Daxter Review

I originally played Daxter a few years ago on the PPSSPP emulator since I thought Sony would never put this game on modern Playstation systems and it ran very well, of course I had to tinker with the controls to have right analog stick movement and the FMVs were really blurry but other than that I had a very good time. Now, a modern Playstation consoles version of Daxter does exist and I'm replaying the game years later, and how does it hold up? I still think the game is geniunely fantastic, I do notice some issues with the game on a replay but for the most part, they hardly get in the way of playing Daxter. The moment to moment platforming and level design is still just as top notch as ever.

Out of all the games in the Jak and Daxter series, this is the safest reccomendation to me. Don't like the collecting of Precursor Legacy? Don't like the bloated open world of 2? Don't like the mini games of Jak 3? Don't care for the racing gameplay of Jak X? Don't really like the aerial combat of Lost Frontier? Then Daxter is by far the most pure platformer of the whole series, sure there are some pace breaking moments like riding and vehicle chases, movie parody mini games, a turret section, and the occasional simon says mini game, but outside of those 85-90% of Daxter is spent platforming and combat. This was especially welcome since Jak 3 is just so adamant of having so many different mini game genres at once.

One very notable comparison you can make with is with Super Mario Sunshine, the titular character Daxter has a spray gun that can help him glide in the air by firing the gadget downwards by holding a button, much like Mario can with FLUDD. The main difference between this game and Sunshine is that the Spray Gun can also be used during combat and there isn't levels where it's randomly taken away from you and you have to do unpolished platforming levels. In Daxter, you keep the spray gun at all times which is good.

Another comparison that Daxter can made to is it's own franchise and how much Daxter improves on everything Jak 2 tried to do. With Jak 2, the idea of a platformer where you didn't have to collect items to unlock more items and how you can run to the start of every platforming guanlet without needing "x amount of stuff" was an interesting and sound approach especially at the time since you can argue a lot of 3D platformers outside of say the Crash Bandicot series focused on exploration than pure platforming, the problem was is that in Jak 2, you spent more time driving an empty and boring open world where there was too much happening except accidentally bumping into a Crimson Guard solider and possibly dying and halting your progress then you got to do short missions that checkpointed inconistently to make up for much time was spent driving to the next mission.

Daxter? It pretty much solves everything by making Haven City, much, much, much smaller, all the mission start locations are only 1-2 minutes away. Due to this, I finally get an appreciation for everything Jak 2 tried to do and I appreciate that game a bit more in retrospect. On top of this, Daxter's levels are much longer than many of Jak 2's missions. So in a lot of ways, Daxter is what Jak 2 and 3 should've been.

The level design is also quite good, standouts include, the Transit Station, Fish Cannery, Baron's Palace, and Prison. What I love is that all these levels are pretty lengthy and all all self contained levels that tests your platforming skills, with minimal interruptions as you go through them, they might've been overly hard especially the Transit Station level with the PSP analog nub but with analog sticks on a controller, it's much more enjoyable. The Transit Station level be a heavy standout with how fast the trains are moving and the players has to quickly think on his feet like dodging signs and laser as the train is moving very quickly. Baron's Palace is also great in that it turns into a puzzle game of trying to get past various laser grids and also making and timing the jumps and spray gun glide enough to make it through.

After all this praise, what do I dislike about the game? Not much but they can be big flaws to some. One, if you are a big Jak fan for the story, Daxter's story is basically a fighting shonen anime filler arc, where the important scenes like Vieger and the Metal Head leader can be counted on one hand. Combat also gets too easy, at first it's challenging with using the fly swatter and using gas to stun, but later upgrades makes enemies too easy to kill and it never introduces new enemies to compensate for Daxter's growing weapon arsenal. Sometimes, the pick ups to use the spray gun's glide doesn't magnetize to Daxter quick enough which leads to some cheap deaths, it might need some rewind use on PS5.

Overall, Daxter is a great game and one of the greatest gaming franchise spin offs ever made. I can't reccomend this high enough especially for someone who isn't big on the Jak Sequels.