[Perfect Stu]

sweet merciful feline...

After having seen the demo and played the game with my own two hands, I have complete confidence Naughty Dog is going to make one of this year's best games on any console. Does that sound overly confident, arrogant? PS2 fan boyish? Call it what you may, but once you play the game, I'm quite sure you'll feel what I do now. Which is this warm, confident feeling that Naughty Dog, instead of simply making another sequel, is creating what appears to be an entirely new game. That it wants to deliver a different experience, push boundaries, show its technological prowess, and reform the very meaning on the traditional platform experience.

The one big difference in this game is that you will indeed play as Daxter later on. Yep, he will be playable, though, Naughty Dog wouldn't show us that part yet

Now for some excellent new information that further sets this game apart from its predecessor. Jak II offers approximately 80 missions or thereabouts, giving players about 20-30 hours of gameplay the first time around. And, unlike the first, which could be finished in one day, it's long and not easy. Naughty Dog knows it made the first game too easy, and apparently wants this game to feel different. We could tell right away that it not only played with a harder difficult curve, but that it played differently in its structure. When you completed a mission, you return to the HQ for more missions. You don't just collect more items. Honestly, I kinda kept looking around more things to collect after reaching my first goal and a Naughty Dog employee said, "Yeah, now go back and do another one," and I said, "Oh, right." And then thought, "I do?"

Yet another difference in this game is that it's story-driven. Creative director Dan Arey explains it this way: "Jak follows a complete storyline. We have a massive script that drives him forward, and the events in the story coincide with his actions to push it to the next dramatic event."

Unlike the first game, the story is the backbone behind all of the actions in the game. His ability to complete missions opens up more areas, which fundamentally changes the game's basis. He no longer moves forward in the chase for more things to collect. "He can indeed collect things, be they items, weapons, eco, ammo, but they aren't crucial for the story to move forward," explained Rubin. "He can collect things is he wants, but he doesn't have to."

After Jak progresses in the game a bit he realizes the old man he first met was walking with a young girl with whom he feels a small connection to, though he doesn't realize it at first. She is a prophet of sorts, and her goal is to reach a powerful artifact, which it turns out, the baron is also after. The first major half of the game is focused on attaining it, and then the second half targets what its power implies and how to stop the Baron, who gets it, from using it for his own evil ends. Needless to say, the story behind Jak II is deep, involved and crucial to the game's development.

The city isn't just bustling with innocents either; it's packed with police, the Baron's Crimson Guards. If you accidentally hit one while in a vehicle, or mistakenly shoot one, an infinite number of them are alerted and they'll swarm you, using powerful tasers to roust your ass.

Another things make this different: You can elevate your vehicle while driving. With a touch of a shoulder pad, you can zoom down to street level or elevate up to a second story level. Chases become particularly harry when you have to switch from high to low while going as fast as possible to escape the guards. It's incredibly fun, and what's more, the framerate rarely takes a hit. This game is so damn fun. Last but not least, Jak also gets another vehicle, a hoverboard. And just like the weapons, once he has it, he owns it for the rest of the game. He can flip it out and perform tricks, flips, ollies, rails; there is a hefty sampling of tricks several of which he'll need to use to get extra eco or items.

All in all, Jak II may not be a revolutionary game, but at least for the platform genre, it's a break from the norm. Like Rare's Conker's Bad Fur Day, Jak II is a dark, still very funny game that retains its classic platform elements, but adds numerous new dimensions to the fold, pushing and reforming the genre, altering its shape into, well, a demented Mickey Mouse shape of sorts. It's the first game I've seen this year that I can point to and say, "Yes! That's a must-have, Triple-A title."

No longer hiding behind primary colors and simple collecting missions, Naughty Dog is branching out with Jak II and giving gamers a dark, story-driven gem that might very well be remembered years from now. The team that once brought us the cautious 2 1/2D Crash Bandicoot doesn't seem so cautious anymore, and, I think it'll once again push the gaming bar to another level, upon which all other games in the closest genres will be judged.

-ps2.ign.com