Ratchet & Clank Going Commando: Part 1: New Galaxy, New Look, New Voice in Aranos
7Since Ratchet & Clank kicked off its first game just as well as Spyro did with his, a sequel was clearly in order for the following year.
This sequel, with starting the trend of lewd innuendo subtitles in its American releases, improved on so much over the first game, namely the gameplay and the writing. Any amount of nastiness Ratchet had towards Clank is completely gone at this point, and they are now truly best buds. To further emphasize this, Ratchet has a new voice from this point on from Mikey Kelley to James Arnold Taylor (Tidus, Fred Flintstone Johnny Test, etc.).
The game's title screen has a cute cutscene of Ratchet playing video games. Sometimes they're of his own games, and other times, they're of Jak & Daxter and Jak II.
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The story of this game starts off with Ratchet & Clank being interviewed back in Ratchet home planet Veldin. Before this interview, this Galactic Duo of the Solana Galaxy went through a lot of celebrations and vacations thanks to their victory over the evil Chairman Drek.
Recently, however, they haven't gone through a lot afterwards. They're just chilling out at Veldin with nothing else to do. They were celebrated as heroes, but no one really needed heroes anymore.
That's when an old guy from a distant galaxy had a grand idea...
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Without preparation, Ratchet & Clank were suddenly warped from their Solana Galaxy to the Bogon Galaxy, courtesy of Mr. Ambercrombie Fizzwidget, the founder of Megacorp, Bogon's counterpart to Gadgetron.
The old man had summoned the Galactic Duo for their help after learning of their heroic deeds in Solana to stop a dangerous threat to Bogon. A thief had stolen an Experiment from one of Megacorp's labs. Ratchet is going to go through two weeks of training to prepare for this mission, while Clank is to become Megacorp's head accountant, which includes owning and living in a suite in Megaopolis.
When his training was finished, Ratchet gained a brand new suit to match with it. Heading inside of a ship on Planet Aranos where the thief was last spotted, it was time for Commando Ratchet to start his first mission in Bogon!
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The controls in this game have improved. For one thing, Ratchet can now strafe with additional gadgets, meaning you can now aim and shoot while also dodging. A bit more niche, but he can now move while his Omniwrench is thrown.
The biggest update is an RPG-like Nanotech upgrade system. You get more Nanomtes (EXP) for Ratchet and whatever weapon he uses to kill enemies. When he gets enough EXP, his health is extended. If his weapons get enough EXP, they upgrade - EVOLVE! - into bigger, better weapons!
What you'll want to do is figure out what weapons you want to use the most and constantly try different ones out to upgrade them, and once they have, try to maybe bench them a bit and focus on upgrading others.
Different weapons upgrade at different rates, and different enemies will give different quantities of Nanomite EXP.
Lastly, Ratchet's helmet in this game is multi-functional. It has a built-in O2 Mask for itself, so don't EVER have to worry about deep space or deep water in this game.
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Ratchet eventually finds the Experiment, but the Thief was waiting for him and took it off the planet.
The Thief then contacts a company called Thugs-4-Less to speak with its leader for a certain job somewhere else...
Ratchet's mission was more or less a failure by this point. He eventually had to make his own escape and re-track the Thief.