Last year’s Ratchet and Clank Future left me pleasantly surprised. It was the first game of the series I had ever played, and when it ended all I wanted was more: more over the top weapons, more brightly colored seamless worlds presented at an impeccable frame rate, more intelligent platforming puzzles, and at least one more thinly veiled joke about the male anatomy. I was also convinced that Insomniac’s other big title about fascist big-toothed aliens would prevent me from getting the sequel I wanted until 2009. It turns out that I was right; Quest for Booty is not the sequel I wanted. This budget-priced cash-in falls short of Tools of Destruction in almost every way; instead of more of everything, it is less, and my complaints have nothing to do with it only being four hours long.

Quest for Booty picks up right after the last game, with Ratchet on the search for the Zoni-napped Clank. This leads him right back to the pirates from the climax of Tools, fighting a hopeless battle made tolerable only by his ridiculous weapons. Ratchet starts the game with about half of the total weapons from before, all of which are already leveled up more than half way. It should come as no surprise that they are all quickly taken away, but in a game that is as much about leveling up hardware as it is anything else, it is a significant loss. I can best describe it as a reverse strip tease. Imagine walking into your local gentlemen’s club to find the dancers start out bare-assed naked (but still gorgeous) and put on more clothes as the evening moves along, eventually sporting a full length trench coat, turtle neck and sunglasses. Even when they get back to the barest of necessities, the effect is lost because you have already seen all there is to see. Quest for Booty starts out mooning the player with all but one gun, and it’s not a bad sight, but it then hides the goods only to give them back later without adding anything extra to make up for the wait.

Tools of Destruction excelled in its presentation. Every level was wonderful to look at on top of being interesting to play through. There was good variety, but it was still consistent with its own established look. Quest for Booty is by no means an ugly game, but when there are only three different environments, one of which is recycled from the last game, things get stale quickly. There are also technical issues that I do not remember seeing in the prequel, namely a finicky frame rate. Perhaps my age is catching up to me, or I am looking through the haze of ten months of other games, but Quest for Booty is just not as smooth as Tools was. Turning the camera quickly can cause stuttering, and the same is true for dealing with multiple exploding robot pirates; it’s not a deal breaker, but even the first step backwards from perfection is a long and almost unforgivable one.

A stable frame rate was not the only casualty, either. The color choices are not as vibrant; the way everything fades to green in the presence of the undead simply does not look good. The voice acting and facial animations of the characters are also more than little shy of what they were. Ratchet in particular was remarkably expressive in Tools, and that is entirely absent now. Clank’s kidnapping is a loss for both Ratchet and the player; Talwyn is simply not a very interesting character and there is no interaction with her that has any affect on gameplay.

Every complaint that I have boils down to this: Quest for Booty is not nearly as good as Tools of Destruction. This has nothing to do with the price or the amount of time it takes to finish; short games can be a blessing as long as they are good. This game would have been a great tease of what was to come if it has done at least one thing new. Even just being equal to its predecessor would have made me happy. Instead, it misses the mark in nearly every area. Quest for Booty is like a bad lap dance in a smelly strip joint: it didn’t cost a whole lot, but that certainly doesn’t mean it was worth it.