However with fond memories of Jak II still swimming around in my head (and wounds still throbbing on my hands), taking in the first level of Ratchet & Clank 2 was like going back in time. While the latter focused on plot and platforms and kept a rigid set of rules in place throughout (scant few meaningful upgrades, four health points, etc), progress through R&C2's platform environments is much more RPG-like, with regular health, tool, weapon and ship upgrades, and a system that doesn't demand backtracking, thorough exploration and repeated play, but at the same time is quite happy to reward it. The True Renegadeĭespite the similarly sci-fi setting, R&C2 doesn't share a great deal in common with Jak II.
But although Insomniac Games refrained from throwing the whole thing out the window and starting again with a blank canvas, their platformer grows to reveal itself as a far more thoughtfully resurrected package, and shows us that while Naughty Dog had to build an entirely new premise to stage their game, there's still a great deal of life left in the R&C universe. There's no massive deviation from the previous game here - just smaller, subtler changes and a new and larger selection of planets to consider. Doubly so when you consider the quantum leaps it made over its predecessor's narrative, structure and sense of humour.Ĭompared to Jak II (which is sadly inevitable), Ratchet & Clank 2 is a much more straightforward sequel. Given that Ratchet & Clank was rather unflatteringly held up as Jak & Daxter with guns, it hardly seemed fair when Naughty Dog's Jak II: Renegade borrowed a futuristic location and flying cars, and mixed heavy weaponry and traditional platforming to great effect.