If you tuned into the Sony press conference at Gamescom last week, you got to see Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One revealed and played for the first time by Ted Price and a couple of other Insomniacs. Which means you also got to see why it's a cool new direction for the Ratchet series: one that allows up to four players to play together (either locally or online). As a hardcore Ratchet fan, I was pretty much sold on the concept within minutes of seeing it in action, but after getting a chance to check out some more of the game and chat with Chad Dezern (studio head at the new North Carolina Insomniac studio) and some of the other team members at the show, I'm even more excited about what's in store.
As you see in the first videos, the game is very much like the Ratchet titles we all know and love, except here you can have up to four people playing on the same screen. According to Dezern, the project originally started as a two-player affair, where one person would play Ratchet and another would play as Clank, but when the team realized how much co-op added, it experimented with adding a third and then a fourth player. So now you can play as Ratchet and Clank, obviously, but also Captain Qwark and Dr. Nefarious. And why would these four ever be teamed together? Well, it turns out Nefarious had this elaborate scheme involving a creature collector, but in addition to abducting Ratchet, Clank, and Qwark, it also sucked him in. So they're all basically forced by circumstance to work together -- which means they all need to rely on each other, but that doesn't mean they always play fair (more on that later).
So while this very much looks and plays like prior Ratchet games, there are some changes done to accommodate these additional players. For instance, the camera has been pulled out for a "director's camera" effect that offers more cinematic perspectives. Another co-op specific tweak are the addition of color-coded rings around the players, and icons that represent where they'll appear if they die -- which helps when things get chaotic on-screen. According to Dezern, even the character models themselves have been oh-so-slightly tweaked, to make them stand out from each other better. And there are numbers that appear on screen to indicate when you've earned more co-op points (points accrued from pulling off co-op actions). But really, beyond those subtle changes, it's very similar to the Ratchet & Clank Future series (in fact, it picks up after those titles -- the Ratchet & Clank comics will bridge the gap between the All 4 One and its predecessors). That said, the gameplay has also changed a bit to play off of the multiple characters better. For instance, there are lots of sequences where co-op actions are required -- such as having all four people push on items or levels in tandem. Though, the game scales with the number of players -- so four aren't always necessary; the minimum number of characters is two, and if you play by yourself, the second character gets controlled by the computer. One cool example of this is a giant wind tunnel, where by lining all of the characters up so they'd hold onto each other, you could create enough air friction to get everyone to float higher. Another is a part where the gang is trying to make its way through an incinerator on a floating plank that kept tilting, requiring everyone to work together to keep it balanced properly. The weapons also tilt toward co-op moves; for instance, there's vacuum weapon that allowed you to toss enemies back and forth. And there are co-op moves you can do like throwing another player (at a boss, for example). Of course, the game itself does need to be structured a bit differently with multiple players -- for instance, you can respawn as long as another player is still alive, which certainly changes up the way the game needs to challenge you. But Insomniac stresses that this doesn't just make it super simple. The difficulty also scales with how many people are playing (which is cool, since anyone can drop in or drop out at any time). Another aspect that mixes up the gameplay a bit is that, while you're all working together, yes, there is a fair amount of friendly competition going on for resources or especially super rare items.
The demos I saw of Ratchet & Clank All 4 One at both Sony's press conference and afterwards made it seem like an absolute blast -- it's clear that having multiple players is going to add a lot to the already-great Ratchet formula. And now I just can't wait to get my hands on it. Honestly, the only disappointing thing about the game so far is its title -- "All 4 One" is hardly as edgy or innuendo-filled as the prior titles. When asked about why Insomniac didn't go with something like "Ratchet & Clank 4-Play," instead, the team just smiled and shrugged. Reading between the lines it's pretty clear it wasn't for lack of trying. Regardless, this is one to keep an eye on So far so good
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