Where Have All The Platformers Gone?

Quickly glancing over the release lists of the Xbox 360 and the PS3 reveals something rather interesting, a disturbing lack of cutesy platformer type characters. Tak, Psychonauts, Sly Cooper, Blinx, Ty, Scaler, Rayman, Crash, Spyro, Jack, Ratchet… they’re all missing in action. The list of Xbox 360 platformers is anemic at best with, Sonic and Kameo the only real standouts. Stop snickering in the back, the PS3 doesn’t fare much better with only two platformers in the works, the aforementioned Sonic, and a mysterious Ratchet and Clank project). So what’s going on, are platfromers just not cool anymore?

Not cool anymore? That’s a good question. Characters like Jak and Ratchet have undergone pretty extreme makeovers in the course of their short lives, and it seems the form of the future platformer is likely to come more in the shape of the Prince (of Persia) or Altair (the Assassin) or Lara (of the Crofts’). Its seems as though in this day and age developers are taking the idea that gamers have grown up just a little too far, just because love Solid Snake and Master Chief doesn’t mean we don’t want to visit the worlds of Crash and Blinx anymore…well, maybe Crash can keep his world.

Developers it would appear, are all too willing and excited about blowing us away with their high impact physics, seat of your pants action and sweaty, muscular men with guns, so much so that they’re forgetting that an enchanting fantasy, a charming cartoon world, and a lovable character still holds appeal. What do you guys think, would you welcome the return of Sly, Blinx, Jak and co. or do you prefer the current trend towards rugged space marines and buxom babes? As always, we’d love to hear in the comments section.

Quickly glancing over the release lists of the Xbox 360 and the PS3 reveals something rather interesting, a disturbing lack of cutesy platformer type characters. Tak, Psychonauts, Sly Cooper, Blinx, Ty, Scaler, Rayman, Crash, Spyro, Jack, Ratchet… they’re all missing in action. The list of Xbox 360 platformers is anemic at best with, Sonic and Kameo the only real standouts. Stop snickering in the back, the PS3 doesn’t fare much better with only two platformers in the works, the aforementioned Sonic, and a mysterious Ratchet and Clank project). So what’s going on, are platfromers just not cool anymore?

Not cool anymore? That’s a good question. Characters like Jak and Ratchet have undergone pretty extreme makeovers in the course of their short lives, and it seems the form of the future platformer is likely to come more in the shape of the Prince (of Persia) or Altair (the Assassin) or Lara (of the Crofts’). Its seems as though in this day and age developers are taking the idea that gamers have grown up just a little too far, just because love Solid Snake and Master Chief doesn’t mean we don’t want to visit the worlds of Crash and Blinx anymore…well, maybe Crash can keep his world.

Developers it would appear, are all too willing and excited about blowing us away with their high impact physics, seat of your pants action and sweaty, muscular men with guns, so much so that they’re forgetting that an enchanting fantasy, a charming cartoon world, and a lovable character still holds appeal. What do you guys think, would you welcome the return of Sly, Blinx, Jak and co. or do you prefer the current trend towards rugged space marines and buxom babes? As always, we’d love to hear in the comments section.