You can't have a platforming renaissance without Naughty Dog's numerous Jak & Daxter titles, can you? Sony seems to have remembered recently that it started a PS2 Classics initiative on the PlayStation 4 a few years back, and now we're beginning to see a steady trickle of up-rendered ports. Next up: four Jak & Daxter titles.
It's worth noting that these aren't the remasters that came to the PlayStation 3 and Vita a while back: instead they're the PS2 games ported to the PS4. Confused? Yeah, it's a bit odd – basically these are taking advantage of Sony's emulation technology rather being full-on remasters. They're looking tasty all the same, though.
And the good news is that Jak X: Combat Racing will be joining the original trilogy of platformers as part of the program. To be honest, we're surprised that the platform holder isn't bringing over the underplayed PSP title Jak & Daxter: The Lost Frontier as well, as that did receive a PS2 port late in its life. Maybe it'll follow once the Naughty Dog entries are out?
[source blog.eu.playstation.com]
Comments 60
Nice! I guess this opens the floodgates for the Sly Cooper and Ratchet & Clank trilogies to follow.
Man, I wish they'd port MotorStorm: Arctic Edge. I'd love to play that with Trophies.
EDIT: Also, don't buy Jak 2. It's terrible.
Weird. I have the trilogy on ps3 and never got to it. Still on my list. Should i wait? Not sure what did play better...
@get2sammyb what?!?!?! Jak 2 is heaps better than the first one! Thems fighting words, Barker!
@AhabSpampurse You're insane. I hate Jak 2, but Jak 1 is a glorious game. Holds up as well.
@get2sammyb c'mon, Jak 2 is the best Jak and Daxter.
What is wrong with you people? Jak 2 is the worst game Naughty Dog has ever made. By a country mile as well.
EDIT: Well, assuming we exclude the terrible non-PlayStation Naughty Dog games that came before. I'm obviously not including Way of the Warrior in that.
@get2sammyb Jak 2 is awesome! Ridiculous at times (Water slums I'm looking at you) but overall a great game imo. Plus I think Crash Bandicoot is ND's worst game. Still a classic, but has aged a lot, especially the save system.
Anyway I have no plan to get this because I have it on PS3, but it's still good news, even more so if it leads to Jak 4. I also wonder if it will be free to people who brought it on PS3?
Awesome news! Now give me Ape Escape 3 as well as Pumped and Primed, toss in SpongeBob: Battle for Bikini Bottom and Ed, Edd, n Eddy: The MisEDventures and my life will be complete.
@get2sammyb I would say Crash 1 is the worst ND game. So many design decisions that aren't even down to opinion bad, just frustrating.
I will agree, Jak 2 is balls hard, but I will take it over Jak 3, as it has more focus on what missions are and do.
HAPPY F*CKING DAYS!! I recently completed 1 on my Vita a few months back but will definitely pick it up again.
@get2sammyb Dunno what everyone is here is smoking but 1 was the best in series, imo they ruined it with the addition of guns, still enjoyed 2&3 though!
@get2sammyb I agree, Jak 2 and 3 felt like a weaker Ratchet and Clank where's Jak 1 was a natural evolution of the Crash series.
I wish Sony would do the Onimusha games though.
@ThroughTheIris56 Highly doubt it, they didn't do it for the Rockstar games either. They should but I know they won't.
@adf86 Ah, that's a bummer
@itshoggie I think Jak 2 and 3 are better mainly because the story was a lot more engaging. though I can see why the changes annoyed people. The great thing about the series is that it has more than one niche, collectathon platformer for some people, story driven shooters for others.
Nice! I want remaster like ratchet and clank but this is fine too
@Kyroki These are just ports of the original Jak games, they're not remasters or reboots.
Jak 2 was hard. I can't believe I beat that game back in the day.
@get2sammyb
I got the PS3 trilogy having never played them originally. Loved Jak 1 (except Daxter himself that I came to hate with a passion) and then got to 2, about maybe halfway thru until I got fed up. Way too much driving, some missions were too hard and you can only take three hits and health is nowhere to be found. Not sure if 3 is better.
If the Jak and Daxter HD remaster was not released on the PS3 I would probably be a lot more hyped for this. I am hyped for Jak X to be on the PS4, though.
@get2sammyb Come on Sammy, just because you didn't like Jak 2 doesn't mean the people that do are wrong. I love the Jak games, except for The Lost Frontier, that was pretty bad.
Sure the difficulty spikes in Jak 2 were pretty brutal, but I liked overcoming the challenge.
@Deadlyblack People are welcome to their opinions. But they are wrong.
Haha, I'm just kidding.
@ZurapiiYohane Worth noting these are probably going to be sold separately and aren't remasters — they're up-ressed emulations.
I would love a new Jak & Daxter built from the ground up for PS4.
And Sly Cooper...
And Ratchet & Clank...
[glad these are coming though!]
@get2sammyb Meh, I thought Jak 2 was pretty good. If you ask me, Lost Frontier is the worst Jak game, probably because they removed Light/Dark Jak, violence was tuned down to be more kid friendly, camera issues, bland story, lack of jetboard action, and the tuned down personalities of both Jak and Daxter.
@get2sammyb yeah, we'll agree to disagree. It is nice though that we can have a friendly banter without things getting messy, even if we do disagree. People are way too quick to go for the jugular these days.
Worth adding, Digital Foundry thinks these will be better than the PS3 remasters. Here's a quote from their article:
"The PS3 HD version was missing visual effects," Linneman explained. "The shiny metallic surfaces, for instance, were all missing. If you emulate the PS2 original and bump the resolution up to 1080p or more, it should wind up looking better than if you just ported the HD versions."
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-04-03-jak-and-daxter-games-are-coming-to-ps4
Wooha! Awesome!
A (few) side question(s): Are those PS2 HD titles looking sharp on the PS4, or blurry? Is there any anti-aliasing? Or does it look like cheap emulation?
Jak 2 is my favourite of the Triology, though Jak 3 is a close second and Jak 1 isn't far behind in 3rd place. I've not played the Combat Racing, so I don't know if that's any good.
The Jak games are certainly worth a look for anyone who hasn't played them butenjoys platformers.
Im sorry im confuse the video didnt say ps2 ports or remasters for ps4 but either way im getting them lol
While I'm not the biggest fan of Jak 2 (though it's far from terrible) I reckon that game set Naughty Dog up for the studio that they became. The original Jak was very much a spiritual successor to Crash that had now evolved into into a more open level design and fluid platforming that brought it on par with the best in the genre. Then they turned that into a sequel that was more focused on it's sandbox, Sci-fi setting and gun based combat. I think that creativity allowed them to take much more creative risks with Uncharted and The Last of Us that made them from been "one of Sony's studios" into "the Sony studio".
Just got my first, and likely last, Plat on Jak & Daxter a few days ago on PS3 on a 4 year old save file that was at 99%.
J&D will always be my favorite game, on my favorite console PS2, the right combination at the right time. J2 wasn't horrible, but it wasn't J&D any more than Starfox Adventures was a Starfox game. Had it been called "Grand Theft Auto: Jak & Daxter Take a Trip" it may have been better received. Playstation Heroes on the Move is one of the worst games I've ever played, compared to that Jak 2 is a masterpiece. Jak 3 I've always refered to as "Jak 2.5" b/c it's basically Jak 2 with cars.
I'm still waiting for a true Jak sequel. No guns, no dark Jak, no angry talking Jak, just fun. Maybe if Yooka-Laylee does well? One can hope.
F*ck yes. I'm seriously pleased for this. Whilst I don't think Jak 2 or 3 are bad by any stretch, I will always prefer the more colourful platforming-focused approach of the first game.
I wish Jak 1 got the same treatment as R&C got with the remaster, either way I'm happy to play them on console again. I'd love some Spyro as well, and NFS Underground 1 & 2.
Nice, I've been waiting for the PS2 Classics releases to start picking up again. When do we get PS1 and PSP games?
@Dodoo Ratchet & Clank has a "built up from the ground" version for PS4 though...
https://store.playstation.com/#!/en-us/games/ratchet-clank/cid=UP9000-CUSA01047_00-RATCHETPS4000000
@Kyroki I'd rather have a sequel to Sly 4: Thieves in Time personally.
@get2sammyb Oh I'm with you 100% Sammy. The first is amongst the best platformers ever made and still is. The sequel was a hideous mess of a game that jumped on the GTA bandwagon to the detriment of the series, it had no charm or character at all. Eurgh, makes me angry just thinking about that poop of a game haha
@get2sammyb Jack 1 sucks sammmy
Jack 1 was the worst.2 and 3 is better
From what I remember Jak 2 was definitely my favourite... But I was about 5 when that came out but obviously played them a few years later!
@Dodoo Not going to happen anytime soon seeing as Naughty Dog was working on a new PS4 reboot for Jak & Daxter before The Last of Us, thay canned it "as it just didn't feel right" when asked if we'll ever see Jak & Daxter " i wouldn't like to bet on it".
I've already played them and have the PS3 collection.
@get2sammyb Jak and Daxter was a classic and easily the best of them.However I did enjoy the other 2 but if they make another I'd definitely want them to go the light hearted no guns platformy route again.
Never played Jak X Combat Racing,was that any good?
@get2sammyb Got ourselves a comedian.
Never played a Jak and Daxter game, so I guess this would be a good place to start, though I'd probably just end up playing Jak 1. I'm not a huge fan of the darker approach of the later games.
For those Sly Cooper fans, I'd actually like a PS4 port of Thieves in Time. I really enjoyed it on Vita a few years back.
@ToddlerNaruto True. Though it was still a remake of R&C1 technically. I love it, but you know what I mean...
@banacheck damn, that doesn't bode well for my hopes of a Jak PS4. D'oh!
Jak and Daxter is a lovely game. Really impressive at the time given it didn't have loading times and ran so smoothly. I haven't played the others but did enjoy Daxter on the PSP.
Never played Jak games. So I'm not sure if to buy this or not.
Awaiting the day(s) hearing some of my top PS2-to-PS4 games list being remastered with plat trophies. Keeping my fingers crossed 😊
Jak X: Combat Racing??? COOL Really want to play that. I played the first 3 Jak games on the PS3 so not to bothered about them really. Now TimeSplitters 1, 2 and 3 PLEASE, ANYONE, SOMEONE, PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEASE
give me Onimusha!!
@Carl-G stuff like timesplitters won't just be down to Sony though they have to get the devs on board like Rockstar have with banging pretty much all there ps2 games on there
Awesome. I loved the first two games and Combat Racing (never played Jak 3). I've been wanting to revisit the games, but I've been hesitant about getting the HD collection due to how bad Ratchet & Clank's was handled. Now here's a great excuse to jump back in.
Hopefully Combat Racing doesn't have that save bug the original had.
@get2sammyb Dude, that's my FAVORITE Motorstorm game!
Ok silly question. I haven't played any of these. What are they like? I always imagined they were kind of like an evolution of Banjo-Kazooie but just never got to playing them. I got the PS4 reboot of Ratchet & Clank but felt a bit underwhelmed. Should I be interested in any of these games or just be happy I'm getting Yooka-Laylee real soon?
Are these bundled together into one glorious retail disc, or are they just coming to the 'store-download' side? Would love to have a nice case with a disc that contains all four of them, and I don't want to go download crazy on the store, in case Sony decides to make a bunch of discs with their games on it (nice collections).
@Carl-G I've been wondering too on why PS1 games haven't come over to the system yet. However, since PS3 is still around (and PS1 titles are on that, plus, you can play PS1 discs on the PS3), maybe they're just waiting for the PS3 era to end completely, or maybe they have surprises later on.
@Azikira yeah, it's great.
Never played them as I was never a Crash fan. In fact I consider Naughty Dog to be massively overrated finding all the games of theirs I've played hugely clunky. Last of Us, Uncharted & Crash all played really badly imo so I won't be touching these
I thought for a minute there was a remaster compilation like that Wipeout trilogy.
@get2sammyb I'm hoping Sony will give us a couple more PSP Remasters, seeing as how a couple of those games have already seen a remaster, ala God of War.
Also, I'm quite shocked that Combat Racing is making the cut, but not Lost Frontier. I'm right there with you on that.
Why not include all 5? :'D
@JoeBlogs I agree with you on that...ps1 did not age gracefully as what some of the other consoles did, however, it's still nice re-playing some of them on the PS3 at the time being. I guess I'm not too much caring about trophies or the HD treatment of them, just surprised that they didn't push them over onto the storefront yet...since they have them on PS3 at least.
@JoeBlogs Fully agree with them looking good on VITA, even PSP they looked good on. The Sega Genesis doesn't look too bad on a 4K television, the only system I own that I have to play it on my old tv from the 80's, is the Atari...the atari looks horrible on HD TV's, and I didn't even try on a 4K. Still though, would be nice to see them, or even see some of the classics get reboots like Crash is getting...I'd love to replay Parasite Eve, Wild Arms (or at least a new Wild Arms title), Grandia, Silent Hill, Legacy Of Kains (why are we not getting a collection yet) and some of the other classics. At least some of the PSP titles are making their way over...can't wait to replay Loco Roco, as I sadly got rid of my PSP in the past and regret it now.
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