9.3

Ratchet and Clank HD Collection

Ratchet and Clank is a series of games that was first released back in 2002 and was developed by Insomniac Games.  R&C follows the main protagonists as they save the universe from maniacal super-villains with amazing regularity.  These titles have become renowned for a combination of action platforming with an emphasis on over the top weaponry.  The original R&C trilogy has recently received the HD treatment.  The original three titles are Ratchet and Clank, R&C: Locked and Loaded and the cleverly R&C: Up Your Arsenal.  These three games are great titles in their own rights, but has the HD treatment been worthwhile?

The first aspect of any HD re-release is the visuals.  The initial game selection screen is very underwhelming; fortunately things improve greatly from there.  Once you start the game and start moving around the environment, everything looks great.  The R&C series features a highly stylised cartoon style and this translates brilliantly to HD format.  The graphics have aged very well and the developers have really put in the work to make sure that everything looks brilliant in full HD.  Don’t go into this expecting the games to look like the PS3 releases – you will be disappointed.  The visuals improve as you play through the trilogy.

The R&C series has always had very tight controls.  There is a combination of platform aspects and action, shooter style to the series.  The only criticism that I have with this is the original title could be a bit frustrating to play as there is no strafe; fortunately the enemy difficulty is far lower than the other titles.  The manual camera control is also not as responsive as more modern titles, but this game is ten years old.  As you progress through the titles the health systems change drastically and the upgradability of weapons grows substantially.

The sound in R&C is also fantastic and holds up very well.  All the sound effects are spot on and the weapons have a beefy over the top feel to them.  The voice work is top of the line – this has always been a strong point of the series and creates much more enjoyable cut scenes.  There is not really anything to criticise in this regard – the blaster sounds a bit weak in the original maybe.   

From my experience the original R&C games have never run smoothly on the larger PS3 models, with terrible frame rates making game play virtually impossible.  Rest assured that the HD re-releases run at a smooth 60fps – I experienced slow-down once on the original title when there were approximately 25 enemies on screen.  The trophy support for the HD collection is also well done.  These are not games to buy for quick and easy trophies, these take some time to get and the challenges have been chosen well.  Making players work for those platinum trophies.

The R&C HD collection demonstrates how these should be done, the graphics and game play and aged incredibly well and the HD re-release does not look as though its based on an aged title.  This provides a great opportunity for long time fans to play through the original trilogy and earn some trophies.  This also provides a great time for those who never experienced these games to play through them on their PS3’s.  There is very little to criticise with this release and any criticisms are very minor.  This all provides supreme value and recommended to everyone who enjoys action plat-former titles.