First Impression: First impressions are something that is drastically important in any media, I've noticed. This is another time where my first impression was covered by the fanboyism that had come out of its shell when this title was first announced. I am a huge fun of Ratchet and Clank and would defend the series from being called a StarFox "rip off" for sure, but that doesn't mean I cannot agree on there being... a fluke or two in the series.
Gameplay: The gameplay within R&C:FFA (I will call it FFA from now on) is significantly different from its predecessors. This is actually a successor to Ratchet and Clank's All 4 One online multiplayer game. That fits the description nicely for this game, though FFA has a single player mode too. Anyway... The primary mechanics of the game have turned into a Tower Defense-like one. You always start each level, or map, with no weapons and have to go locate them from conveniently placed weapon pods throughout the map. They allow you to take one weapon per pod, with a choice of three weapons per each pod. Why Ratchet just doesn't have a weapon in the first place (especially considering he's had a blaster in every other game by default) is a bit baffling to me. Regardless, the objective in the game is to regain control around 6 planets, which serve as levels. The free roaming space travelling from A Crack in Time is now gone and we are back to the "Using a Menu to Go to Planets" feature again. You can play as Ratchet, Clank or Quark and use them to defend your base from waves of enemies while pressing forward once enemy waves are down and try to regain control of the planet through its Interplanetary Defense System. Progressively, the levels lengthen and get more challenging, before finally having us revisit one planet to fight the final boss, which happens to be a grown up version of the Quark fan from Ratchet and Clank 2. The gameplay on the Vita is largely the same as the PS3. Touch screen interaction was added, but I never used it because the normal buttons served the same purpose.
Graphics: Graphically on PS3, this game looks a bit less polished than the other Ratchet and Clank games. Not entirely sure with All 4 One, but I didn't like Ratchet's styling change in this game. On the Vita, the graphics are noticeably downgraded to that of a PlayStation Portable (thus PS2-like in comparison) quality that made me question the point of the port. The Vita is able to still maintain the beauty of games (look at Borderlands 2 Vita) but this game... no, it was a complete downgrade in textures, lighting and so forth.
Story: This time in the Ratchet and Clank universe, we meet our heroes on Quark's spaceship. Quark lost the re-election for a 2nd term as Galactic President and now tries to find some crime to fight. Ratchet also notes that it's been surprisingly quiet and he is getting bored as well. As if he was heard, an alert goes off with a masked man threatening Quark and invading various nearby planets to take over their defense systems. Ratchet and Quark both agree that they have to stop this man, obviously thankful for someone rising up to do evil. Then after you save about two planets, the man reveals himself to be an adult that would be remembered as the Quark fanboy in Ratchet and Clank 2 (who gave you a bolt radius enhancer) and is named Zurgo. Crushed by how Quark betrayed his fans and become a laughing stock and dubbed "not a real hero", he vows revenge by taking over defense grids and framing Quark to cause a great disaster by hijacking the Weather Grid. Our heroes manage to track down and defeat Zurgo and while he's being carried to the ship, Quark stumbles and accidentally throws him off of a bridge.
--- Rating System ---
Gameplay: 2/5 - The gameplay tries to bring back or keep the "Run and Gun" feel of the single player story driven games of the series. Though the added Tower Defense element is very lackluster and feels a bit out of place in the universe. Yes, level designs had been restricted before due to being a linear platformer/shooter style game, but I feel like Insomniac was creating an entirely different game and at the last minute decided to slap on the Ratchet and Clank brand to test it out. Again, touch screen support was added for the Vita version but it was never used by me, so a pointless addition. The Vita version would get a 1/5 if I did a seperate score. The game has siginificant frame rate issues on my Vita at least (and I looked around, more people were reporting this). It didn't make the game unplayable, but it was vastly unenjoyable. I found myself completing most of the game on my PS3 and then transferring that file to the Vita to pretty much screw around.
Graphics: 3/5 - If we're talking PS3, the graphics are moderately okay for this title. They don't look as crisp and beautiful as A Crack in Time's did to me (and perhaps that's because A Crack in Time is my favorite PS3 game of the series). The designs were perhaps taken from All 4 One and not the Future trilogy, so the odd design (to me) for Ratchet might be for that very reason. If we're talking the Vita, however, hell no. These graphics were butchered to the point of why they didn't even opt for a PSP port along with a Vita port - as apparently PSP game support only stopped very recently - is beyond me. Hell, the Vita version could be considered as a cross platform title among Sony titles. With how it looked and acted, the PSP and PS2 could have probably run this version. It's similar to the problems with PS3 to PSP ports. It cannot be done with just a few people. And if you have a horrible result, don't publish the port. Just scrap it.
Story: 2/5 - The story is almost... very predictable and very disappointing considering the universe Ratchet and Clank take place in still has so many questions to be answered. However, someone at Insomniac thought it'd be a good thing to create a Tower Defense game and then slapped Ratchet and Clank onto it for possibly a bigger budget and I feel like the story was the very, very last thing on their minds when they finished the levels. Compared to the original PS2 trilogy and the PS3 trilogy, this story is utter crap. I would have been fine waiting for a game like Enter the Nexus to continue the Future trilogy, not a sequel to All 4 One (which has also been known as a bad Ratchet and Clank game).
Overall: 2/5 - Well, this is my lowest rating to date. For the PS3 version, yes, sadly. This is accurate for my opinion. I was excited at first at the announcement of a new Ratchet and Clank game, but disappointed when I found out it was labeled as Tower Defense. Despite that, I still bought it as I was a fan of the series and hoped Insomniac would surprise me. In the end, it did not. To make matters worse, it made me think of how little Insomniac might feel about their beloved series and if they decided to make it into a cash cow or not (which I certainly hoped not). The Vita version was an indicator of this, as they had assigned a small unknown development team comprised of only 3 team members that were ex-Insomniac members. THREE. ONLY THREE FOR INSOMNIAC'S MOST SUCCESSFUL FRANCHISE! When I noted that in the credits, I grew a bit more lax about my opinion on the game as a whole but that doesn't mean I won't tell people to not buy that version alone.
--- Where to Buy ---
You can by FFA on the PlayStation Network store or at your nearest GameStop. I DO NOT recommend buying the PS Vita version by itself. The PS3 version is cross-buy and you get the Vita version for free, but now I can see why it was free. It's a terrible port. And I reiterate, IT WAS ONLY MADE BY 3 PEOPLE!!
--- Screenshots ---
Here's some screenshots! These screens are from the PS3 version of the game.
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