Review: Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One

Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One takes our heroic Lombax and his diminutive robot companion and up to two other players work together to conquer evil.

The game is built from the ground up to be a co-operative experience, with up to four players teaming up to complete missions. The games scales from two up to spots, depending on the number of live participants. Attacking a target in unisoon ramps up the power of the attack.

The game also features a lot of what Insomniac Games calls co-opetition – battling against your teammates for additional points while working toward a common goal. This can be accomplished by the old standard of gathering bolts from crates or from defeated enemies, the new practice of nabbing small critters – some looking like twisted Pokemons, or by winning mini-races within levels. These added points help in the quest to win individual levels or for overall leadership.

The game, like any good Ratchet game, features lots of destruction-dealing gadgets. Old favorites like Mr. Zurkon and the Omniwrench return, with new tools to amuse and waylay enemies.

Fans of the single-player Ratchet games shouldn’t necessarily pass up Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One. Playing alone designates you as Ratchet and Clank becomes your sidekick – much like the other R&C games. The entire game can be played in this mode and feels like a traditional R&C game. In this mode, you get to harvest all of the bolts and critters found, giving ample opportunity to power up all the cool weapons.

A big difference, however, is the very linear path of the game. In past R&C games, players were free to hop in Ratchet’s spaceship and fly to different planets or to artificial moon level. None of that is present in Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One.

Playing in co-op mode allows players to choose from Ratchet, Clank, Captain Qwark or Dr. Nefarious. Finding an online game is done by selecting from a list based on area of the game and skill level. A new player can only join a game if the host allows for a “reload” of the level.

In playing online, I did run into several glitches, mostly getting booted out randomly from games. Playing with three strangers is only done well if all know how to play and understand the goals of the level. One game I played had the host barking instructions for those who were lost, which seemed to work well.

Playing with buddies, as with most co-op games, is the much preferred way to compete. Random strangers online often don’t exhibit the willingness to work together required.

Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One maintains the high quality of the series, with the caveat that playing online is much better if played with friends or others who are willing to actually cooperate.

Platform: PlayStation3

Manufacturer: Sony Interactive

Rating: Everyone

Score: 8 “c’mon, help me out” chilies