Ratchet and Clank

[Perfect Stu]

Sony Computer Entertainment of America and Insomniac Games bring action/shooter/platformer/character/adventure game 'Ratchet and Clank' to the Playstation 2.

IGN REVIEW:

• Presentation - Seamless menus and no loading times. A clean, well polished game in all regards. 9.2
• Graphics - Immense landscapes and incredibly quanitities of polygons on screen. Decent to good character design, and a honed, burnished look. 9.4
• Sound - Weirdly, the genericized techno music sounds good here, and the voice acting, though familiar in style, works. 9.0
• Gameplay - Although it's got weapons and a unique monetary style, Insominac's effort is still a platformer at its heart, and a deep, enjoyable one at that. 9.0
• Lasting Appeal - Requiring more than 20 hours to play, Ratchet and Clank has a lot to offer, plus many rewards for collecting all the extras. 9.5

OVERALL SCORE (not an average) 9.2

GAMESPOT REVIEW

Gameplay - 9
Graphics - 9
Sound - 9
Value - 9
Tilt - 9

OVERALL SCORE: 9 (superb)

"Ratchet & Clank skillfully avoids most of the traps that hold back the majority of modern platform games and presents a fantastic, well-balanced, story-driven adventure"

This highly-anticipated game also received a 9/10 from PSM, who awarded the title 'GAME OF THE MONTH', and EGM gave the game an average of 8.5/10, awarding it their 'SILVER AWARD'.

After reading the reviews, watching the video interviews, watching trailers, and gawking at screenshots, I will definately be picking up this game as soon as it hits my local EB (which should be today, the 5th, or tomorrow, the 6th)

Your thoughts?

[Null]

looks like a great game...

my prob is i dont have time for it. GTA VC..... hell, havnt even finished mario yet. (havnt played in a while)


my other thought is..... if that got game of the month for PSM...........what they give GTA VC ?

[Perfect Stu]

Originally posted by Null
my other thought is..... if that got game of the month for PSM...........what they give GTA VC ?

any moron would know that Vice City and Ratchet and Clank aren't released in the same month

and I don't know if they even HAVE reviewed Vice City yet

[Crono]

I'll probably rent it sometime...

[DarkMaster]

i'll rent it, since my money is of low quantity. and PSM is pretty strange, that was the December issue and they're saying R&C is game of the month and they havent even reviewed GTA:VC yet.....wut the hell?

[Joeiss]

Too bad my EB won't be getting it until the 15th of November.

Oh well, this gives more time for me to play VC!

[Joeiss]

Well, my EB got it in today! I am going to pick it up tomorrow.... Hmmm... Just yesterday they laughed when I asked if they had it in yet, and then they said, oh, it won't be out until the 15th.

LOSERS!

[Perfect Stu]

Impressions

I picked up the game today, and I've played for a couple hours.

The first thing you'll notice about this game are the wonderful graphics and the even better animations. You'll soon find out that the people at Insomniac have quite the sense of humour. Ratchet is a good character, and Clank is a very likeable character. The humour is displayed in the story-telling cutscenes...wait till you first meet the main bad guy (forget his name at the moment) and this 'Big Al's Robot Shop' commercial.

The controls take a little getting used to...in about 30 minutes, you'll get used to the controls. As for the controls themself, they're good. Not fantastic, but definately not poor. Ratchet responds well to the movement of the left analog stick, and flipping in between weapons and gadgets soon becomes a breeze.

The one thing I really enjoy so far about the game are the weapons. You start off with a wrench that you can throw as a boomerang or just pound enemies with, and a bomb glove that you can use to throw small grenade-like bombs at nearby enemies. Soon you'll run into such weapons as a flamethrower of sorts, a blaster gun, and a suck cannon, which sucks up little enemies and then blasts them at larger foes. It's a good addition to the usually weaponless platform genre, and plays a huge role in the game. Once you have 5 or more weapons, there are many ways to take out an area of enemies, which adds quite a bit of variety.

That's it for now. I'll post more later, perhaps

[Joeiss]

This game, my friends, is amazing. I am on like the fourth planet, and it just keeps on getting better and better. Also, the worlds are getting bigger and bigger as well. Also, Stu, should I be buying all the new weapons that appear? Because I have like 8 allready.

[Perfect Stu]

Newsflash

After the first 4 worlds, the game gets fairly hard. You have you utilize your weapons with precision, which you really didn't have to until this 5th level (the space station-like place). Also, there was one area I played just controlling Clank. The action was toned down big time, but there were more platforming elements...like walking across a narrow walkway from space station to space station. Good stuff.

This is definately, DEFINATELY the best 3D 'platform' (I don't even think it should be qualified as a platformer, but it is) game I have ever experienced. If you've enjoyed 3rd person action games, or platformers, or both, you owe it to yourself to buy this game. It's that good...that fun.

Updated impressions to follow...

and Joeiss, the one weapon I think isn't worth buying yet is found in the 5th world (called the distractor or something...it makes a sound to distract the enemies...only it draws them to you, so you'll have like 15 baddies on your ass). Buy everything except for that.

Damn I love this game...

[Joeiss]

I bought that.... LOL.... Oh wait, actually, I won that as a prize, or found it or something.

And yeah, the Clank part in the space station is REALLY SLOW. And Clank's jumps are crappy, even though in the begining of the game he jumped really high in one of the cutscenes. I am on the Hoverboard race planet.... Is that fun? Is it hard? I am like just at the place, but my mom kicked me off the TV.

[DarkMaster]

that place is great fun Joeiss, as is every level. i'm at the snow planet Hoven, awesome fun. i like that planet where you have to help that military guy and you get to use your grind boots on that long track, awesome. this game is great, i think those clank levels are just used to add variety, they're more about puzzles and stuff (well later on they are) where as with Rachet its cool fast action. oh, and that planet with the beach resort (Palukora? or something....), that was beautiful.

[Joeiss]

Man, I am at the hover race right now. I have come third place, but that is my best. Do you guys have any tips? Like, should I just not use cool jumps and stuff? And is there a boost button? Or do I get boosts only from the rings, the bad guys and the green arrows?

[DarkMaster]

for the hover race, dont even bother doing jumps and showing off for now, just keep going through the course and try to get every green arrow you see. also, the white circles last longer than the green arrows so try to get those too. stay on the inside and cut the other guys off, eventually you should win.

[Joeiss]

Oh, I won! LOL. I beat it in my first try this afternoon!!! Now I do tricks, because I can convert it into turbo.