This was my first Ratchet and Clank game and while I have to say at first it started to seem boring and repetitive, it grew on me. The game has average to above average graphics and the sound effects are okay, but sometimes lacking (mostly during cutscenes). The storyline is probably typical of ratchet and clank games, tho i asume this one is probably smaller scale than the ps2/ps3 brothers.

Unfrotunately no screenshots of this one at this time, My digital camera is on its way back to me. Overall I enjoyed ratchet and clank, but there was some issues that designers keep making over and over again. First off, the difficulty of the game is not so bad if you dont mind redoing things over and over again. This starts to be one of my pet peves about games, espically when you just want to get through to the next part. I enjoy a challange as much as the next guy, but long grueling guantlets are not challanges, they are just annoying. Killing 6 guys, then kiling 5 guys, then killing 6 guys, only to die and have to do it all over again (espically when ever single guy takes 15-20 average shots) is not fun, it never was fun, it never will be fun. It’s a tedius repetition of a substitute for challanging gameplay. It borders on frustration but its not frustratingly hard, not to any degree, the different area’s as a seperate sectoins are quite easy, its just when you have to do 6 of them strung together and you fail on the last one, that it really SUCKS cuz you have to do it ALLL OVER AGAIN. No matter how many times you’ve proven that its a boring test of your reflexes it just gets old after a while.

Case in point, half way or so through the game, there is a boss in a flying plane crop cutter thing (its hard to describe), First you run through a field running towards the camera, with the plane buzzing behind you randomly shooting at you, all you have to do is run left or right to dodge, this is easy. But the plane makes 10 trips, so you end up spending a minute or two doing this. Then the plane lands and brings out its crop cutting blades, you still run towards the camera, only now you need to keep jumping over randomly placed boulders, still no challange here.. this lasts another minute.. Then you are on this platform after jumping off a cliff (cuz we all know crops are planted on cliffs!) Anyways now this 3rd part, boulders are falling off the cliff (presumably) and you need to stay out of their shadows.. again not challanging at all, but tedius every time.. AFter dodging all these, the plane comes back down again and starts shooting lasers at you, charging you and eventually taking a 6th phase of shooting these green smoke bombs onto the ground random. none of this is particularly challenging, but untill i purchased a rocket launcher and used it and rebought ammo during the fight, i died a few times during this fight.. it just got more and more annoying having to go through ALL Those things every single time.. Why is there not simple check points between each one? Why? I’ll tell you why, Cuz they think its ‘challenginging.. The problem with this thought is, its a PSP, its a casual gaming system, not a hardcore system, i dont want to sit in one place playing the game for 45 mintues to get past one single part that should take me 10. I feel i’ve passed these previous parts, yet i’m punished cuz i failed on part 6? redoing the old parts it not my idea of a good time..

Ultimately i got past this boss and trapsed on, then i made it to the next level, which proceeded do the same thing again, now just in a different form. First fight 6 guys with electroc shock ‘no limit to their reach’ guns, then go into a room, fight some small robots.. Then go into a hallway, fight a few small robots, then some electro shock guys, then into another room with BOTH electroc shock and little robots, oh and this time, there’s electricity running through the floor and if you step on it, you take ass loads of damage.

This is where the problems come in.. The controll sceme is NOT perfect.. you run around with the analog stick, and shoot stuff.. but if you hit the digital pad, you ‘ideally’ target something and strafe around with it, it works for the most part, but when there’s groups of 5 guys coming at you, it gets sporadic on who it targets and for how long, and often times it wont target that guy coming nearest to you so you try to run away and jump, and BAM you hit a shock wire in the floor, and you’re dead, DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN! it’s just punishment, a little more than I wanted to take on the system.

Honestly this is as far as I got before i decided to write this review. I will probably give it another try, but with time being slim and so many other better games out, I just can’t stand to replay the same level 60 times just to get past it to say ‘yep the game coulda be done better’, I already know it could have been done better.

IT all comes down to the argument of casual games vs hardcore gamers, you will allways have that 13 year old kid crying out “J00 NEWB I b33t THE G@M3 in 5 MiN33tS! |T W@$ t00 3@sy! I AM L33t!!! M@k3 |t H@RD3R CUZ M0M 0NLY BUYS M3 1 G@M3 a Y3AR!!oneone!!” vs people who just like to sit down play a game and have a good time doing it, without being stuck on an area for days or frustrated. With the gaming market getting bigger, i think designers need to accept the fact that they have to figure out better ways of making something challanging..

You want to know the difference?

The difference is this:

You beat a challanging area of a game that is not frustrating or long or repetitive = “SWEET I AM GOD! I TOTALLY KICKED ASS ON THAT PART!! WOOT!”

OR

You beat a frustraitingly hard area of a game that was tedius, made you jump perfectly, dodge perfectly, and never get hit = “OMG I NEVER WANT TO DO THAT SECTION AGAIN IM SO GLAD ITS OVER!”

Which do you think is a more positive feeling for a gamer? And which promotes replayability? hmmm.

Sorry to rant off there..

There are some good points of the game. Many guns, with much customizing, also It’s really great when a gun auto upgrades itself, while you are playing, you just see a flash on the screen with the current gun you are using, changing its power level. (1.1, 1.2 etc..). Thats satisifying in a way, it lets you know you’ve really been using this gun alot, but it also lets yo 

In the end Ratchet and clank will probably be just what fans of the originals are after, Personally, I could have done with out all the ‘redo this cuz you aren’t bionic man’ mentality they put into the game to keep it from being what they’d call ‘too easy’. They should figure out a better way to present challange rather than stamina induced battle sequences endlessly chained together. That said i cant rate the game terribly, its fairly solid in its play style if a little on the weaker side, I Find my wanting to give it an 8.0 for a solid shooter, but i also find myself dissapointed with the decisions made and want to give it a 7.5. That said the verdict is….

8.0/10

Basically, its solid, If i had the time (and not 15 other games piling up, or this was the only one title I owned), it would probably finish out after the frustrating bits, with a fairly good feeling to it. I enjoyed it for the most part.