Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters Review
It’s
taken a little while, but the PlayStation 2’s popular duo of Ratchet and Clank
has finally made its way on to the PSP. Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters not only
fills the gaping combat-platformer hole in the PSP’s library while maintaining
the series’ tradition of double entendre subtitles, it also manages to be one of
best PSP games to date.
Size Matters opens with our heroes enjoying a vacation after their latest galaxy-saving adventure. What starts out as an innocent request by a young girl for some photos of Ratchet for a school report soon turns into another galaxy-saving adventure when the girl is kidnapped and all that is left behind is a mysterious, ancient alien artifact. I’ve always been a big fan of the humor in the Ratchet & Clank series and I’m happy to report that the writing in the game is definitely up to par with that in its predecessors.
If you’ve ever played a Ratchet & Clank game before than Size Matters will be instantly familiar to you. Insomniac games have done a great job of shrinking the game down to the PSP without losing any of the graphical charm of its PS2 cousins. The biggest difference is the loss of the right analog stick and its use to control the camera. Size Matters makes up for this by using the shoulder buttons to rotate the camera. This works well enough most of the time, but there will be occasions where you will need to struggle a bit to get the camera to a spot from where you can see the action on screen.
What really sets Ratchet & Clank apart from other platform games is Ratchet’s arsenal of imaginative and humorous weapons and Size Matters definitely carries on this tradition. As you use each weapon you’ll gain experience with it until it is eventually upgraded into a more powerful version. There are also some additional weapon upgrades to be found, so when you take the game’s large arsenal and add in improved and upgraded versions of the weapons you’ve got quite a few ways to beat back the robot and alien hordes.
As you make your way through the game you’ll also have the chance to find various pieces of armor along the way: helmets, chest protectors, gloves, and boots. If you equip yourself with four pieces of armor from the same “set”, you’ll receive a bonus like a fire attack added to your wrench – which is a feature that you WoW players out there will be intimately familiar with.
