/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.8559587]

Why is this series so cursed?
>Ratchet still gets good games, even if they're soulless compared to the originals
>Sly got a new game in 2013 and is rumoured to get a new one soon
>Jak got... a shitty sequel on a handheld

I just want a new Jak game. It's all I ask for...

[Anonymous No.8559606]

Because ND decided lol fuck our old IPs and made The Last of Us II

[Anonymous No.8559614]

Because unlike those franchises, only the first Jak was any good

[Anonymous No.8559713]

>>8559587
You should be glad we aren't getting a new game unless a different studio makes it. Naughty Dog is fucking awful nowadays

[Anonymous No.8559727]

>>8559713
Not so sure how well that worked out last time they outsoirced the series, but I'll still take it over anything Neill Cuckmann and Naughty ZOG would shit out.

[Anonymous No.8559734]

>>8559587
It's because of Grand Theft Auto. When they had focus tests for Jak 2 back in 2002, 8 year olds didn't care for collectathon platformers, and only wanted to play GTA3.

[Anonymous No.8559739]

>>8559614
beat me to it

[Anonymous No.8559882]

>>8559587
It’s one of my favorite series on PS2, and I don’t think that it sold too poorly either. It’s kind of odd that it never got sequels in later systems. If I had to guess, it’s probably because they had no idea what to do with the series. Jak & Daxter has suffered from an identity crisis ever since it tried to capitalize on the GTA trend with Jak II. They probably didn’t know where to go next after the racing game. I still play through them every now and then on ps2. Jak x requires its own memory card due to save breaking bugs, so it really helps to have the disc for that one.

[Anonymous No.8559937]

>>8559606
Still waiting for Unkarted and The Fast of Us.

[Anonymous No.8559941]

>>8559734
Jak II was great. It was Jak 3 that felt phoned in. They also committed the unspeakable crime of reducing Kira's role to background character.

[Anonymous No.8560026]

>>8559587
>modern ND making a new Jak
You don't want it.

[Anonymous No.8560032]

>>8559882
very nice
>>8559941
They didn't phone it in, but you can tell that Jak 3 only had a year of development.

[Anonymous No.8560107]

>>8560026
honestly pre tlou2 I would have been down to see what Jak4 could have looked like as a gritty and realistic game, just as a morbid curiosity, but at this point yeah let the series rest in piece. Don't need to watch Ashelin bite Kiera's fingers off.

[Anonymous No.8560176]

>>8560107
Something tells me Naughty Dog is aware they went way too cynically dark in TLOU2 and won't be continuing that trend. Mechanically the game is awesome but playing through it is soul crushing.

[Anonymous No.8560448]

>>8560176
TLOU2's real problem is not just it's darkness but that it fingerwags you the entire time in a "look at what you're doing you scumbag" kind of way but it gives you no choice in the matter. Like do you want me to play your game or not? If you're going to act like I'm a giant asshole for doing these things then don't make me do them to advance the story.

[Anonymous No.8560703]

>>8559614
But that's also true of Sly

[Anonymous No.8560871]

ND really had no idea what to do with the series after the first one. Jak 2 had an absolute shit open world with garbage vehicles and Jak 3 just wanted to be a racing game. Ratchet and Clank on the other hand knew exactly what it was from the beginning.

[Anonymous No.8560916]

>>8559937
>The Fast of Us
good name for 'Fast and Furious #387'

[Anonymous No.8561346]

>>8559587
This series didn't need to be continued, honestly.
>>8559614
SPBP

[Anonymous No.8561472]

>>8559614
Same goes for Sly.

[Anonymous No.8562443]

Still trying to decide to play Jak II or not. I thought the first one was very good. As I understand it's different and there seem to be varying opinions on this. Any advice from Jak veterans?

[Anonymous No.8562501]

>>8560176
I'm playing through it right now and it's honestly just fucking boring outside of the core gameplay, like it gets so edgy that it just feels numb

[Anonymous No.8562502]

>>8559587
Daxter for psp was a let down like literally anything else i ever played for psp. Except for this lotr turn based game but id probably hate it now as an adult.

>>8562443
You will get a lot of anons saying they were filtered by the city in Jak 2 which is pretty funny. It can be aggrivating at times but it isnt hard to navigate. It certainly isnt the same collectathon style as the first game. I enjoyed it for what it's worth. I also consider JakX Combat racing probably my favorite racing game but i rarely encounter other fans of the game.

[Anonymous No.8562687]

>>8560448
I can't believe Neil Druckmann ripped off Spec Ops: The Line. What a hack.

[Anonymous No.8562705]

>>8562501
You don’t get it bro. This is a DARK and MATURE game for ADULTS. This is the REAL WORLD in this ADULT GAME for ADULTS where you KILL people with REAL WEAPONS.

[Anonymous No.8562707]

>>8562705
Worst part is that outside of a few contrivances I found the first game pretty good with its story. Nothing spectacular but it worked.
>>8560448
I just finished Ellie's sections and being forced to kill the dog in the aquarium feels like such a fucking dick move, I'm not surprised if I'll see that on Abby's side and get indirectly judged for it

[Anonymous No.8562710]

>>8562687
>war is actually bad ok guys, it isn't fun!
such a deep, stunning and brave concept.

[Anonymous No.8562717]

Is Jak 2 worth playing? Only touched the first one which I liked a fair bit

>>8562707
The absolute flaming irony of the game is that when you finish it, it essentially wags its finger at you and goes “revenge and killing is bad!” Ignoring the fact you’ve just gone through the entire game massacring everyone in your sight without a moment’s notice.

[Anonymous No.8562729]

>>8562710
At least Spec Ops is only like 5-6 hours vs. 20

[Anonymous No.8562765]

>>8562710
I feel like this kind of message can't properly be done in a video game. In a movie where you have a passive audience, sure. But a video game is obligated to make doing the thing fun to do. You inherently send mixed messages. If you want people to not think war is cool then you either have to stop making war seem cool or acknowledge that a video game is just make believe and doesn't translate to the real world.

[Anonymous No.8563302]

>>8562717
All of them are worth playing, except maybe The Lost Frontier.

[Anonymous No.8563470]

>>8562717
It's worth playing but has some really frustrating parts (looooong gap between checkpoints)

[Anonymous No.8563556]

>>8562765
Lol, exactly. It's what pretentious essays or reviews would call 'ludonarrative dissonance'. A similar thing with the first Bioshock. Wow, so you're acknowledging that the player doesn't actually have agency because games are bunch of deterministic ones and zeroes, all the while making no actual commentary or possibly offering a solution, so witty and deep.
I feel like these hack westerners played Metal Gear Solid 2 and were desperate to have some of that impact on their games, without particularly understanding why that worked so well.

[Anonymous No.8563587]

>>8559727
this game wasn't that bad, it's just bland

[Anonymous No.8563590]

>>8559941
Jak 3 feels extremely rushed and the twist of the precursors being like daxter is lame

[Anonymous No.8563619]

>>8563556
Even games that give you choices often have this problem. Because too often the evil options don't actually serve a purpose. Maybe you get a little more money or something but it typically doesn't actually make your mission easier. In fact it often causes you more problems because it will cut you off from extra help, pit you in very hard fights, or render entire plot points narratively nonsensical. A lot of Bioware games are like this, where the two ways to play are "normal" and "whackjob crazy person."

[Anonymous No.8563635]

>>8559587
This series has surprisingly good worldbuilding for a children's platformer. Probably my favorite ps2 title.

[Anonymous No.8563645]

>>8563619
And you'll still save the world in the end and be a hero no matter how many """"""""""evil"""""""" choices you make. Not to mention the inherent problems with open world games and no sense of urgency and pacing, I could go ahead and choose to singlehandedly save the entire universe on this final mission here, but I'm feeling like playing some table tennis for 30 hours instead, and then go shopping for new threads.

[Anonymous No.8563651]

>>8560703
The first sly cooper game is so tight and fun to play. The open world shit in the sequels is boring

[Anonymous No.8563663]

how do you guys rate
Crash
Spyro
Jak and Daxter
Ratchet and Clank
Sly Cooper?

Am I forgetting anything big?

[Anonymous No.8563676]

>>8563663
Crash > Ratchet > Sly > Jak > Spyro

[Anonymous No.8563680]

>>8563663
Spyro > Sly > Ratchet > Crash > Jak

[Anonymous No.8563683]

>>8563645
Jade Empire started out with an interesting concept, where Open Palm and Closed Fist weren't necessarily good and evil but more like Order and Chaos separated from actual morality. But the game in practice doesn't follow this. There aren't any "good" closed fist or "evil" open palm options. It just degenerates into either helping people or being a shithead. These games also tend to not care much about the type of evil so sometimes you're engaging in calculated self-interest and other's you're a cackling madman like the Joker.

I think the only way to really fix this is for the game's storyline to be a lot more malleable than they typically are. It'd be a lot of work but you really have to let the player take things totally off the rails. You can't have the player choosing between saving the lost child and raping the lost child but then carry on with the same general storyline with the only difference being the reactions of your party members.

[Anonymous No.8563764]

>>8563663
jak>crash>sly>ratchet>spyro

[Anonymous No.8563770]

>>8563663
Jak > Spyro > Ratchet > Sly > Crash

[Anonymous No.8563862]

>>8562443
>Still trying to decide to play Jak II or not.
Just play it, you fucking idiot.

[Anonymous No.8563870]

>>8563663
Spyro's better than all of them and I don't give a fuck about Sly. lol

[Anonymous No.8564080]

>>8562502
daxter was a great platformer

[Anonymous No.8564323]

>>8563663
Crash > Spyro > Sly > Ratchet > Jak

[Anonymous No.8564765]

>>8559587
If there was a Jak 4, would it be a collectathon or a GTA clone?

[Anonymous No.8564768]

>>8564765
it would be a stunning and brave cinematic experience showing you the injustices and lies deeply rooted within Jak's universe, and invite you to challenge the status quo.

[Anonymous No.8564797]

TPL is the best one, i liked jak 3 more than 2, couldn't play X because of that MC bug and Lost Frontier was "ok", haven't played Daxter yet.
I wish they stayed with the world and atmosphere of the first game, one thing i didn't like about 6th gen platformers was how everything had guns, combat mechanics or vehicles.

[Anonymous No.8564812]

>>8560703
>>8561472
I like sly 1, but no.

[Anonymous No.8564912]

>>8559614
The second Jak is *mostly* good. The level curve is wrong and that makes some of the set piece missions suck, but in between the really bad ones (the Slums Gauntlet, the Sewer Escort Mission, the Underport) are plenty of fun and reasonably challenging missions. The entirety of Mar's Tomb is a great way to finish off the second act, for example. If Jak had been given more hit points (at least as reward, if not just to start with) and the checkpoints were a little more fair, the game would be 10/10.
And Jak 3 is... really just meh. It doesn't have any challenging sections because it's so overstuffed with bullshit that you just need to figure out which option fits your natural skillset so well that you have an auto-win, but it doesn't have any good sections either because it's constantly reinventing itself. It needs a far more significant overhaul, but mostly in the sense of having LESS. Keep Light Jak and ditch the gun upgrades, I think.
The trilogy wasn't what it should have been, but the later games aren't irredeemably bad.

[Anonymous No.8566672]

>>8563764
Sypro >> Ratchet PS2 > Jak > Sly (only played Sly 1) > Crash > Ratchet not /vr/

Crash is great though

[Anonymous No.8566679]

>>8559614
So I guess OP point stands, Jak was cursed from the start
Jak 2 will always be one of the worst sequels ever made.

[Anonymous No.8567035]

>>8566679
Maybe, but I would still say it's a good game.