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Sony Announces New Ratchet, Jak, Sly Cooper
Thanks to Yahoo for reprinting a press release revealing third versions of the Jak & Daxter and Ratchet & Clank series for PlayStation 2 are due out Fall 2004. The press release notes the "upcoming sequels will continue to push the boundaries as both teams incorporate revolutionary gameplay elements", although with only 12 months between iterations, either fast work or simultaneous development teams seem needed to really push the envelope. Elsewhere, a sneak peek at the next Official PlayStation Magazine reveals a follow-up to another Sony-published title, in the form of Sly Cooper 2: Band of Thieves, the sequel to the underselling, but critically acclaimed late 2002 PS2 platformer.
I am not singling Sony out for this but I am getting tired of sequels. Every game has several versions sequels now (don't even get me started on FF). Movies are the same and the remakes of older movies is similar to a sequel.
Where is the original thought? Is the only way gamecoders can make money is to reuse a theme and add some bells and whistles, repackage and call it Dungeon Seige 2 or Unreal 5 or Warcraft 3. I understand that these franchises are popular and some of them are really quite good but I beg these people to think a little more.
B O R I N G
I know this lists only 3 titles, but doesn't anyone think there is an overabundance of platformers like these? True, those above are popular titles, but think of all the junk they are competing with. Are they actually all that good?
But Sly Cooper? Never sold well, didn't have much marketing, and was certainly not noticed in the mainstream. Where did the idea for a sequel for this come from?
One can only hope the commercials for this will be as creative and memorable as the ratchet and clank commercials.
With the except of X and X-2, no Final Fantasy game has ever had a sequal. Each game that SquareEnix (and previously Squaresoft) put out under the name was a completely different RPG sharing only some character elements (moogles and chocobos, a character named Cid, etc).
To put it in perspective, Suikoden has more sequels than Final Fantasy as of Suikoden 3. Square just happened to label their projects worked on by their lead designers as "Final Fantasy" sort of like a label for a particular kind of RPG that Square's people felt were representitive of their best work.
So how, how in a talk about sequels, can you bag on FF, which has only 1 sequel to its name? At least go, "and don't get me started on X" in a series that is nothing but direct sequels, like the Mario games, or Madden football.
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My wife loves this game. It's the first game she's played on a modern console. It's gone a long way to have her see my PS2 as more than a DVD player and huge timewaster. She has told me that if the sequel is good she intends to buy it.
The cartoonish style of Sly Cooper really appeals to her. She thinks the game is funny and cute.
Go Gusties
compared to the original. I for one didn't like the darker theme and the addition of GTA style carjackings. I hope they bring back the style of Jak and Daxter for the next sequel. I completed the original 2 times, but got bored about halfway through Jak II.
On the other hand, Ratchet and Clank Going Commando was improved in almost every way - different puzzle types, the ability to import weapons from R&C, and more Giant Clank missions to name a few of the many improvements. I just completed it two weekends ago and I am ready and waiting for R&C3.
Well... the subject line may be a bit much, but Sly Cooper definitely deserved more attention than it got. I love all three of these series, but Sly has got to be the most creative, the most polished, the most interesting, and the most original. Hopefully, Sony won't change much of the formula as a result of this games limited sucess.
Again, both Jaks and both Ratchets are great games, but I'm not sure that I'd call either original. Sly actually adds a great deal of new ideas to the Super Mario genre.
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor
Jak1 was great. I thought Jak2 was the sell-out and unnecessary sequel. While J2 was a better game technology-wise and play-wise (read "longer"), it didn't really server any purpose in advancing the title.
On the other hand, I'm looking forward to seeing what R&C3 would do, after seeing the huge improvements made in the Commando title. I don't see a need for a 4th title in either series on the PS2 platform... although I would guess that if #3 is wildly successful that they'll try and sell #4 with the rollout of the PS3.
...why not toss one ICO's way?
A game needs a great engine to succeed. The re-use of an existing engine towards that purpose is more common than most people believe and, quite frankly, necessary with the increasing complexity of games these days. Writing a 3d library from scratch is about as difficult as writing a physics engine from scratch. Why not use existing resources and add to them the features you never got a chance to have the first time around?
The same thing goes for theme. Warcraft 3 dumped the engine from Warcraft 2 in a complete re-write, but kept the Orcs / Humans battle in a colorful mythical world. It resonated the first time, and it resonates today. Dungeon Seige 2, Warcraft 3, Thief 2, Super Mario Brothers 3,(world, 64) are some of the best games out there, yet they are sequels. They took what worked, threw out what didn't work, and built up a new experience. This is a good thing.
If you don't like sequels, feel free to buy any one of the thousands of games released every year that aren't a sequel. Quality is definitely not guarenteed, but sometimes you get a Savage or a Halo. Of course, we all know Halo is a sequel to Marathon... so much for that idea.
Really, what it comes down to is quickly and poorly made games vs really great games. Some sequels fall into the first category, and are particularly memorable because the first game was so good. But many sequels fall into the second category. Terminator 3 was a terrible milking of the franchise, but Terminator 2 was just awe-inspiring. Zelda 2 was a quirky game without much going for it, but Zelda 3 was a masterpiece.
Don't paint everyone with the same brush. There are many good reasons to make sequels, and many good reasons to enjoy them. In other words, well-made sequels deserve as much of a place in the gaming ecosphere as any other well-made games. Otherwise you are rejecting gems like the new Prince of Persia game, in favor of more original games like, oh, Daiktana.
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