'Jak & Daxter' on the Right Track

By AARON CURTISS

Dec. 20, 2001 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Nothing about “Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy” for Sony PlayStation 2 is all that innovative or surprising.

But so what?

It’s still a heck of a lot of fun to clamber through such colorful and evocatively named locales as Misty Island, Geyser Rock and Boggy Swamp in search of the sage who can return a critter back to human form.

In many ways, “Jak & Daxter” is the video game equivalent of a Hollywood blockbuster or dinner at Claim Jumper: nothing daring, just heaping portions of tried-and-true recipes.

In this case, the creators of “Crash Bandicoot” serve up a three-dimensional exploration-based buddy game in lush tropical environments and spice it up with wisenheimer jokes.

Jak and his pal, Daxter, are a pair of elves or pixies or something vaguely human. As they go exploring one day, Daxter falls into a pit of goo and is transformed into a meerkat or mongoose or something vaguely weaselly.

And so players take control of Jak and guide him through deep mountain passes, along sandy beaches and across bubbling lava pits--all of which are beautifully rendered in bright colors and rich detail.

Even parts of the landscape with no apparent relation to the game can be explored.

Although primary control is of two-legged Jak, the four-legged Daxter plays an integral role. He rides on Jak’s shoulder and comes in handy when Jak performs a spin attack.

The relationship between Jak and Daxter gives the game a certain amount of emotional depth. Yeah, yeah, it’s still a video game and there are no weepy male-bonding moments. Yet all but the most hard-hearted players will want to help Daxter regain his form. Despite a back story about long-lost elders--called Precursors--leaving behind magic artifacts, the real emphasis is on getting Daxter back to normal.

The path to Daxter’s transformation opens as players collect items scattered throughout the seamless game world. The primary currency of the game is power cells accumulated to earn new equipment or access to higher levels. They’re just lying around at the beginning of the game but get tougher to track down as Jak and Daxter get closer to the end.

Like other search-and-explore games, such as “Super Mario 64,” “Jak & Daxter” emphasizes thorough reconnaissance over offensive action. Enemies fill the levels, but most don’t pose much of a challenge. Instead, the most obstinate obstacles lie in the landscape itself.

The cause is helped considerably by a smooth set of controls. The problem with most third-person three-dimensional adventures is that the camera angle is perpetually just a little bit off. “Jak & Daxter” is not immune, but it never frustrates play.

“Jak & Daxter” falls squarely into the “been there, done that” category. But it does a good enough job covering its rehashed elements with visual tweaks and interesting twists that it never feels like anything but a good time.

*Pikmin”

The trick in “Pikmin” is in describing it.

The hero of this new Nintendo GameCube title is an inch-high alien who crash lands in a garden and recruits a bunch of ant-size plant people to help him reassemble his damaged spaceship. The plant people, or Pikmin, spawn from pods and walk around with leaves or flowers sprouting from their heads. The Pikmin follow the little space guy with devotion--to the point of drowning themselves if he leads them too close to a puddle.

“Pikmin” takes about 30 seconds to learn, and the rules borrow heavily from real-time strategy games.

Although collecting spaceship parts is the primary goal of the game, “Pikmin” also demands players fight off garden bugs and arranging the Pikmin into useful units. So while one squad is chopping down flowers to spawn more Pikmin, another can be hunting down a critical ship component.

Each piece must be collected during the span of a single day since Pikmin can’t be away from their pod overnight. This makes locating and securing parts a frantic exercise that takes several attempts to master.

Titles such as “Pikmin” give Nintendo its well-deserved reputation as an innovative game maker.

Aaron Curtiss is editor of Tech Times. He can be reached at aaron .curtiss@latimes.com.

“Jak & Daxter”

Genre: Third-person exploration

Platform: Sony PlayStation 2

Price: $50

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

ESRB* rating: Everyone

The good: Beautiful graphics, huge worlds

The bad: Not all that inventive

Bottom line: A solid title

“Pikmin”