This tactic worked pretty well for me, although there are times that no matter what you do, you start to think that luck plays more of a role in attaining gold medals than actual skills. This gameplay balancing issue is less of a worry in the open-ended races like the artifact race or the arena-style deathmatch, but a point worth noting nonetheless. There's a ton of pickups and weapons to feast on throughout the game, including essential turbo boosts, health packs, and a vast selection of both rear- and forward-facing attacks. If your cruising away in the lead, you'll need to concentrate on getting those rear-based weapons, which include mines, gun towers, missile stoppers, and smoke screens, whereas the forward-firing stuff includes lock-on missiles, machineguns, and the aforementioned Peace Maker mega-bomb. The more kills you get, the more likely you are to reach that Zen-like state of purple Eco double damage.
Naughty Dog has crafted a good-looking game in Jak X. It supports full widescreen and 480p, and sports some crisp texture work and nice vehicle models. The use of blurring to emphasize the sense of speed when boosting is a nice touch, as well. On the whole, it's a great-looking title. The musical score is fitting, and while it's not to my personal tastes, it does the job quite adequately. But the game shines brightly when the cool cutscenes come into play. There's some funny gags, and some good plot-spinning yarns to be had, and anyone who's a fan of the franchise will get a kick out of seeing familiar faces crop up and get stuck into the action.
