Jak and Daxter: The precursor legacy was a huge success on the PS2. It was a simple game, yet it required a bit of skill. It was named one of the PS2 greatest hits. The game contained beautiful and colorful environments. There was a bit of humor involved. The sequel, Jak 2 was a little different.
Jak 2 naturally proceeds off from the ending of the first game. It starts off with the protagonists, Jak, Daxter, Kyra, and the Green sage operating a portal found in the previous game. The portal is opened and sends our heros to another city that is in the future. Jak is seperated and captured in this strange city. He is subjected to a series of experiments resulting in a huge change. Daxter frees Jak after two years of hiding and from there Jak vows revenge on the man who changed him: the baron.
The storyline for Jak 2 revolves around Jak's attempts to have his revenge on the baron. As you progress through the story, The origins of Jak are explained. Everything is cleared up at the end of the game. As a *SPOILER* one of the pieces of information you discover is the city that Jak and his party ended up. That city is the future Haven city, the city of the first game. The story in the game was nicely done. Everything fit and it was sort of looking at an upgraded version of the first game. It does have a happy ending but it depends on your point of view.
The gaming environment was a huge expansion. Unlike the first one, there are a lot of places to explore. If you want to discover everything in the game, you seriously need some time because certain powercells are difficult to achieve. There are screens where you can take tests to prove your worth and the reward is a powercell, but the tests are not easy. I guarantee this is not a short game like the first. There is a lot of areas to explore. The main mode of transportation are hovercrafts. The durability and speed are inversely proportioned. For example, If you have the motorcyle craft, it has the fastest speed but if you hit other objects five times or less, the craft explodes. It's a risk, but it's the main way to travel through the city in a decent amount of time. There are many people in the city, but you can only talk to the important ones. If I had to put it another way, it's grand theft auto at a lower ESRB rating. Because the enviroment is huge, it takes up a chunk of the PS2 memory card.
The gameplay is similar to the first. Jak retains all of the moves that he did in the first game. A new factor are guns. Jak has the opportunity to gain four different guns: Shotgun, Rifle, Machine gun, Peacemaker. Each one has a different strength and weakness. The Shotgun has a wide blast area, but short range. The rifle has a long range, large amount of ammo, but it's not too accurate. The Machine gun has long range, large amount of ammo, rapid fire, but it's not a strong gun. The peacemaker is the strongest gun, but it has a limited range and the smallest amount of ammo. These guns are essential to completing the game since Jak's move can't overcome each boss. Jak gains a new ability called Dark Jak. Since he was exposed to dark eco, Jak has the ability to pick up Dark Eco orb and transform into a dark version of himself where he is temporarily invincible. Dark Jak is an incredibly fast and strong. He also has button combinations, but you can get those combos only by offering powercells to the god. There are also other vehicles you can use for destruction, powersuit, certain cannons, etc.
In addition to having new characters introduced, a prominent part of the game are missions. While some missions ;are optional, there are some that are required to complete the game. in certain missions, it will take time because you can't complete the mission in a normal fashion. Usually you will have to think of a creative way to pass the mission, and it could take hours. Unlike the first one, you don't have an idea of what missions are left to complete, optional or required. However, the game's map will help point you in the right direction of where you need to go.
Overall, I thought the game was pretty decent for a sequel, but the difficulty of the game was extremely steep. You could complete what you thought was the hardest task only to find out that the next one was even worse. In one part of the game, you are required to race three times. Each race is extremely difficult than the previous ones. The only way you could win in first place was if you took the shortcuts, but the track was extremely difficult, so you would have to play several times to in order to know the shortcuts and the track fairly well. Another scenario was stopping four robots. Shooting from a distance wasn't the best solution because the robot could probably hit you along with the soldiers in the city. The best way was going up to the robot and shooting until it exploded because the robot had a unique characteristic. But nonetheless, the story really did add to the Jak and Daxter Universe. since the controls haven't changed, it's an easy fit for those who have played the first Jak and Daxter. Definitely worth the eight bucks I spent.