Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy | |
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Developer(s) | Naughty Dog |
Publisher(s) | Sony Computer Entertainment |
Director(s) | Jason Rubin |
Designer(s) | Evan Wells |
Programmer(s) | |
Artist(s) | Erick Pangilinan Josh Scherr |
Writer(s) | Daniel Arey |
Composer(s) | Josh Mancell |
Series | Jak and Daxter |
Platform(s) | PlayStation 2 |
Release | |
Genre(s) | Platform |
Mode(s) | Single-player |
Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy is a 2001 platform video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2. It is the first game of the Jak and Daxter series. The game follows the protagonists, a young teenager named Jak, as he tries to help his friend Daxter after he is transformed into an "ottsel", a fictional hybrid of an otter and a weasel. With the help of Samos the Sage, a master of the mysterious energy called eco, created by an ancient race known as the Precursors, the pair learn that they must save their world from the rogue sages Gol and Maia Acheron, who plan to flood the world with dark eco, a mysterious substance which corrupts all it touches.
The game offers a large range of missions, collectibles and objectives often in the form of minigames which provide a variety of gameplay experiences, as well as puzzles and platforming stages. Jak and Daxter is often credited as being one of the first games with no loading screens, as players can explore the world in its entirety without experiencing any breaks in gameplay.
Development began in January 1999, following the release of Crash Team Racing ; it was Naughty Dog's first game to not be produced by Universal Interactive in 3 years. The game received critical acclaim upon release, with most critics praising the game's variety. Many critics agreed that the game had some of the best-looking graphics at the time of its release. By 2002, the game had sold a total of over one million copies worldwide, and by 2007, it had sold two million in the United States alone.
The game was followed up by Jak II . In 2012, a remastered port was included in the Jak and Daxter Collection for the PlayStation 3, and for the PlayStation Vita in 2013. It was released as a "PS2 Classic" port for the PlayStation 4 on 22 August 2017, which was also later made available on PlayStation 5 through backward compatibility.
Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy is a 3D platformer in which the objective is to gather items to progress through the levels. The player controls Jak, who has access to abilities such as double jumping, a rapid spinning kick, and glide punching. Injuries are accounted for by way of a life meter, which decreases whenever Jak is hit by enemies, falls from long distances, or makes contact with hazardous surfaces.
The Precursor Legacy offers several collectibles for the player to gather. The main objects are power cells, which are used to energize machinery to reach new hub locations. Power cells can be earned in many ways, such as fighting enemies, performing tasks for other characters, completing platforming challenges, and paying for them via Precursor orbs. Precursor orbs are egg-shaped collectables found scattered throughout the world, some in plain sight, and some hidden. Another type of collectible, scout flies, appear on every level. Collecting all seven scout flies in a level rewards the player with a power cell.
Eco is a mysterious form of energy encountered throughout the world. Eco comes in six different forms, differentiated by color; of those, four types are found during regular gameplay and provide the player with unique abilities. When eco is collected by Jak, it imbues him with its power for a short duration of time. [3] The player can utilize eco powers by collecting small amounts of glowing eco particles, or fully charging through eco vents. Green eco, the most common type of eco, restores health. [4] Blue eco increases Jak's speed, breaks nearby boxes (except strong boxes), attracts Precursor orbs, scout flies, small clusters of blue and green eco, and activates certain machinery. [5] Red eco increases attack power, [6] while yellow eco allows the player to shoot ranged bursts of energy through Jak's hands. Dark eco is presented as an obstacle that damages Jak, and light eco is used exclusively as the killing blow in the game's final boss battle.
The game contains three bosses whose defeat earns the player power cells or allows the player some method of progressing further in the game. However, not all bosses are mandatory. The first boss, the dark eco plant, is only defeated in order to gain a power cell and to remove hazardous spiked tentacles from the jungle area. The second boss, a cyborg Lurker named Klaww, must be defeated in order to enter the Mountain Pass. To do so, players must collect enough power cells to utilize a levitation device and unblock a path, allowing access to him. Once he is defeated, the areas beyond his lair are accessible. The final boss is an ancient giant robot, which has been restored to working order by the game's villains, Gol and Maia. Defeating the robot is the final task in the game; once it has been defeated, the end cutscene plays.
The game is set on a fictional planet with fantasy elements; its inhabitants live in small, sparse settlements, and use simple technologies. The game begins in Sandover Village, home of the two protagonists: Jak, a mute 15-year-old teenager, and his best friend Daxter (Max Casella), a loudmouth who is transformed at the beginning of the game into an ottsel, a fictitious crossbreed between a weasel and an otter.
Eco is an energy found throughout the world and was created by an ancient race of beings known only as Precursors, implied by Samos Hagai (Warren Burton) to be the masters of the universe and creators of all life on the planet. The two boys live with Samos, the Sage of green eco, and father of Keira (Anna Garduño), who is implied to be Jak's love interest. She builds the flying Zoomer vehicle that Jak and Daxter use throughout their adventure.
The primary enemies of the game consist of beasts known as Lurkers, commanded by the Dark Sage Gol Acheron (Dee Snider) alongside his sister Maia (Jennifer Hagood). Together they studied dark eco and ultimately fell prey to its malevolent effects, believing it can be wielded to alter the universe. Other characters are the Blue (John Di Crosta), Red (Sherman Howard), and Yellow (Jason Harris) Sages, all of whom are masters of the eco from which they take their name.
Against Samos' warnings, Jak and Daxter adventure to the forbidden Misty Island. There, they see two unknown figures ordering a cohort of Lurkers to gather eco and Precursor artifacts. The duo, worried by what they are seeing, prepare to leave, but are soon discovered by a Lurker guard. Jak manages to kill it with an explosive device they found, but the resulting explosion sends Daxter into a pool of dark eco. He emerges transformed into an "ottsel" (a fictional hybrid of an otter and a weasel) but is otherwise unharmed. Returning to their home of Sandover Village, they seek help from Samos; he explains that only Gol Acheron, the Dark Sage, can reverse the transformation.
Gol lives far to the north, and the teleportation gates to the other Sage huts are not operational; thus, the boys look for a means of crossing the deadly Fire Canyon. Samos's daughter Keira, a skilled engineer, offers to let them use her Zoomer (essentially a hoverbike) in exchange for enough power cells to operate it. Jak and Daxter begin their training in a nearby island called Geyser Rock, where they collect a few cells. Then they return to Sandover Village and explore a neighboring jungle, a beach off the village's coast, and Misty Island (which is accessible via speedboat after helping a local fisherman). After collecting enough cells, the heroes make their way through the Fire Canyon to Rock Village, the home of the Blue Sage. To their horror, the village has been attacked by a massive Lurker known as Klaww, and the Blue Sage has vanished. With the path forward blocked by Klaww, the boys look for more cells and explore an abandoned underwater Precursor city, an elevated basin filled with Precursor technology, and a swamp across the village bay. Using the collected cells, Keira clears the path, allowing Jak and Daxter to defeat Klaww, cross the Mountain Pass, and make their way into the ancient Volcanic Crater where the Red Sage dwells.
With the Red Sage missing as well, Samos sends the boys to hunt for enough cells so Keira can upgrade the Zoomer's heat shield. At this time, the truth is revealed: The Blue, Red, and Yellow Sages have been abducted by Gol and his sister Maia (who were also the figures Jak and Daxter saw on Misty Island), who intend to harness their combined power to extract the dark eco in their possession and use it to remake the world. However, Samos warns that if they open the silos containing the vast stores of dark eco deep underground, the dark eco will twist and destroy everything it touches. Jak and Daxter continue to look for more cells, exploring a dark cave filled with Lurker spiders and a mountainous tundra by the volcano's summit.
Making their way through the lava tunnels leading to Gol and Maia's citadel, the boys run into Keira, who reveals that Samos has also been captured. With the four Sages now under their control, the Acheron siblings begin restoring their excavated automaton so that they can release the dark eco from its silo. After rescuing the Sages from captivity, Jak and Daxter intercept the machine and engage it in battle. However, they only manage to destroy its eco weapons. Realizing that a greater power is needed to defeat Gol and Maia, Samos and the Blue, Red, and Yellow Sages combine the four different types of eco into one, creating light eco. [7] Daxter contemplates using the light eco to return himself to normal, but ultimately allows Jak to use it instead. [8]
Unable to escape the cockpit of their destroyed machine, Gol and Maia plunge into the silo and are presumed dead. With the world saved, the group focuses its attention on unlocking the fabled Precursor Door, which can only open with the energy of 100 power cells. Once the door is opened, it reveals a large, mysterious object enveloped in a blinding light. The object itself is kept a mystery until the second game.
This section needs additional citations for verification .(January 2023) |
Development on Jak and Daxter began in January 1999 as "Project Y". [9] As the rest of the Naughty Dog team were working on Crash Team Racing , only two programmers were allocated to the project. The rest of the team began work on Jak as well after the release of the PlayStation 2; eventually 35 developers worked on the game. [10] Because of the PS2's status as a new console, Naughty Dog felt they had to create a unique character for it. Before the main development of Jak and Daxter, Naughty Dog confirmed the idea with Sony Computer Entertainment, and after showing them a character they dubbed "Boxman" to demonstrate their animation engine, they came up with Jak and Daxter.
Jason Rubin stated in an interview with Play (US Magazine) that the 40 minutes of animation in the game required 6 full-time animators and 4 support animators. In some cases the animators came from outside of the video game industry from companies such as Disney and Nickelodeon. [11]
The game was in development for almost three years, and throughout this time, numerous changes were made to almost every aspect of the game, while the various engines used in the game were all tweaked to optimize their performance. The engine tweaks allowed Jak and Daxter to have no loading times or fogging and be able to display high-quality textures in a seamless, multi-level world. [12]
Due to each area of the game being 3–6 million polygons, the 3D computer graphics application Maya would stop working even on cutting-edge PCs. To combat this issue, the team had to use references and proxies as Maya and other current tools available were not capable of handling the entire area all at once. [11]
The main characters also went through changes. Originally, there was going to be a third main character that would develop as the game was played in a Tamagotchi style. [13] Instead, Naughty Dog concentrated their efforts on two main characters in order to create the exact characters they wanted. [13] The characters were inspired by Joe Madureira's Battle Chasers and Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke , while the village setting and character interactions were influenced by Asterix . [14] The game was announced at E3 2001. [15]
The voice-acting was recorded in the New York City-based Howard Schwartz Recording facility. [16] The game's soundtrack was composed entirely by multi-instrumentalist Josh Mancell. The album was produced by Mark Mothersbaugh. [17]
Aggregator | Score |
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Metacritic | 90/100 [18] |
Publication | Score |
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AllGame | 4/5 [19] |
Electronic Gaming Monthly | 24.5/30 [20] |
Famitsu | 34/40 [21] |
Game Informer | 9.25/10 [22] |
GameSpot | 8.8/10 [23] |
GameSpy | 4.5/5 [24] |
IGN | 9.4/10 [25] |
Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine | 10/10 [26] |
X-Play | 4/5 [27] |
Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy received "universal acclaim", according to review aggregator Metacritic. [18] Douglass C. Perry, a member of IGN's staff said, "…Jak and Daxter is a breath of fresh air, a funny, light-hearted, but no less epic action-adventure game all its own…" after reviewing the demo build for twelve hours. [28] Shane Satterfield of GameSpot praised its tight execution and heavy action elements which "ensure that things never become dull," and continued, "Next to Rayman 2 , Jak and Daxter is the best 3D platformer available for the PlayStation 2." [23] Andrew Reiner of Game Informer also offered praise to its graphics and the absence of load times, saying: "On several occasions, I found myself staring in awe at the little details Naughty Dog so meticulously included." [22] At the 2002 Game Developers Choice Awards, Daxter from Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy won the Original Game Character of the Year award. [15] It was a runner-up for GameSpot's annual "Best Platform Game" award among console games, which went to Conker's Bad Fur Day . [29] During the 5th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated Jak and Daxter for the "Console Action/Adventure" and "Game Design" awards. [30]
After its release in late 2001, the game went on to sell over 1 million copies, promoting it to "Greatest Hits" and reducing the price. By July 2006, it had sold 1.7 million copies and earned $49 million in the United States, and had become the best-selling Jak and Daxter game in that country. Next Generation ranked it as the 19th highest-selling game launched for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, or GameCube between January 2000 and July 2006 in the United States. Combined sales of Jak and Daxter games reached 4 million units in the United States by July 2006. [31] As of 2007, Jak and Daxter has sold almost 2 million copies (1.97 million) in the United States alone. [32] Jak and Daxter received a "Gold Prize" in Japan for sales of over 500,000 units. [15] The game is also the 17th best-selling game on the PlayStation 2.
In 2022, a group of fans reverse-engineered the game and unofficially ported it to modern PC platforms; titled OpenGOAL. [33]
Jak and Daxter is an action-adventure platformer third-person shooter video game franchise created by Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin and owned by Sony Interactive Entertainment. The series was originally developed by Naughty Dog with a number of installments being outsourced to Ready at Dawn and High Impact Games. The first game, Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, released on December 4, 2001, was one of the earliest titles for the PlayStation 2, and the series collectively is regarded as a defining franchise for the console.
Naughty Dog, LLC is an American first-party video game developer based in Santa Monica, California. Founded by Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin in 1984, the studio was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment in 2001. Gavin and Rubin produced a sequence of progressively more successful games, including Rings of Power and Way of the Warrior in the early 1990s. The latter game prompted Universal Interactive Studios to sign the duo to a three-title contract and fund the expansion of the company.
Ratchet & Clank is a third-person shooter platform video game developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 in 2002. It is the first game in the Ratchet & Clank series and the first game developed by Insomniac to not be owned by Universal Interactive.
Jak II is an action-adventure platformer third-person shooter video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 in 2003. It is the second game of the Jak and Daxter series and a sequel to Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy. It was followed by Jak 3 the following year in 2004.
Jak 3 is a 2004 action-adventure platformer third-person shooter video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2. The game is the sequel to Jak II and serves as the conclusion of the trilogy. The story of the previous games continues as the player takes on the dual role of recurring protagonists Jak and Daxter. It adds new weapons, devices and playable areas. The game was followed by Jak X: Combat Racing.
Jak X: Combat Racing is a 2005 vehicular combat video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 console. It is the fourth installment in the Jak and Daxter series. The plot follows protagonist Jak and his allies who, after having been poisoned, must partake in a championship of the fictional sport of "combat racing" in an effort to obtain an antidote.
Daxter is a 2006 platform video game developed by Ready at Dawn and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation Portable on March 14, 2006. A spin-off of the Jak and Daxter series, Daxter takes place during the two-year timeskip occurring during the opening cutscene of Jak II; unlike the other installments of the franchise focusing primarily on Jak, the game focuses on the adventures of his sidekick Daxter while Jak is imprisoned.
Andrew Scott Gavin is an American video game programmer, entrepreneur, and novelist. Gavin co-founded the video game company Naughty Dog with childhood friend Jason Rubin in 1986, which released games including Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter. Prior to founding Naughty Dog, Gavin worked in LISP at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.
Game Oriented Assembly Lisp is a programming language, a dialect of the language Lisp, made for video games developed by Andy Gavin and the Jak and Daxter team at the company Naughty Dog.
High Impact Games was an American video game developer based in Burbank, California, formed in 2004 by former Insomniac Games and Naughty Dog members. In 2007, the company released Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters for the PlayStation Portable, with a PlayStation 2 port released the next year, and Secret Agent Clank in 2008, also for the PlayStation Portable. On November 3, 2009, the company released its third game, Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier, for the PlayStation Portable and PlayStation 2. The game was based on the Jak & Daxter series made by Naughty Dog. In 2010, High Impact Games was developing a remake of Crash Team Racing for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii, but the publisher Activision canceled the game before the initial prototype was made. In 2011, an environmental artist who had worked on some games, revealed that High Impact Games was working on a new project for the Wii. This game was revealed to be Phineas and Ferb: Across the 2nd Dimension.
Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier is a 2009 platform video game developed by High Impact Games and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable. The game is the sixth and final in the Jak and Daxter series and the first to not be developed by series creator Naughty Dog. The player assumes the role of Jak, the angst-ridden hero enhanced by his exposure to Light and Dark Eco. Announced on April 1, 2009, the game was released November 3, 2009. It received generally mixed reviews from critics, but there was praise for the graphics, gameplay, and aerial fights. Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier was later made available for purchase on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 in March 2024, featuring new unlockable trophies.
Jason Rubin is an American video game director, writer, and comic book creator. He is best known for the Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter series of games which were produced by Naughty Dog, the game development studio he co-founded with partner and childhood friend Andy Gavin in 1986. He was the president of THQ before its closure due to bankruptcy on January 23, 2013. Rubin is the vice president of Metaverse Content at Meta Platforms.
This is a list of characters in the Jak and Daxter series, a video game franchise originally developed by Naughty Dog for the PlayStation 2. Currently, six games in the series have been released, with Jak as the primary playable character in all except Daxter for the PlayStation Portable.
Amy Hennig is an American video game writer and director, formerly for the video game company Naughty Dog. She began her work in the industry on the Nintendo Entertainment System, with her design debut on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System game Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City. She later went to work for Crystal Dynamics, working primarily on the Legacy of Kain series. With Naughty Dog, she worked primarily on the Jak and Daxter and Uncharted series, the latter of which she created.
Jak and Daxter Collection is a 2012 video game compilation developed by Mass Media and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 3. It is a collection of remastered ports of the first three games in Naughty Dog's Jak and Daxter series. A port to the PlayStation Vita was released in 2013.
Babak "Bob" Rafei is an Iranian video game art director, character animator and concept artist. He is the CEO of Big Red Button Entertainment, a video game development studio he co-founded with Jeff Lander in 2009.
Bruce Straley is an American game director, artist, designer, and studio director. He previously worked for the video game developer Naughty Dog, known for his work on the video games The Last of Us and Uncharted 4: A Thief's End. Straley's first video game work was as an artist at Western Technologies Inc, where he worked on the Menacer six-game cartridge (1992) and X-Men (1993). Following this, he formed a company, Pacific Softscape, where he worked as a designer on Generations Lost (1994). After the company disbanded, Straley was eventually hired at Crystal Dynamics, where he worked as a designer on Gex: Enter the Gecko (1998) and was initially game director for Gex 3: Deep Cover Gecko (1999); he left the company partway through development of the latter.
Charles Steve Zembillas is an American character designer, art director, educator, and author. Zembillas designed early concept art for games such as Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, and Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, as well as animated television series such as Wish Kid, Where's Waldo?, James Bond Jr., and Ghostbusters.
Evan Wells is an American video game designer and programmer and former president of Naughty Dog. Wells's first video game was at Sega, where he worked on ToeJam & Earl in Panic on Funkotron, before moving to Crystal Dynamics in 1995 to work on Gex and Gex: Enter the Gecko. He was employed at Naughty Dog in 1998, working on several Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter titles before becoming co-president of the company alongside Stephen White in 2005; White was replaced the following year by Christophe Balestra, who retired in 2017. The two oversaw the release of the Uncharted series, and The Last of Us. Wells remained the sole president, overseeing the release of The Last of Us Part II, until Neil Druckmann's promotion to co-president in 2020. Wells announced his retirement in 2023.