Ratchet & Clank: Tool of Destruction can now be purchased in a shiny silver box which means it is a platinum edition and carries the price tag of £19.99 (sterling, pip pip pop pop). With the latest installment (A Crack In Time) available in shops and such, lets look at its predecessor and whether its still worth a good banging.
For those unaware of the game it is the seventh installment in the Ratchet and Clank series where the pair of them endeavor to find the fabled ‘Dimensionator’ and foil Emperor Tachyon’s attempts to capture Ratchet (the last Lombax in the galaxy). It is the first platformer I’ve encountered for the PS3 and I cannot help notice that it takes a bucket load of influences from other games. A few below are noted and explained:
Crash Bandicoot - You’ll spend a lot of time smashing up boxes whilst playing, perhaps paying homage to Sony’s first mascot.
Pikmin - Apart from the main theme of blowing things you’ll find a lot of mini escapades to keep you occupied. Several times you take control of Clank (Ratchet’s robo companion) who commands little alien creatures to solve puzzles and defeat enemies.
Sonic Adventure - High speed escapes via grinding long segments of piping are reminiscent of the far too short Dreamcast era.
Lylat Wars - The levels where you take control of Ratchet’s ship nearly gave me RSI until I realised you can simply hold down R1 to fire (grumble). Also please note Insomniac Games, I don’t need to be told that by tapping R2 and L2 I can do a barrel roll. Just cut to the chase and tell me to “DO A BARREL ROLL!”
Super Monkey Ball - Ratchet and Clank may call it a Gyrocycle but I call that a ball and I’m rolling around super monkey style.
So evidently this game has a lot of different elements but for the most part you are just blowing things up and the majority of these things are robots. Therein lies the title as you are provided with more weapons than you can shake a memory stick at. You start off with some standard arms and as you progress you are introduced with more and more creative toys. Some weapons look better on paper such as the ‘Tornado Launcher’, whereby moving Ratchet and the tornado at the same time can prove difficult. Other gadgets are useful and provide amusement such as the ‘Groovatron’. Lob this bad boy and all the enemies on screen will bust into dance, giving you time to take aim and fire.
Humour is a recurring theme with a few chuckles here and there from the dialogue. The plot doesn’t need a great amount of attention as is common of your average platformer. Gameplay rules all in this genre, take Mario 64 for example. one of the best platformers the gaming world has ever seen. Princess kidnapped by dinosaur, plot sorted. No need for the details when you’ve got decent gameplay and puzzles to keep you occupied. Indeed that is what the gameplay is too with, for the most part, well thought out controls. Combining platforming and shooting can always be tricky but R&S provides a manual aiming function to ensure you’re not always running around in circles in order to maneuver yourself into the firing line of the enemy.
If I’m picking scruples with the game then there are a few instances where I think there could be more check pointing. A few times I was faced with a couple of tough segments in a row without a checkpoint in between which is always a frustration. Also the mechanics of the swingshot could use a bit of tweaking, a number of times it failed to activate when my aim was only slightly off and if this sends you a long way back through the level it is severely annoying.
Scruples aside I still think this game is a quality piece of entertainment and shouldn’t disappoint any platforming fans. So its 4 out of 5 spanners from me
Popularity: 6% [?]
Write a Comment