syntheticgerbil

Jak and Daxter... more like Dad's a Bastard

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Making a thread for index reasons. Someone had recommended the Jak game series long ago on 2005 Idlethumbs I think along with the whole rest of the PS2 talking animal mascot shebang. I did play the Sly Coopers much earlier and loved them (except not so much on 1), but I'm now just getting around to playing the first Jak game.

There's also the motivation that Hirokazu Yasuhara worked as game and level designer on 2 and 3, but I'm getting the feeling I'll dislike those. Hope I'm wrong, I suppose.

There's a lot to like about this game and for whatever reason, according to the ads I had seen back in 2000 that had me wanting the game originally (but with no PS2), I had always expected it to play like a more American version of Zelda. It appears that was not the case and instead I was playing a very standard platformer that had very frustrating controls but comfortable and intersting level design similar to Mario 64. I really didn't enjoy collecting a ton of shit, but I'm obligated to 100% every game I play and it wasn't that painful, but I would rather games not take a page out of the Rare books. I have not played any Crash Bandicoots to that extent yet so maybe this kind of design is akin to those? I get the feeling it is.

I hate how the main character looks. Seeing how he changes on the boxees for the next few games, I see he only gets worse. He looks like an idiotic frat boy or like the lead singer of that unmemorable late 90s band Lit. I'm guessing I'll really hate him when he starts talking the next game and gets all agressive, but I'll see. Maybe something will be written where he's redeeming in someway, but I'm prepared for mediocre fanfiction levels of story.

Just weird how bland the main character is and how much it sticks out from the designs of the rest of the characters and environment.

I really don't know how to trump the game's strengths but it was very enjoyable to figure out every nook and cranny of the levels and find out the secrets. It managed to have that elusive addictive quality which made the game enjoyable despite any flaws.

Really the worst thing going for this game is the camera. I don't know if this just how most 3D game cameras were back during the turn of the century, but despite possibly being spoiled now I don't seem to remember any other game I've played from that era being this broken in terms of camera. Looking at old reviews, Jak and Daxter made good scores all around on various sites, with a few citing camera problems but not really being offended by them.

I just don't know what's up with this game with the major problem being that it's missing a way to snap the camera behind the character. I had to almost constantly make sure I was controlling the camera correctly when jumping or whatever else because it would hardly ever intuitively follow the character or even stay behind him. If I ever had to change direction or avoid an enemy, I was running straight into the camera and being blinded. Not to mention it seems like the camera was just sort of a freefloating thing in the world I was controlling that would get stuck between collision boundaries in walls or obstacles without any way to make it move in some points as I had walked in a way it would get stuck.

Extremely frustrating, but I'm sure it won't be like that next time around.

On the note of the PS2 mascots, I probably won't be playing Ratchet and Clank. There's nothing eyecatching at all about those and I hate that ugly cat.

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I recently bought a PS3 with Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time, and I was thoroughly charmed. The style plays a lot with 60s sci-fi futurism, the Crank time puzzles are really clever, and the weapons are batpoop loco.

I would throw down some frost mines to freeze enemies in place, set up some proximity bombs around them, throw up four lightning rods in a square, that connect together and shock anyone near them, then throw up a disco ball so that if they unfreeze, they simply start dancing, and finally throw up a black portal to another dimension where a creature named "Fred" will reach out his tentacles and eat anyone near the hole, picking off left-overs with my personally modified shotgun.

This was my first Ratchet game, and while the covers may scream "late 90s antropomorphic childrens cartoon", I think you may be pleasantly surprised, like I was. I guess there's an actual reason that R&C survived the PS3 jump over Jak and Sly?

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I never played the Jak n Daxter games, but I can vouch for all the Ratchet and Clank games being awesome. They had great weapons with upgrade systems, fun huge feeling levels with amazing attention to detail, and a fairly good/funny plot in each one.

The PS3 ones sounded like they continued to make cool guns and streamline the upgrade process, but R&C 2 and 3 will always be well remembered by me.

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Stop that Hermie, if you keep recommending, I will have to play them! Ahh so many games!

I do think I'd like the more arcade style kill 'em all gameplay of Ratchet and Clank, what I've seen of a last boss that was a Britney Spears parody, as well as finding the robot design to be solid, but I guess in a weird way, it feels silly to eat up all the Sony paid mascot games completely.

I think Sly Cooper doesn't make it over to next generation because Sucker Punch is smaller and can't handle more than one game at a time. It doesn't help that Infamous pretty much sucked, yet for some reason there's going to be another one.

The parallels between the three developers is extremely ridiculous though.

Edited by syntheticgerbil

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Jak & Daxter was the wrong series to pick, if you ask me (and you totally did). Ratchet & Clank is just so much better in so many ways. Oh man. Sly Cooper is also great, but you already played those, so huzzah!

I wish I still had a PlayStation®2 Computer Entertainment System. Or, better, I wish I finally had a PlayStation® 3. D:

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The first Jak & Daxter game is the only one I enjoyed... except for the PSP ones, that is, the rest are just vehicular combat, which I rarely enjoy.

I can vouch for Ratchet & Clank too, any game in which you can turn the enemies into monkeys with one weapon, make then dance with another and then summon an elder horror to feast on the poor bastards while they dance to their doom is awesome in my book! :woohoo:

I actually tried the first Crash game and... While it's not a bad game, it's has terrible design flaws, like... You can only save if you find the hidden bonus stage AND BEAT IT! :frusty:

I don't think they considered themselves mascot in the PS2 era, the mascot-Armageddon of the previous era made mascots "uncool" in the Western world, although Japan still looks mascots till this day?

Oh, and most games had terrible cameras back then, although most of us won't admit it.... :blink:

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Alright, you guys got me, I'm adding Ratchet and Clank games to my wishlist. I'm a sucker for these types of platformer or action character games, so I guess I don't need a ton of convincing.

I don't think they considered themselves mascot in the PS2 era, the mascot-Armageddon of the previous era made mascots "uncool" in the Western world, although Japan still looks mascots till this day?

I guess while I might have been okay with character mascots when I was younger, I think the furry inclinations (or furry artists working on the team) plus the sheer obnoxiousness of anthro animals kind of ruins it for me. I'm fully okay with the classic comical animal stuff like Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck, but I guess I see it all in a different light now.

That being said, there are plenty of games I do enjoy starring a bunch of animal types and I see the appeal to a point, but I get weirded out if there is some kind of deep drama or storyline going on with a talking cat/bird/monkey/whatever. There's a lot of this kind of walking the line in Sly Cooper, but I felt it was handled more in the way of a Saturday Morning cartoon with less furry pandering even though I could tell many of the artists working on the game were probably furry artists. Luckily, most of the main art was done by people much more seasoned, including a few people from Humongous as well as some early concept from Peter Chan. Also none of the Sly 2D movies were done by someone with that kind of artistic style.

But even then, gritty realistic humans is just as obnoxious to me. Elf people like those in Jak don't make any kind of exception and neither does playing a frat boy. Sonic was much better when he was just a Felix the Cat mimic and there wasn't a bunch of high sci-fi drama. I think Nintendo characters are all very appealing to many and likeable to a general audience. I feel like Beyond Good and Evil and Rayman achieve that sort of appeal to everyone Nintendo thing, but I guess not since people were bothered by Pey'j and I think Americans generally hate Rayman.

Oh, and most games had terrible cameras back then, although most of us won't admit it.... :blink:

I guess I just compare everything to Rayman 2, which was released in 1999 and something I never had any major camera problems on. At least not constant. It seems most cameras in that game were set up both functional and cinematic and routinely snapped to the back of your character (or the best view).

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I was going to say I don't think some of your example are mascot games, but I'm not sure I get the concept of mascot or maybe... it's the others who don't get it?

I always considered a mascot to be a representative of the company, or at least used for merchandise, but many of the character people consider mascot don't do any of these things.

I just realized that many of the mascots from the "Mascot-megaddon" of the 90's never did either of those things? :erm:

It's almost like people assumed that any toon or non-realistic character in a video game is immediately classified as a mascot?

I think that many of the "mascots" of the "Mascot-megaddon" of the 90's are really just trying to appeal to the "toons with 'tudes" crowd back then.:hmph:

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Yeah definitely the extravagant mascot games of the 90s with the 'tude stuff or the uselessness of non memorable platform characters of whatever animal was what I was referring to. I was also sort of meaning the big three Sony mascots for the PS2 era (and PS3) with these second party companies developing similar things all simultaneously and in threes no less.

It's not so much in the way that Mario represents everything Nintendo and is also the happy man who walks around with the tool box on the Nintendo repair form.

Definitely Sly, Rachet, and Jak all go into much more depth than any of the unmemorable folks from the 90s like Aero the Acrobat, Bubsy, Jazz Jackrabbit, and whatever else I have surpressed.

But I suppose the weird thing with me is that while I am generally annoyed by not well thought out platformer characters jammed into some world that takes them through the ice, fire, forest, and water levels, this kind of stuff has a soft spot in my heart as nostalgia, so deep down I'm not really against any well done platformer mascot type of fare.

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As a platform game lover, I'm pretty sure I've played most of them and I at least know of the rest....:mock:

I think that even the first Bubsy game isn't that bad... compared to the rest of the series at least! :blink:

It's so strange that they are making a game with the "Sony mascots" together, too bad it's a Move Controller game.

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So I beat Jak 2, with all orbs. That was yesterday. I beat it the day I started getting super sick. Seemed about right since I don't think I've gone through such a torturous game loop in a long time. Difficult racing minigames in a game not about racing is just cruel. I don't even know where to start other than 100%ing all race sequences was a combination of bad collision detection, fucked up expectations from developers, and a generic lack of care or testing offered to a side part of the game. That's where my time with the game. I've heard other parts of Jak 2 are supposed to be infuriating but I wouldn't know, since every time I didn't have to race somewhere, I felt like I was playing a Kirby game.

 

I was actually into the story. It's very odd how similar this is to Beyond Good and Evil in terms of gameplay, scope, plot, and tone. I kept thinking I was hearing "Loyal Hillyians" when I passed this dictator's voice box around the city. Sucks this game could have been more fun had the designers allowed some wiggle room. I hear I'll be happier with Jak 3, guess I'll see.

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You know, I'm pretty sure almost every game had terrible racing sequences back in those days, it was the escort mission of that era, only worse. I remember playing Haven, which is similar to the whole " PS2 mascot" series in gameplay and I could never beat it because of a bloody race.

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I wouldn't say they are over, they just moved from "mascot games" to sandbox games and slowly got less terrible.

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