One of the Best PS2 Franchises Deserves a Reboot, 13 Years After Sony Ended It

Naughty Dog is best known today for The Last of Us, but the series that helped put the developer on the map deserves a comeback. Naughty Dog’s evolution has been an interesting one, a clear case study in the way gaming has increasingly tried to become more cinematic with each subsequent generation of home consoles. The Last of Us is one of the better examples of this practice in action, with a focus on narrative that bleeds over to the game’s mix of natural landscapes and intense encounters.

Before that, though, Naughty Dog was more known for their adventure games. While the Uncharted series has its fans, one of the best contributions of the developer to the gaming space came during the PS2 era, with a series of platforming/action games that delivered on the potential of the platform. 13 years since they last appeared in a new game, Naughty Dog’s Jak and Daxter deserve a comeback.

Jak And Dexter Were Icons Of The PS2 Era

During the PlayStation 2 era, Jack and Daxter were among the most iconic characters on the console — and they are long overdue for a comeback or reboot. Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy launched in 2001 on the PlayStation 2. Developed by Naughty Dog, the game was a colorful platforming adventure. The game introduced players to the mute protagonist Jak, a wide-eyed adventurer who works alongside his best friend Daxter (who has been turned into an ottsel) to explore their world for the mysterious element known as Eco. While it didn’t necessarily reinvent the wheel, it wasn’t trying to. Instead, the game’s straightforward approach, tight design, and charming characters worked in its favor.

Naughty Dog achieved greater success two years later with Jak II, which relocated the character to a grimmer urban environment and added darker layers to the story. While this kind of tonal shift hindered other franchises at the time, like Prince of Persia, Jak II found the right amount of edgy storytelling and combat-heavy gameplay to fit alongside the colorful aesthetic and snarky riff on adventure epics to make for a compelling experience.

It all came together in 2004’s Jak 3, which closed out the trilogy on a high note with a strong mix of platforming adventure and run-and-gun combat. In the subsequent years, there were three spin-offs for the series, including 2005’s Jack X: Combat Racing, 2006’s PSP platformer Daxter, and the spin-off Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier in 2009. Since then, however, the series has more or less lain dormant, outside ot two remastered collections of the franchise for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. Naughty Dog moved on to other franchises like Uncharted and The Last of Us, with fans of the older series even left on a bit of a cliffhanger.

Jak And Daxter Ended On A Cliffhanger 13 Years Ago

While the primary Jak and Daxter trilogy concluded on a high note, the subsequent spin-offs established that the titular pair’s adventures were far from over. In fact, Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier even laid the groundwork for a larger adventure. High Impact Games took over development on the title, focusing on a new adventure that sent Jak, Daxter, and their ally Keira on a globetrotting adventure, facing off with sky-pirates. The game’s ending revealed a new source of Eco beyond the edge of the world, with the trio set to investigate the mystery as their next adventure.

However, that never came to fruition. The Lost Frontier (which was developed by High Impact Games instead of Naughty Dog) performed fairly well with critics but came out during the latter era of the PlayStation 2’s life cycle and after the larger gaming atmosphere had moved away from the platformers that Jak and Daxter represented. It was a shame, too, because the ending of The Lost Frontier had opened up the possibilities for the franchise to go into all sorts of different directions. That’s partly what makes it such an enticing proposition to imagine where the series could go moving forward.

Jak And Daxter Deserve A Return

It’s been sixteen years since Jak and Daxter debuted, and they deserve a return in some capacity. The series was popular during its heyday and was well-received by critics and audiences alike. As a whole, the franchise sold over 15 million copies by 2017, highlighting how it connected with audiences. Naughty Dog currently has Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet in development, a revisit to the world of Jak and Daxter could be a fun way for the developer to bring modern aesthetics and gameplay touches to the franchise that helped define them in the public’s eye.

A sequel could build off the open-ended nature of The Lost Frontier’s ending or ignore it entirely, throwing the characters into a new setting. A reboot could combine the previous games into a single epic adventure, smoothing out some of the growing pains the franchise experienced as it moved from the standard platformer into the more action-heavy direction of the sequels. Jak and Daxter’s ecological themes would feel more prescient than ever, and Jak could use an opportunity to reassert himself as one of PlayStation’s best mascot characters alongside the likes of Ratchet and Kratos. It’s been far too long since gamers got to play with Jak and Daxter, and they deserve another chance in the spotlight.