(I've decided that before throwing out my reviews on my "blog" thingy, I'll run it by you, seeing as the Escapist is inhabited by smart people. Anyway, a long retrospective on the J&D series)
Some might wonder what I actually like in games, seeing as my taste differs in many ways, but if there?s one thing I always liked, it?s the Jak & Daxter series. It's an arsenal of action platformer games started by Naughty Dog in 2001, with game play that includes cars, racing, jumping, guns and funny dialogue. It was the first game series for me to encounter for the PS2, and it has always had a special place in my gaming heart, along with other favourite games like Kingdom Hearts, FFVII, and Left 4 Dead.
The first game, Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, featured the story of Jak, a mute village boy in a fictional world where everything is built up by an energy called Eco and a number of sages that make sure that balance is kept in the universe. He travels with his best friend, Daxter, to a place called Misty Island, an island that their guardian, and the master of Green Eco, Samos the Sage, tells them not to go. However, they didn?t listen, probably due to the giant log on his head. Anyway, when they get there, they discover a conspiracy being planned by a villain who sounds like he swallowed a microphone, to attack the other villages and take control over the world. On their way out of their, they get ambushed and Daxter falls down a pit of poisonous Dark Eco, and he turns into an orange ottsel (otter + weasel). So it's up to them, Samos, and Samos?s daughter Keira, to go out and find the sage of Dark Eco. On their way, they?ll notice a number of attacked villages, and discover a hidden conspiracy, a conspiracy that you?d think Jak would take into concern when he stumbled into the microphone man. It?s not the most intriguing story, but it gets the job done.
The gameplay is built up by solving puzzles, jumping on platforms, and hitting enemies in the face with your fist. You go on different missions to collect orbs, explore areas, etc. And you get rewarded with Precursor artefacts, that you need to collect to continue. While many free world games fail to grasp the notion of variety in missions, this game actually pulls it off by giving you beautifully made environments and different, if not a bit frustrating objectives, which includes deafeating enemies, looking for secret paths, riding a hovercraft, which makes the game have great amounts of variety. The difficulty is however a bit annoying, with some of the objectives taking fifty tries to finish. Luckily, some of them are optional, so you can skip some of the inhuman objectives. But even though the missions are successfully done, the game itself is pretty linear. There?s nothing to do except doing missions and finding hidden orbs and stuff. But I forget that with the missions being fun as hell. There is however a bunch of stuff I could complain about more and it wouldn?t be much of a review if I didn?t. The camera can sometimes be a bit on the dodgy side, with it being hard to direct during fast running objectives. The voicing is well done, but some of the dialogue is extremely embarrassing and poorly written, probably for the sake of trying to be funny and kid friendly. But if you let it in, you will find some really hilarious cutscenes, with quirky and unusual characters. This continues on into Jak II.
In Jak II, you go from friendly villages, to travelling into the future, where the world has become a technological dystopia, where the only place to live is in Haven City, a filthy poor city ruled by an evil baron. Jak gets captured and tortured, until Daxter, that is still an ottsel, gets off his lazy ass and saves him. Being tortured and infused with Dark Eco, Jak goes through a quick puberty stage, and gets a dark and evil voice, and a green beard, and a hunger for revenge. They now have to find a way out, while they fight for an underground rebel group, and working for a local drug leader named Krew. And this is where the story started getting my attention. Even though some of the dialogue was still laughable, it became less of a kid?s game, and gave a darker story, while introducing new and interesting characters, which most of them were less embarrassing than the original ones. It gave the picture of a desperate and horrible place that needed your help. But you were still the public enemy #1. But let?s ignore the funny dialogue and the local unthankful bastards of the city, and focus on the fun violence of the game.
There are some new aspects of the game. For example, there are vehicles now, so you can now get through the city. You get a number of weapons that gives new ways to brutally murder enemies, and you can now turn into a dark purple demon, known as Dark Jak, and reign havoc over the city. And this is where it became more of a fun sandbox game for mr. You can travel fast, you have a number of ways to kill the local residents, and you have an army of guards ready to chase you whenever you point at them funny.
The missions are pretty much the same, killing, escorting, defending, racing. And this becomes more fun than in the last game thanks to the aforementioned new aspects of the game and new interesting enemies. Enemies include guards, armoured robots, and a race of boneheaded monsters called Metal Heads, who ironically doesn?t listen to Slipknot. There is however a problem with an obnoxious difficulty. If you thought the first game was hard, prepare for a punch in the face, because the missions are more impossible than before. The enemies are more powerful than you and some have armed vehicles. The platform jumping is dodgier with fixed cameras and reoccurring baddies repeatedly shooting at you. The traffic is hard to drive through without blowing up your hovercraft. The races take annoyingly many times to win, as the courses are very hard to steer through without falling into pits. And the time limits are sometimes just pure evil. But that?s fine, that?s how a game is supposed to be, you?re supposed to be challenged until you want to break the controller and feed the disc to your dog. Wasn?t that the point of the Mario games, for example?
In Jak 3, the tradition of new environments and greater gameplay continues. Now you wake up in a desert, and must work for the king of a forgotten wasteland city, while Haven City is at war. Once again, it?s up to Jak to save the day, and along him comes Daxter, a talking bird named Pecker, and the other characters from Jak II. On the way, Jak will get even more dark powers, and also get the powers to turn into Light Jak, a white angel that can slow down time and fly. The enemies are the usual, Metal Heads, robots, etc. What is different now is that the guards are on your side, with a new regime in the city, and there are more robots and Metal Heads than ever. All this eventually connects to a secret plot to destroy the world, and even more background to the Precursors, the ones who created the world.
As I said, there have been some new changes. You get three times the weaponry, with new upgrades to the old ones, this meaning more destruction. The new vehicles are fun, with some fun cars that can drive fast, jump 10 metres up in the air, shoot bombs, shoot with machine guns, or multiple of these at once. Sadly, with new weapons and vehicles, there isn?t much of an authority chasing you when you go psycho ballistic on everyone. But this is being made up for with there already being enemies willing to kill you. Also, the difficulty has been lowered a bit, which I don?t know is better or worse. Jak II?s difficulty curve was annoying, but as I said, that wasn?t necessarily a bad thing. One thing I would like to see would be more mini games, cause there were a lot of missions I enjoyed (like the mission where you fly a battleship hovercraft and have dogfights with drones), and you don?t get to do the same thing again, unless you get the Mission Selection cheat. Speaking of which, one thing that I loved with Jak II and 3 was that when you?ve completed the game, you could get the cheats, which gives more fun to making mayhem around the city, like the unlimited Dark/Light Jak cheat, unlimited ammo, further upgrades to weapons, new vehicles. There were also more unserious cheats, like toggling Jak?s goatee, and giving him a big head. This was generally the peak of the series.
After completing the trilogy, some fans thought: ?Hang on, how did Daxter ever save Jak? How can a small obnoxious rat save someone in a city full of armoured soldiers and high security?? Well, this plot hole was filled in the game Daxter, which was a PSP game where you controlled Daxter, who?d got a job as a bug exterminator. You then meet some rather interesting characters that help you out in your quest in saving Jak. You fight of enemies with an electric fly swatter and a bug sprayer that can be used as a jet pack and the enemies are mostly the Metal Heads here. I?m starting to feel a bit oppressed here. It?s essentially the same formula as the original games, but with a different story angle and some new things to the table. There are also some new mini-games, where you are in a dream of Daxter?s which is basically parody?s of famous movies, like The Matrix and Lord of The Rings, which gives more fuel to the characterisation of Daxter?s obnoxious nature. The mini-games are basically a bunch of quick-time events, where you have to press a special button at the right time. And while this does sound a bit boring, you?ll be surprised by how addictive it is. But it isn?t more impressive than other action games, so it?s more of a game for the fans, which makes sense, cause you need to play the original games to understand what?s going on.
There was also a racing game spin off of the series named Jak X: Combat racing, but that?s hardly worth mentioning as it is only remotely connected to the original story, but here goes. After the events of Jak 3, Jak and the others find Krew?s death wish, and while fulfilling it they are tricked into drinking poison. And apparently the only way to live is to race. While this at most seems like a story for the all time fans, it?s more focused on the game play. It?s basically just like every other racing game, only with classic Jak & Daxter environments, Eco upgrades, and weapons, as it says on the title. My favourite was actually the weapons, because just like in games like Mario Kart, just getting past an opponent is one thing, but to blow him up, and send him to last place is bloody more entertaining and challenging. One problem is that after first half, the game has run out of ideas. New cars are hardly worth getting, the courses aren?t that much interesting, and the different kind of races stop being varied. So, rather than coming up with better ideas, Naughty Dog avoids this topic by raising the difficulty like it stepped on a bounce mat with double springs. And this is where I stopped playing, cause the races were fucking impossible! I know that the Jak games are supposed to be hard, but I?d rather play Jak II again on double difficulty than put up with this bullshit. The opponents are stronger and faster, and the courses are more annoying than ever. You can of course play with a friend, and if you both get good at it, there?s nothing more satisfying than shooting him down and then giving a smug laugh towards his face (of course, that would be a very stupid move of you, you prick).
So now that we?re down at the last paragraph, some of you may still wonder if these are the games for you. Well, that depends. If you enjoy good old platform action, like Crash Bandicoot, you will certainly like The Precursor Legacy. If you like a little more action, obnoxious difficulty, and a good story, I recommend Jak II. And Jak 3 would probably need you to play Jak II first, so go ahead and play that first. If you?re a fan of the whole series, and would like to see more of Daxter, Get a PSP and buy Daxter. And lastly, if you like playing Mario Kart on hardest with one hand while yelling at the TV screen, I suggest some therapy. And while you?re at it, feel free to buy Jak X and try to complete it. So now let?s wait until Jak & Daxter: The Lost Frontier arrives, and hope that it will be as fun as we, or at least I, hope it will be. Go on, grab a seat and a soda and we?ll wait? Wait for it?
?Ah, fuck this, I?ll go play Ratchet & Clank.
Some might wonder what I actually like in games, seeing as my taste differs in many ways, but if there?s one thing I always liked, it?s the Jak & Daxter series. It's an arsenal of action platformer games started by Naughty Dog in 2001, with game play that includes cars, racing, jumping, guns and funny dialogue. It was the first game series for me to encounter for the PS2, and it has always had a special place in my gaming heart, along with other favourite games like Kingdom Hearts, FFVII, and Left 4 Dead.
The first game, Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, featured the story of Jak, a mute village boy in a fictional world where everything is built up by an energy called Eco and a number of sages that make sure that balance is kept in the universe. He travels with his best friend, Daxter, to a place called Misty Island, an island that their guardian, and the master of Green Eco, Samos the Sage, tells them not to go. However, they didn?t listen, probably due to the giant log on his head. Anyway, when they get there, they discover a conspiracy being planned by a villain who sounds like he swallowed a microphone, to attack the other villages and take control over the world. On their way out of their, they get ambushed and Daxter falls down a pit of poisonous Dark Eco, and he turns into an orange ottsel (otter + weasel). So it's up to them, Samos, and Samos?s daughter Keira, to go out and find the sage of Dark Eco. On their way, they?ll notice a number of attacked villages, and discover a hidden conspiracy, a conspiracy that you?d think Jak would take into concern when he stumbled into the microphone man. It?s not the most intriguing story, but it gets the job done.
That's one large log.
The gameplay is built up by solving puzzles, jumping on platforms, and hitting enemies in the face with your fist. You go on different missions to collect orbs, explore areas, etc. And you get rewarded with Precursor artefacts, that you need to collect to continue. While many free world games fail to grasp the notion of variety in missions, this game actually pulls it off by giving you beautifully made environments and different, if not a bit frustrating objectives, which includes deafeating enemies, looking for secret paths, riding a hovercraft, which makes the game have great amounts of variety. The difficulty is however a bit annoying, with some of the objectives taking fifty tries to finish. Luckily, some of them are optional, so you can skip some of the inhuman objectives. But even though the missions are successfully done, the game itself is pretty linear. There?s nothing to do except doing missions and finding hidden orbs and stuff. But I forget that with the missions being fun as hell. There is however a bunch of stuff I could complain about more and it wouldn?t be much of a review if I didn?t. The camera can sometimes be a bit on the dodgy side, with it being hard to direct during fast running objectives. The voicing is well done, but some of the dialogue is extremely embarrassing and poorly written, probably for the sake of trying to be funny and kid friendly. But if you let it in, you will find some really hilarious cutscenes, with quirky and unusual characters. This continues on into Jak II.
In Jak II, you go from friendly villages, to travelling into the future, where the world has become a technological dystopia, where the only place to live is in Haven City, a filthy poor city ruled by an evil baron. Jak gets captured and tortured, until Daxter, that is still an ottsel, gets off his lazy ass and saves him. Being tortured and infused with Dark Eco, Jak goes through a quick puberty stage, and gets a dark and evil voice, and a green beard, and a hunger for revenge. They now have to find a way out, while they fight for an underground rebel group, and working for a local drug leader named Krew. And this is where the story started getting my attention. Even though some of the dialogue was still laughable, it became less of a kid?s game, and gave a darker story, while introducing new and interesting characters, which most of them were less embarrassing than the original ones. It gave the picture of a desperate and horrible place that needed your help. But you were still the public enemy #1. But let?s ignore the funny dialogue and the local unthankful bastards of the city, and focus on the fun violence of the game.
There are some new aspects of the game. For example, there are vehicles now, so you can now get through the city. You get a number of weapons that gives new ways to brutally murder enemies, and you can now turn into a dark purple demon, known as Dark Jak, and reign havoc over the city. And this is where it became more of a fun sandbox game for mr. You can travel fast, you have a number of ways to kill the local residents, and you have an army of guards ready to chase you whenever you point at them funny.
I wouldn't want to live there.
The missions are pretty much the same, killing, escorting, defending, racing. And this becomes more fun than in the last game thanks to the aforementioned new aspects of the game and new interesting enemies. Enemies include guards, armoured robots, and a race of boneheaded monsters called Metal Heads, who ironically doesn?t listen to Slipknot. There is however a problem with an obnoxious difficulty. If you thought the first game was hard, prepare for a punch in the face, because the missions are more impossible than before. The enemies are more powerful than you and some have armed vehicles. The platform jumping is dodgier with fixed cameras and reoccurring baddies repeatedly shooting at you. The traffic is hard to drive through without blowing up your hovercraft. The races take annoyingly many times to win, as the courses are very hard to steer through without falling into pits. And the time limits are sometimes just pure evil. But that?s fine, that?s how a game is supposed to be, you?re supposed to be challenged until you want to break the controller and feed the disc to your dog. Wasn?t that the point of the Mario games, for example?
In Jak 3, the tradition of new environments and greater gameplay continues. Now you wake up in a desert, and must work for the king of a forgotten wasteland city, while Haven City is at war. Once again, it?s up to Jak to save the day, and along him comes Daxter, a talking bird named Pecker, and the other characters from Jak II. On the way, Jak will get even more dark powers, and also get the powers to turn into Light Jak, a white angel that can slow down time and fly. The enemies are the usual, Metal Heads, robots, etc. What is different now is that the guards are on your side, with a new regime in the city, and there are more robots and Metal Heads than ever. All this eventually connects to a secret plot to destroy the world, and even more background to the Precursors, the ones who created the world.
As I said, there have been some new changes. You get three times the weaponry, with new upgrades to the old ones, this meaning more destruction. The new vehicles are fun, with some fun cars that can drive fast, jump 10 metres up in the air, shoot bombs, shoot with machine guns, or multiple of these at once. Sadly, with new weapons and vehicles, there isn?t much of an authority chasing you when you go psycho ballistic on everyone. But this is being made up for with there already being enemies willing to kill you. Also, the difficulty has been lowered a bit, which I don?t know is better or worse. Jak II?s difficulty curve was annoying, but as I said, that wasn?t necessarily a bad thing. One thing I would like to see would be more mini games, cause there were a lot of missions I enjoyed (like the mission where you fly a battleship hovercraft and have dogfights with drones), and you don?t get to do the same thing again, unless you get the Mission Selection cheat. Speaking of which, one thing that I loved with Jak II and 3 was that when you?ve completed the game, you could get the cheats, which gives more fun to making mayhem around the city, like the unlimited Dark/Light Jak cheat, unlimited ammo, further upgrades to weapons, new vehicles. There were also more unserious cheats, like toggling Jak?s goatee, and giving him a big head. This was generally the peak of the series.
Cars, deserts and explosions. What's not to love?
After completing the trilogy, some fans thought: ?Hang on, how did Daxter ever save Jak? How can a small obnoxious rat save someone in a city full of armoured soldiers and high security?? Well, this plot hole was filled in the game Daxter, which was a PSP game where you controlled Daxter, who?d got a job as a bug exterminator. You then meet some rather interesting characters that help you out in your quest in saving Jak. You fight of enemies with an electric fly swatter and a bug sprayer that can be used as a jet pack and the enemies are mostly the Metal Heads here. I?m starting to feel a bit oppressed here. It?s essentially the same formula as the original games, but with a different story angle and some new things to the table. There are also some new mini-games, where you are in a dream of Daxter?s which is basically parody?s of famous movies, like The Matrix and Lord of The Rings, which gives more fuel to the characterisation of Daxter?s obnoxious nature. The mini-games are basically a bunch of quick-time events, where you have to press a special button at the right time. And while this does sound a bit boring, you?ll be surprised by how addictive it is. But it isn?t more impressive than other action games, so it?s more of a game for the fans, which makes sense, cause you need to play the original games to understand what?s going on.
There was also a racing game spin off of the series named Jak X: Combat racing, but that?s hardly worth mentioning as it is only remotely connected to the original story, but here goes. After the events of Jak 3, Jak and the others find Krew?s death wish, and while fulfilling it they are tricked into drinking poison. And apparently the only way to live is to race. While this at most seems like a story for the all time fans, it?s more focused on the game play. It?s basically just like every other racing game, only with classic Jak & Daxter environments, Eco upgrades, and weapons, as it says on the title. My favourite was actually the weapons, because just like in games like Mario Kart, just getting past an opponent is one thing, but to blow him up, and send him to last place is bloody more entertaining and challenging. One problem is that after first half, the game has run out of ideas. New cars are hardly worth getting, the courses aren?t that much interesting, and the different kind of races stop being varied. So, rather than coming up with better ideas, Naughty Dog avoids this topic by raising the difficulty like it stepped on a bounce mat with double springs. And this is where I stopped playing, cause the races were fucking impossible! I know that the Jak games are supposed to be hard, but I?d rather play Jak II again on double difficulty than put up with this bullshit. The opponents are stronger and faster, and the courses are more annoying than ever. You can of course play with a friend, and if you both get good at it, there?s nothing more satisfying than shooting him down and then giving a smug laugh towards his face (of course, that would be a very stupid move of you, you prick).
So now that we?re down at the last paragraph, some of you may still wonder if these are the games for you. Well, that depends. If you enjoy good old platform action, like Crash Bandicoot, you will certainly like The Precursor Legacy. If you like a little more action, obnoxious difficulty, and a good story, I recommend Jak II. And Jak 3 would probably need you to play Jak II first, so go ahead and play that first. If you?re a fan of the whole series, and would like to see more of Daxter, Get a PSP and buy Daxter. And lastly, if you like playing Mario Kart on hardest with one hand while yelling at the TV screen, I suggest some therapy. And while you?re at it, feel free to buy Jak X and try to complete it. So now let?s wait until Jak & Daxter: The Lost Frontier arrives, and hope that it will be as fun as we, or at least I, hope it will be. Go on, grab a seat and a soda and we?ll wait? Wait for it?
?Ah, fuck this, I?ll go play Ratchet & Clank.
