Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy is a 2001 action-adventure platform video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 console. The game was re-released for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita in 2012 as part of the Jak and Daxter Collection, remastered by Mass Media Games. A port for the PlayStation 4 was released in 2017.
The game follows protagonist Jak as he tries to help his friend Daxter after Daxter is transformed into an ottsel, a fictional hybrid of an otter and a weasel. With the help of Samos the Sage, the pair learn that they must save their world from Gol and Maia Acheron, who plan to flood it with dark eco, a mysterious substance. Gameplay is centered around platforming through a seamless open-ended environment with players being able to hunt collectibles and participate in mini-games to progress through the story.
Jak and Daxter began development in 1999 under the codename "Project Y", after the release of 1998's Crash Bandicoot: Warped, and ran concurrently to 1999's Crash Team Racing. Development lasted for almost three years, during which Naughty Dog constantly changed and updated character designs and engines. Naughty Dog felt that due to the PlayStation 2's status as a new console, the team had to create a new, unique character for it. Improvements to the engine allowed the team to create a seamless game world without the need of loading screens. Sony formally announced the title at E3 2001.
Upon release, The Precursor Legacy received critical acclaim, with critics praising the game's production values, seamless world design and variety of locations and gameplay elements, though some minor criticism was pointed at its perceived lack of originality and low difficulty. It was a commercial success, selling over 1.9 million copies within the United States alone by 2007. Its success launched a franchise, beginning with its 2003 sequel, Jak II.
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Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy received critical acclaim upon its release. On MetaCritic, it holds a score of 90/100 based on 35 reviews, categorized by the site as "universal acclaim". It is the highest-rated Jak and Daxter title on the site, and at the time of its release was the second highest-rated title developed by Naughty Dog after 1998's Crash Bandicoot: Warped.
IGN's David Zdyrko deemed it a "true 3D platform/adventure masterpiece", while the reviewer for Game Revolution felt the game "set a new benchmark" due to its "huge environments and gaming freedom". Eurogamer's Tom Bramwell considered it to be the "definitive article" to 3D collect-a-thon platformers due to its "powerful" usage of the genre's tropes, and believed it was "pinnacle of platform gaming as it stands". GameSpot's Shane Satterfield considered Jak and Daxter to be one of the PlayStation 2's best platformers and compared it favorably to Ubisoft's Rayman 2: The Great Escape.
In a retrospective review, Eurogamer's John Walker felt Jak and Daxter wasn't as good as its fellow PlayStation platformer Ratchet & Clank, but felt it was still "utterly great" due to its varied, interconnected locations and freedom of gameplay. Walker, however, found faults within the game's camera and lackluster controls mapping options.[1]