)
Multi-Disc Launcher (Up Your Arsenal)
Rift Ripper 5000 (A Crack In Time)
Quantum Repulsor (Into The Nexus)

Which one(s) would you pick?

[Spark Of Spirit]

Hard question, indeed. Hmmm...

1. Leviathan Flail (Deadlocked)
2. Liquid Nitrogen Gun (Up Your Arsenal)
3. Qwack-O-Blitzer (Up Your Arsenal)
4. Tetra-Bomb Gun (Going Commando)
5. Quantam Whip (Up Your Arsenal)
6. Constructo Shotgun (A Crack in Time)
7. Dual Raptors (Deadlocked)
8. Rift Ripper 5000 (A Crack In Time)
9. Heavy Bouncer (Going Commando)
10. Zurkon The Destroyer (A Crack in Time)

A lot missing, though. There's a lot of good ones.

If Zurkon doesn't count, then the Multi-Disk Launcher from UYA would be just as good.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Beat A Crack in Time then on to Into the Nexus.

What can I say? It's one of the best games of the generation. I like how they made it so that certain weapons are more effective against certain enemies and that enemies in general are back to flinching again. Also, the enemies are back to having dialogue again. My favorite "We come in peace" while they're trying to dice you with a saw blade.

Every level and aspect of the game is still as awesome as ever. Not to go on to the final game.