Extended Practice Game Play Mechanics and Collectibles Research: Ratchet and Clank

The next series that I looked into was Ratchet and Clank as this is a great example of how design in a game and work incredibly well with the game play mechanics overall. The series is brilliant and originally consists of three base games, which have since been added too over the years and many more games have been released, but not with the same nature as the original three. The game feature two characters called Ratchet and Clank who work together throughout the levels in order to progress further in the game.

To begin with the obvious features of the game start with you mainly playing as Ratchet through the main parts and he is a lot like many games produced around this time in the way that he interacts with everything around him. His movement is slightly labored giving him a strange but good aesthetic quality to him and he feels smooth to run around an environment with. He has the basic moves to get him around the environment but this is less a platformer and more a action, shooter with some very basic puzzle elements to it. The general game play is fun though and the basic platforming does feel fluid and works very well.

When we then go onto looking at the mechanics of shooting, this feels very solid throughout, although there doesn't feel like your using different weapons as they all work in a similar fashion, but this is not a major issue. The shooting is strong and powerful but you don't have the capabilities to just smash through everything, you have to be conservative with ammo or you will die, something that has a good balance in my opinion and something that does work exceptionally well.

Along with the obvious mechanics the game does have a few hidden secrets that are very nice and make a great addition to the game play. The first is the fact that at some point on a number of levels you will get the chance to control Clank, he is not just a character that is with you for no reason, and although his mini levels do not play out quite as fast as Ratchets, they are still enjoyable and more about puzzle solving than anything. The second feature is Ratchet has a hover board type jet object and this is obviously very fun to play with. It feels very smooth to fly although not very weighty, but then again it probably wouldn't if it were real. But this is a very nice extra mechanic that adds another depth of game play. 

Lastly I wanted to look at the collectibles in the game, but I do feel that this is not something that this game is aiming to sell to it's audience. The collectibles that are featured are literally just nuts and bolts, which can be used to then buy weapons and upgrades from the shop, and there is the addition of gold bolts of which 40 can be found altogether, but again these are only used to unlock weapons. The collectibles are a little disappointing for me, but then again it was not what the game was trying to sell to the audience so cannot be put down for that, although I do believe that some form of collectible would have helped improve the overall quality.