Was the Daxter PSP Game Any Good?

As established last week when I did the video on Jak X: Combat Racing…it was pretty clear to Naughty Dog that when going from PS2 to PS3, they were going to move on from Jak and Daxter being their main thing. Releasing Jak 3 in 2004 to wrap up the trilogy, and Jak X in 2005 as an epilogue to the series. Putting all their effort into Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, which was released on the PS3 in 2007. However, just because Naughty Dog wasn’t going to be the primary developer of the series anymore didn’t mean the franchise was destined

to end. In 2005, it was announced that Sony’s Playstation Portable was going to receive an exclusive Jak title, simply called “Daxter” which was set for release in early 2006. Developed by Ready at Dawn Studios, Daxter being their first game. As they then went on to develop the God of War PSP games, the collection of those games and The Order: 1886 on PS4. Today, they do Oculus Rift games, but now we are just going to focus on Daxter, their first release. One that I do have a decent bit of nostalgia for. In a previous video concerning

PSP games, I mentioned that I was resolute on getting a PSP back in 2007 due to the release of Sonic Rivals 2 on the system that year. When I got it, I

also managed to nab Sonic Rivals 1, and to sweeten the deal, my console was a bundle that included a copy of Daxter, a game I didn’t even know existed until it was in my possession. Only, it didn’t come with a case, it was with a weird sleeve thing. I still have that disc to this day, and I might even still have that Family Guy

episode it came bundled with, although I don’t know where it is, I’d have to look for it. I remember loading that one thinking I was getting a video game, but ended up watching Family Guy for 22 minutes. Still the only prolonged exposure to the series I have had to this day. But as for Daxter…here I was playing a Jak game I didn’t know existed, that I didn’t even ask for. And back then, I actually liked the Sonic Rivals games. Needless to say, this was quite the score for me in 2007. Although, I definitely was not

the only person playing Daxter. The PSP, while not nearly as popular as it’s rival, the Nintendo DS, still sold 80 million units, and so the player base was large. Daxter being one of it’s best selling games, pushing more in sales than Jak 3 and Jak X even, which definitely came as a surprise to me, since I regard this one as a PSP side game…when it sold better than Naughty Dog’s last 2 PS2 entries. Despite that, people don’t really talk about this one much at all today. It’s lack of re-releases certainly didn’t help that. But in

terms of the fanbase, you see people talk about the trilogy, and Jak X, maybe give a mention to The Lost Frontier killing the franchise, but this one is definitely underrepresented in the discourse. I myself barely play or think about it as well. I never beat it as a kid for a reason I can explain later, I got it on the Vita store in 2014 when I got that system, and that’s when I finally beat it…playing it again for the review I did six years ago, and now I am back to play once more, despite never

having touched it once in those six years. So, is this game any good? Is it worth busting out a PSP or Vita to play? Well, that’s what we shall find out today. When going into a Daxter game, you might wonder…what would it even be about? Well, they picked a really good answer to that question. Daxter begins in Haven City with a struggling insect exterminator business, run by Osmo. One day, he sees a giant light as something plummets to the ground. This being the moment that Jak and Daxter arrive in Haven City at the start of

Jak II. You know the story, Daxter escapes while Jak gets captured by the Krimson Guard, and two years later Daxter rescues Jak, beginning the events of Jak II. Daxter fills in the blank of these two years as Dax is telling tall tales in bars for two years, until Osmo catches up with him to give him a job at the Kridder Ridder shop, which puts Daxter on the path to rescue Jak, as seen in Jak II. An excellent setup for a Daxter solo game, filling in the blank on something we wouldn’t have asked many questions about

before, but now have a concrete answer on what happened to Daxter that led up to his rescuing Jak. From the get go, there are many things with Daxter I was really impressed by. For a relatively early release on PSP, it showed off what the system could do in many ways. For starters, a variety of aesthetically pleasing areas and stable performance. It’s not 60fps, but for a PSP game the performance target is stable. Sometimes I saw it dip, but not to the point where that would be a noteworthy takeaway from the experience. In the forest area,

I noticed some pop-in, but again, for handheld gaming in 2006, it really showed how much more powerful the PSP was, given the fact that the prior era of gaming handhelds was the GameBoy Advance, which couldn’t even dream of doing anything like the kind of visuals you’d see in Daxter. Fully 3D gameplay and areas, multiple cutscenes with high quality animation and it’s entire script being voice acted? That was a pretty high bar for 2006 PSP standards. The console wanted it’s games to feel like less powerful PS2 games, and of it’s early release stuff, I think Daxter

demonstrated it pretty damn well. Seeing the player explore tiny bits of the massive Haven City from Jak II, the industrial district and the port to be specific. The PSP housed these environments showing what the console was capable of. I also noticed that Daxter has more fur in this game than usual…well, in the entirely pre-rendered cutscenes, but still, it’s new. I feel like Daxter’s cutscene model in Jaks II – X is more aesthetically pleasing with the simpler fur texture, but I found out that the reason they gave him more fur in scenes was so that Daxter’s

character would have a little bit more to his design, now that he is the focus character which makes sense. In gameplay he’s still looking exactly how he did in the PS2 games, but we are just talking cutscenes. And while we are talking about how the game is presented, I figured now would be a great time to address the fact that I think the soundtrack in this game is another really high quality one. Despite Daxter being a silly character by nature, the music for his game goes for a more atmospheric and dangerous vibe as you explore

the depths of Haven City, like the Brewery, The Transit System or Fish Cannery. In more recent videos I have dropped the habit of letting music play out, but in the case of these Jak games, I feel like it’s worth it, because so far, the series is 5 for 5 when it comes to music I can vibe with while playing. When reviewing games like Daxter, you never really know what kind of video you are gonna get out of it. I am someone who likes covering all the games in my favorite franchises, especially if those franchises are

more niche, so they don’t have a million games. But the part that is the mystery with games like this is…will it be a spin off that you feel there is a lot to say about like…Secret Agent Clank because of how awful it was or will it be more…by the numbers. Daxter is definitely in the second category of those two. Daxter is a good game, but when looking at it’s mechanics, it pretty much stops there. What I first noticed was that the game is paced pretty well. Despite taking place in the world of Jak II, the

mission structure is much more like Jak 3. You don’t have to repeatedly go back to the Kridder Ridder shop for new missions, you just go to the hotel, and then you get told to make it to the construction site. The flow is kept up by taking you from mission to mission, and the areas are very close to one another, so you never feel like you are commuting from place to place, as the game just keeps the action going almost non stop. Perk of it being a handheld game, since players are playing on the bus or

the train, you don’t want to have traveling to gameplay being a significant chunk of time, just get to the point. You also don’t tend to revisit areas much in Daxter, compared to Jak II and 3 where you would do a mission in the sewers and then come back later in the game to do something else there. You do return to the construction site once, but largely, Daxter is a game where you do one grand mission at the Brewery and that’s that. Levels in this game are very focused on platforming. I forgot about that when getting

back into this game for the video because it took me by surprise to see a level like the transit station seeing you get on top of a train and dodge these lasers coming from various directions and hopping from one train to another. Or multiple levels having you time your spray hover ability to get past gaps. If you want a game with consistent platforming action, you can’t go wrong with Daxter since it’s whole runtime has it in abundance. Daxter also plays well too. He was playable in Jak II and 3 during specific setpieces, but was just

a Jak clone in terms of handling, here they gave him a more unique moveset as he fights with this electric fly swatter that you use for a basic combo and if you hit an enemy with the last hit on said combo, you will repeat it on the nearest enemy. The game encourages you to go COMBO MAD with it. To unlock more moves, you have to first, gather up precursor orbs in the stages. Collecting certain numbers of them unlocks these Dream Sequence QTE movie reference games you play. Say that ten times fast. There’s not much to

these, but I just think it’s fun as a brief distraction from the main gameplay, especially when they ramp up in the amount of buttons you have to press at once. I also think the various ways Daxter is designed to fit into various movies was charming. Besides that, Precursor Orbs also unlock secrets like concept art and behind the scenes. And in gameplay, you can find secret items that allow you to wear different masks, like Jak, Human Daxter or Samos, even having ones for Ratchet and Clank and of course…Sly Cooper. Instantly making the game better since you

can play with Sly’s face. The game always reminded me of Sly when I was a kid as you’d attack with a close range weapon, crawling through vents and such, and now that’s come full circle. Anyway, besides the electric swatter, you also attack enemies with your spray gun. The upgrades to your gun also felt really well paced. You get the gun in the second mission, and then the game spends the rest of the mission teaching you how to use it, then you unlock the hover ability and use it throughout the next few areas. Then you get

access to the flame mod with two areas open in the port that both tutorialize different abilities with the flame mod, the first showing it’s combat prowess as it lights Metal Heads on fire, and the other showing how it can help with platforming by melting ice. You repeat the process with the Ultrasonic attachment that destroys crowds of enemies both from a distance and from above, and then you use all the skills combined in the final areas. At the end of the day, I think this game is very mechanically sound. Daxter’s jump and double jump feel a

bit slippery, but other than that, I really can’t tell you anything the game does wrong from a mechanical standpoint, it’s just very bland as a game. They created a decent combat system, they structured the game in a well paced way in terms of progression and unlockables, but the game just never really left much of an impression on me throughout. I did have some issues with the game, like how it’s occasionally difficult to know where you are going in a more open ended mission like the lumber mill since there is no map in the actual stages,

so when I have one target left in the Mill, I can’t be sure what ground I have and have not covered yet, so I run around aimlessly in the hopes I find it, only to realize that one spot I did cover had two targets instead of one like all the rest. That would have been good to know, and a map like the one in Jak II and 3 would’ve saved me there. I never got far in this game as a kid because I could never find the last eco crystal in the strip mine, and that’s

also a result of just not knowing where I am going at any given time. I also felt like these button mashing mini games mid mission came out of nowhere a lot of the time and felt shoehorned in with little fanfare, and the vehicle segments all felt really slow. Lacking the tension they had in the prior games. So yeah, it’s not like the game is perfect and didn’t leave a huge impression. It’s much more that I thought the game was mechanically solid and well structured, has replay value with unlockable easter eggs and skins. Was a very

serviceable game for it’s four hour runtime. But it’s never doing anything so incredible that makes it a must play. Not that every game has to completely rock your socks off, it’s just that this is kind of the thing with handheld spin offs like this. When your goal is to make an authentic Jak game on PSP in 2006, well…mission accomplished, but once the shine has worn off and that fact is no longer impressive on it’s own since Handheld gaming has evolved to where console quality games are the expectation. The game is just left to being good

on it’s own merits, and Daxter is good on it’s own merits, but doesn’t really do much else to impress you. Making it pretty bland on the replay. What I did find interesting about Daxter, is how they used this game’s place in the timeline to expand upon the series’ lore. In the first half of the game, Daxter is just hunting bugs, but we all know that these new bugs are the Metal Heads just beginning their attack on Haven City. In Jak II, you start by facing the smaller Dog like MetalHeads and by the end are facing

off against huge monsters. And you see even bigger ones in Jak 3. So it’s fitting that when going backwards in the timeline, the enemies you fight before Jak II are even smaller, but are to scale with Daxter as a character. So it’s timeline placement suits the game mechanics well. In the back half of the game, the story gets more focused as Daxter…remembers that he needs to rescue his best friend Jak when a prison ship with Jak in it flies by. A little weird to make it a gag that Daxter kind of forgot about Jak, maybe

taking his carefree attitude a little too far, but once he’s set on rescuing Jak that becomes the most important thing for the rest of the game. But once Daxter sets his sights on that, the player gets more insight on the lore. Like how Erol makes a cameo, being back to who he was in Jak II. But what’s new is that we see him in a meeting with Count Vegar from Jak 3. Vegar is insisting that Praxis and Erol use Light Eco on Jak and the other test subjects because he, like he did in Jak 3,

believes that Dark Eco is an abomination. Also mentioning that he’s got his sights set on the Precursor Catacombs. Expanding the universe by showing Vegar’s ambitions were there in Jak II, you just didn’t see him in that game. In this scene, we also learn that the Dark Warrior program has killed every test subject that isn’t Jak, because his eco powers are keeping him alive. Another interesting tidbit is that Erol mentions that Onin claims Jak is special, due to his eco powers. From this, you could infer that Onin was the one who told Praxis and Erol that

Jak was going to be where he was at the start of Jak II so they could capture him. But why though? Onin was on your side in Jak II. Well, I think that what they were going for was that, in Jak II, Onin had some larger perspective on the way things were going to play out. So by adding this detail, I think Onin made it so Jak would undergo the Dark Eco experiments specifically because it would take away his precursor interactivity, thus making it so Jak’s older self could not open the precursor stone, allowing Metal

Kor to feed on the life force inside, and then could use these dark powers to battle against Metal Kor and win out, saving Jak’s younger self, and starting the time loop I discussed in the Jak II video. This idea of mine has evidence backing it from Jak II, but Daxter seals that deal. Also, while I am on the discussion of Erol, the scene that tries being comedic with him here makes the guy more entertaining in one scene than he was in the entirety of Jak 3. But that’s neither here nor there. Speaking of Kor, he

is also in this game, directing Kaeden, a MetalHead, to disguise himself and go into the city and shut down every insect exterminator shop, but Osmo refuses to back down, causing Kor to grow impatient with Kaeden, especially as it becomes clear to Kor that Daxter is going to rescue Jak. But here’s something that doesn’t make sense to me, maybe you all in the comments can help make more sense of it. Kor explains that the Metal Heads have just found their way to breach the shield wall in Haven City, explaining why it’s only the tiniest of bugs

you face. That, and he still would, at this point, have his deal with Praxis so he is just barely attacking the city on the outskirts, as agreed upon. But what confuses me is this part at the end, which should be cool as Kor doesn’t think Kaeden will succeed in killing Daxter so he plans on something else, disguise himself as an old man so he can meet Jak and Daxter outside once they’ve escaped, and use them to his advantage in his quest to undermine Praxis and get the Precursor Stone, which directly ties the end of Daxter

into the beginning of Jak II. However, this scene makes it seem like Kor only just thought up the old man disguise. Like, 30 minutes before seeing Jak and Daxter. But…he was already a member of the Underground when you met him in Jak II. Since he refers you to Torn to meet the Shadow. That, and he also had the kid with him, who we know was found by The Shadow first and given to Kor to look after while The Shadow planned the missions for the Underground. Unless Kor had already been in the city gaining the trust

of the Underground before this point with this very disguise, he just now thought to use it on Jak…but then…what other disguise would he have used? It’s a bit of an inconsistency, one you can wrap your mind around, but one that goes unexplained in the game. But the Jak games in general have some plot inconsistencies that don’t get addressed at any point in the stories. Such as Jak’s Uncle from Jak 1, or how in Jak II I feel like the idea was that Haven City was the last refuge of humanity from the Metal Head menace, and

that the Wasteland was where the Metal Head nest was at. But then Jak 3 shows an entire desert civilization in the wasteland. That I can accept, but then Jak X has Kras City right nearby Haven on the map with decades of it’s own history of Combat Racing that you get mixed in with. The backstory of Jak X said that the city and the sport were getting back on their feet after the Dark Maker attack in Jak 3, but then…how were they doing before when the Metal Heads were attacking in Jak II right next door? Unless

the Metal Heads were only attacking Haven because they wanted the Precursor Stone that sat in Mar’s Tomb? I don’t know, I am just saying these kinds of questions go unanswered. But having said that, I love Jak and Daxter lore, hence why I would even bother talking about it to this extent in the first place. And I am glad Daxter contributes to it…because everything else in the story goes in one ear and out the other. Mainly the new characters. Taryn, Ximon and Osmo, they aren’t bad characters, but they just fulfill roles on the checklist like the

wise older guy who isn’t Samos, or the attractive woman Daxter hits on who isn’t Ashelin or Tess. Very one note new characters, as you spend more time focusing on how the old characters relate to this new story. The new characters just don’t really add much or even get satisfactory resolutions. Like Daxter taking on a tiny dot as a sidekick who gets killed by Kaedan, that was kind of random. And how Ximon’s last note is giving the outfit they found for Jak, explaining why Daxter just has that at the start of Jak II. But otherwise hasn’t

done anything as a character in the game besides be a surfer bro. Osmo’s shop blows up before the final level, but we don’t really see what he does after that in the ending. The final shot shows Ximon and Osmo with Jak and company at the Naughty Ottsel celebrating the defeat of Metal Kor after the end of Jak II…making it so we could infer that he got the business back up and running, but the story knows you don’t really care about that, as fans in the end would be more hyped about how they connected it directly

to Jak II’s opening, instead of seeing fleshed out resolutions to the new plot. Which I think is a good way to describe the whole experience, in a way. I gave this game a lot more criticism the first time around six years ago, but now, there really wasn’t anything about Daxter I seriously didn’t like, and there are things it does that I did quite like. It’s a well made game, but it’s just not that memorable, and is overall a one and done type game. Of all the Jak and Ratchet games released on PSP, this was definitely

the best one…probably because it was made by Ready at Dawn and the other three were done by a different, singular studio. But still, Daxter impresses me visually, and with how it feels like an authentic Jak game in terms of Art design and story and gameplay, but it’s just not doing anything to set itself apart as a game you’d want to revisit. I have explained the various tiers through which I see games in a previous video. I don’t think rating games is necessary in every video…although, if you want this system to be mentioned in each game

I review, I suppose I could. I bring it up now because I kept thinking…if I were to put Daxter on tierlist, where would it be? Well, it’s certainly quality enough to be a B, which is the “all around good game” tier. But I kept thinking about other games I’d rate a B…and thought Daxter wasn’t as good as those. So it’s the most positive form of a C Tier game. It’s not doing anything super wrong, and is in fact doing a lot right, but those right things don’t make it an experience with any staying power. So

it gets a C because it’s a decent game, just nothing special. Compared to Jak 3, which is in C Tier because of the flaws that actively drag the experience down. Although I probably would rather that game anyway. It’s hard to quantify what I am trying to say here, but I hope you get it. It sounds like a harsh rating, but really, I don’t have anything against this game, it’s that in the grand scheme of things it’s just kind of there. Like I said, when going into handheld spin off games like this for review, there often

isn’t that much to say if the game is overall good besides, it’s neat for the time and does some interesting stuff, but only the hardcore fan should seek it out. Having said that, I think that just about covers Daxter. Meaning that there is only one Jak revisit left, this being a spinoff people do talk about much more. The infamous Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier from High Impact Games. Who were responsible for two Ratchet games on PSP that people like that I thought were both awful, as seen in my videos on them last year. So

how will the universally agreed upon bad one go down in the re-review? Well…find out next week! In the meantime, I will say what I always do, thank you all for watching and I will see you next time!

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