Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction

On November 4, 2002 developer Insomniac made a platformer called Ratchet & Clank. Though I never played those, this is my second game in the Ratchet & Clank universe. I played Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters before this, and I liked it. It was a pretty good platformer. My expectations for this game were a little even. I wasn't expecting a lot and I wasn't expecting a bad game. What I did get out of Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, was a birth of a new favorite franchise for me.

So the story. You play as Ratchet & Clank obviously. The beginning of the game was basicly Insomniac saying "Hey look how good this game looks!". Which it does look great, but now isn't the time to talk about that. You get a call from Captian Qwark for help. So the gang goes to go see whats up. Theres a large army of robotic commandos attacking the city. You then meet up with Emperor Tachyon who is the prince of the Cragmites. You find out that wants to kill Ratchet so he can get rid of the Lombax race. The story pretty much is about that. Ratchet is tries to find out what happend to his people. And Clank is kinda stalked by the Zoni, these are people only Clank can see and Ratchet pretty much thinks he's crazy. They are trying to find the Dimensionator, a device the Lombax created to defeat the Cragmites in the Great War. The story takes you to some amazing looking places, all looks new. Though the story is very linear. You have to kill a set group of people before you can move on.

The gameplay is fantastic. Insomniac got the controls very polished. You can hit the L1 to go into a third person type aiming

system. And you can it either R1 or O to fire. Like most of the games you can hit the triangle to bring up your guns and devices. There is a small lock on system but it only works if your up close. You can use L2 to not lock on, but to get a better defensive look at your enemy. I suggest you use that. Some times the controls don't responed and that led to a good amont of deaths. That was mainly with the grappling device though.

Ok. The one thing I hated about this game. It is so unforgiving. Where the hell is the checkpoints. They are so far between eachother it is a sad thing. I got half way through a level then died. Then they put me right back at the beginning again. So I have to go back and totally redue the mini boss fights, all the puzzles. It's a annoying thing about the game that unfortunatly caused me to give the game 4/5 rather then a perfect score. The game also has a flew glitches. Enemies got stuck in walls a lot. And I fell through floors a couple of times.

So, the game does have it's strong points. And the good thing is, is that these are really strong points. The game looks fantastic. To me, I favor cartoony graphics like these. And to me, this game looks better then say a Gears of War or Halo 3. Maybe up there with Killzone 2. I thought the game looks great. Out of the whole game 99% of it had no pop ins. And this game is pretty big. That's pretty impressive. The voice acting is spot on. Might be some of the best I have heard. Everyone seems dedicated to their roles, it's nice. The comedy is very very good. I laughed more playing this game then I did Portal. Here are some of my favorites.

"Oh, I didn't recognize you guys in HD"
"Could the inmate 432(I forget the name of the inmate) please report to the death chamber. We have a...present for you."
"Just look at that mustache, have you seen anything look better"

I loved it. Writting is great.

So, Ratchet & Clank Future: ToD is what I wanted. Great looking game, fantastic controls, great humor. But it gets frustrating near the end. The ememies get harder and the checkpoints seem to get far more distant. I easily can recommend this, only if you don't get mad easily. Though, this is easily one of the best game I have played on the PS3.