Ratchet and Clank is a series most notable for its dry wit, friendly atmosphere, inventive weapons, and just a dash of great platforming. Now strip all of that out and throw Clank to the wayside. The product would feel a lot like Ratchet: Deadlocked.

It's hard to describe just how disappointed I was with Ratchet: Deadlocked. We?re in the middle of an age loaded with mascot platformers delving into generic rage for no apparent reason: Jak, Prince of Persia, Shadow the Hedgehog, and now?Ratchet. The game starts off with a movement tutorial sequence ripped from Halo, a sign of things to come. You?re soon tossed into the middle of a deathmatch sponsored by the Vox Corporation (a really thinly veiled parody of Fox) and surrounded by corruption, poor commentating, and cursing sprinkled throughout?

I don't think Deadlocked would be as disappointing if it weren't for the cut-down weapon selection. Even though the series was getting bonkers in its arsenals with specialty weapons for each scenario, it was part of the charm. In Deadlocked, you have a handful of weapons that can do multiple things with the help of mods. Alpha mods are a rpg element that awards you a point in a certain stat for guns, of which you can apply that one point to any gun freely. Omega mods give you the ability to change an additional charge to your weapons at will, such as electric or brainwashing capabilities. This leads to balancing problems, however, has certain combos (such as Dual Vipers and shock) break the game. When you can take out fifteen enemies with a single shot from the weakest weapon, something is wrong.

Level design is another shortcoming of Deadlocked, with a shunning of the somewhat open levels that marked the series. Now, you?re presented with highly linear stages that quickly become repetitive. Gameplay winds down to a mixture of running to an objective, having your robot assistants take care of said objective, and shooting eighteen and a half million enemies that pop out of nowhere. Platforming is kept to a minimum as well, with only a couple of places outside of the recurring battle arena where you'll have to jump around.

Gameplay aside, the lack of any of the warm, dry humor of the series really hurts. In its place is something entirely different. Vox, the man behind it all, curses frequently with copious bleeps throughout. Announcers blather on about your performance with very few soundbytes that boil down to ?KILL HIM? and ?WAR IS HELL? in the most genial and fake tone available. Clank, the series favorite, sits this one out. Instead of really helping, he tells you what you already know in between sections of him flirting with a robot girl on the internet.

In its credit, Deadlocked carries some decent shooter elements with the baggage it drags in. Multiplayer modes such as CTF and Deathmatch are standard, and appreciated. Vehicles similar to those in Halo and Unreal Tournament turn up both in the single and multi player modes, and serve as a rare change of pace. As well, boss battles are much improved in Deadlocked, no longer the exercise in running around in circles and shooting that prior games fixated upon.

Ratchet: Deadlocked is one of the most disappointing games I've played all year. I remember when Ratchet and Clank was a friendly platform shooter that offered great action on its own terms. Then, by some odd token, it pulled a Jak II and metamorphosed into its current form'soulless gun porn.