10 Best Stories In Ratchet and Clank, Ranked

Ratchet and Clank: Full Frontal Assault (2012)

Full Frontal Assault, which came out in 2012 to mark the 10th anniversary of the series, is generally thought to have failed. The core of the three to four-hour campaign is a tower defense mode that isn’t very good, and the light, DLC-filled multiplayer mode didn’t do much to help the game’s image.

The story of the game is also just average. Stuart Zurgo, a one-note side character from Going Commando that no one really wanted to see again, gets in a fight with fan favorite Captain Qwark, who is a bit of a klutz. Zurgo is a former fanboy who has become a supervillain. He wants to cause a new ice age on three worlds in a system, but his plans fail when he doesn’t take into account the Q-Force. This story is the worst because it isn’t memorable, it’s short, and it has nothing to do with the story that fans wanted to keep going.

Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty (2008)

Quest for Booty was a downloaded adventure game that followed the trend of being very short. In the end, it felt like I was just spinning my wheels.

Ratchet’s search for Clank, who was taken by the strange Zoni race, picks up where the last game left off. In this game, he has to find the Obsidian Eye by making his way through a number of underwater environments. With this handy piece of technology, he will be able to zero in on where Clank is. However, as is usually the case in these kinds of stories, he will need to find one MacGuffin after another to find it. Even when they meet the ghostly pirate Captain Darkwater in the last hour of the movie, it doesn’t leave much of a memory.

Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One (2011)

All 4 One is different from the other Ratchet games because it was made to be played with other people. You can technically play by yourself with an AI Clank to help out, but the fact that the game was made for four players and the challenge isn’t balanced makes this a pretty sad thing to do.

In the same way, the story assumes that you are playing with friends because the three other playable characters come and go from moments at will. It’s a confusing story that presents more ideas than it knows what to do with. The team gets caught up in Dr. Frumpus Croid’s experiments, which seem to have accidentally given birth to an evil thing. What is it? Mister Dinkles. Of course. Throw in some highly complicated lore about souls that can travel between dimensions, and you have… well, not the best episode of the series.

Ratchet and Clank: Into the Nexus (2013)

Into the Nexus was the last game for the famous duo on the PS3, and it came out almost at the same time as the PS4. It would have been a better launch game for the PS4, though.

In terms of story, the game gets points early on for killing off some important characters. Even though they were two characters that most players found to be very annoying, they helped make the story darker. Talwyn, who has been dating Ratchet for a long time, has to deal with the loss of her warbot friends Cronk and Zephyr while another threat from another world is going on. The criminal Prog twins want to let eldritch Nethers loose on the world, and it’s up to the reliable Dimensionator (again) to keep them from getting out. Not very exciting, but a good way to start Rift Apart.

Ratchet and Clank (2002)

Even though it might seem strange to put the first trip so low on the list, Insomniac would agree. They have said on the record that the way Ratchet was portrayed in the first game was so off that they would do it over if they could, which is exactly what they did with the 2016 remake.

Ratchet in this game is nothing like the version that fans have come to love. Instead, he seems to go out of his way to irritate everyone he meets, especially Clank. Since the two are thrown together in a cynical world and have to get rid of the corrupt Chairman Drek. Players needed a more likeable main character than Lombax.

Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando (2003)

With the sequel, Insomniac did a great job of making up for their mistakes. They even changed Ratchet’s name to James Arnold Taylor, who has been in the business for twenty years.

In Going Commando, a guy named Abercrombie Fizzwidget hires the two to find a “Protopet” that has been stolen. Of course, it’s not that easy. The thief is revealed to be a Lombax freedom fighter named Angela Cross, who has found that the Protopet can be turned into a soft killing machine under certain circumstances. This one set the series up for greatness by being funny and making Ratchet much better.

Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction (2007)

Tools of Destruction kicked off the HD age of Ratchet with a bang. It was the first game to have a main storyline and introduce characters like Talwyn and Mr. Zurkon, who have since become fan favorites.

Percival Tachyon, a tiny marauder, comes to Ratchet’s galaxy to kill the last surviving Lombaxes. Why? Well, the fact that they killed off all of his people might have something to do with it. We also see the Dimensionator for the first time. We learn that it was made by the Lombax and was used to seal the Cragmites in another world, which, ironically, is exactly what happened to them soon after. At the end, Clank is taken to a place called the “Great Clock,” and Ratchet’s past is called into question. What an exciting ending!

Ratchet: Deadlocked (2005)

Back on the PS2, Deadlocked stands out from the other games in the series. In response to the trend in the mid-2000s of making cute gaming mascots into hard-edged badasses, it is unashamedly grimdark.

Ratchet, Clank, and a few other figures are sent to DreadZone, a place where gladiators have to kill or die. The team has to go up against Gleeman Vox, the CEO of Vox News. If they try to escape, their collars will blow up, which is the Watto business plan. The story makes some sharp points about shopping and has some great jokes thanks to the arguing DreadZone hosts. But it just misses the top spots because of its strange tone.

Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal (2004)

Up Your Arsenal is often called the best PS2 Ratchet game, and its crazy story is a big reason why.

How to start Spacebar Clicker? Clank is now a TV star with his show “Secret Agent Clank,” and he has to deal with Courtney Gears, the sexiest robot this side of the internet, trying to get close to him. She is also working with Dr. Nefarious, a screeching idiot whose robot parts often short out and tune into iffy telenovelas. On top of all this, there is a drive to make organic lifeforms look bad across the galaxy. Ratchet is falling in love with the President’s daughter, and Qwark? He believes that he is a monkey. Not much more to say.

Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time (2009)

A Crack in Time is an all-timer because it’s the best of the games’ thematic stories and ties up a lot of open ends. It was a joke.

For most of the game, you’ll switch between Clank and Ratchet, who are still apart and learning things about their families. Ratchet is fighting Nefarious again when he runs into Alister Azimuth, who is a friend of Ratchet’s father, Kaden. Clank, on the other hand, finds out that what he made wasn’t a mistake. He has the mind of the son of Orvus, the leader of the Zoni who run the Great Clock. Which is a space station at the center of the universe that keeps time moving. Azimuth wants to use the Clock to fix the mistakes the Lombaxes made. Which puts him in the path of Clank’s new sense of duty and, by extension, Ratchet. As paradoxes are solved, Azimuth dies, and Clank runs away from the Clock to be with his friend Lomba. There are epic battles and heartbreaking scenes. Smart move.