Solo adventure

Last Year Insomniac Games turned the reigns over on its highly popular action-platforming series, Ratchet & Clank, to developer High Impact Games for the PSP release Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters, which released to generally high acclaim. Insomniac reclaimed the reigns for the duo’s initial appearance on the Playstation 3 but High Impact is taking the series portable once again with their new game Secret Agent Clank.

Secret Agent Clank is notable for a few reasons; the biggest is that the game will be the first solo Clank game. Ratchet’s little robot buddy will be leaving the safety of a supporting role and step himself firmly into the spotlight for this release. The other notable point, especially for series’ fans, is that the game’s story does not follow the Playstation 3’s Tools of Destruction. Instead it takes place sometime before the events of that game.

To series’ fans the story of the Ratchet & Clank games is one of their top priorities and it looks like High Impact will deliver another smart, funny and touching endeavor. This time out, Ratchet has been tossed into jail. Clank is tasked with helping to free him and to clear the name of his lombax buddy. As the title suggests Clank acts as a secret agent – think James Bond as a toaster – which means there will be a stealth based aspect to Clank’s missions. In keeping with the tradition of the series Clank gets a variety of wacky weapons and equipment to help him along his quest. Weapons like the Tie-a-Rang, a bow tie equipped with razor sharp blades, and Cuff Link Bomb keep in the spirit of the franchise and the theme of the game.

Playable characters

Of course all the stealth / spy based gameplay doesn’t mean that Secret Agent Clank abandons the jump and gun platforming gameplay of its predecessors. Fear not, as there will be plenty of seemingly insurmountable odds to face. While the game does place Clank firmly in the lead role, you do get to play as Ratchet, as he attempts to survive the rough prison life. Gamers can take control of their favorite superhero, Captain Qwark as well. Having three playable characters allows High Impact Games to vary the gameplay accordingly and hopefully keep everything feeling fun and fresh. It will also allow them to work their magic with level design.

Clank’s missions will obviously be more stealth based and will require more sneaking around and puzzle solving than normal. However Ratchet’s levels seem to be more along the lines of Ratchet: Deadlocked; arena battles with hordes of enemies charging from all sides with a few platforming elements tossed in. From what has been seen of Qwark, he will also fight in arena battles but against fantastic bosses straight from his mind.

Graphics and sound

Something else that High Impact Games is attempting to keep fresh is the graphics. It is going to have a daunting task this time around. Recent games like God of War: Chains of Olympus and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII have raised the bar for graphics on the system. However High Impact proved with Size Matters that it had a firm handle on the PSP hardware, so hopefully with that experience under their belts Secret Agent Clank pulls together and keeps the high graphical standards the series is known for.

One area I don’t expect High Impact to worry about is the sound, in particular the voice acting. They will once again be using the series’ assets. And providing the writing is as good as it should be the voice acting should have fans clutching their sides in fits of laughter.

On the roll

The PSP has been on a solid roll the last couple of months, with releases like the previously mentioned God of War: Chains of Olympus and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII. Sony would certainly like to keep that momentum going and Secret Agent Clank could very well be that title that keeps it going forward. We will have to wait a little bit longer to find out.