This is it. The final Grand Prix awaits. If we win, we’ll take home the entire championship. The competition is fierce, but so are we. Let’s break some faces!

We’re the champions now! We did it! The whole competition is ours! Surely, we’ll just get the antidote and go home, right!?

Right!?

The final, Yellow Eco Cup, awaits. But before we can compete in the Grand Prix, we must first qualify for it.

What crosses my mind once again as we head into this final section of the game is just the sheer variety of activities. Between Circuit Races, Turbo Dashes, Artifact Races, and Freeze Rallies, we were constantly switching up gameplay styles.

The core gameplay never changes, but that core enables a robust and varied list of activities to keep us engaged. Rarely are we even capable of getting bored of a specific type of event because rarely are we partaking in any one event type multiple times in a row.

That is probably one of the greatest strengths of Jak X. I can say that it’s been a ton of fun to stream.

It’s the final cup, and the competition has finally decided to step up their game. It’s up to us to rise to the challenge.

And avoid any and all sewer levels!

At the rate we’re going, we should be finished next week. I have no idea what we’ll do after that, but we’ll think of something.

GT Blitz doesn’t seem all that bothered by the fact his dad was killed by Mizo’s men. And yet, he seems increasingly bothered by our heroes’ continued efforts to win the whole racing season.

Eh, there’s probably nothing there. It’s not like he’s Mizo or anything.

Since I’d rather not whine about sewer levels again, I’ll instead focus on the plot, such as it is. As far as Jak and Daxter plots go, it’s a strange one. We’ve started with Jak and company needed to race Mizo’s goons so that they can win the antidote, and that status quo has mostly been maintained for all this time.

There have been mentions of political maneuvering and gang activity that permeate the background of the story. (Mizo and Krew have a bet over control of all crime in both cities.) However, by and large, our cast has no interest and no stake in all of that beyond their immediate need for an antidote to the poison. If someone handed them all a cure right now, they would drop out of the race and that would be the end of the story.

And that’s honestly probably the big mistake Jak X makes with its story. If I could ask for anything, it would be a more connective issue between our heroes and the underlying machinations of the plot. I’d like more reason for us to be here than “Krew poisoned us”, something that helps the audience get emotionally invested beyond an excuse to race.

That never really happens here, and that’s odd coming from Naughty Dog.

This is it, baby! We’re on the third Grand Pri… Wait. Another goddamn sewer track!? Can we not!? Can we please not!?

*sigh* Figures.

At least once we’re out of the sewers, the last two tracks we need to race on are a lot more gentle on us.

And after that, we have a novel race where we have to win despite our weapons being jammed and useless for the entire race. We just need to focus purely on driving. Thankfully, on the snowy track it takes place on, the driving feels smooth like butter.

When Jak X plays well, it plays extremely well.

We’re nearly ready for the Blue Eco Cup Grand Prix, but we must get more medals and complete a few qualifiers first. Let’s scorch the pavement and leave our opponents in the dust.

There’s nothing quite like figuring out exactly what about a game drives one crazy, and this episode was the one that finally gave me clarity on that.

I don’t understand why someone would want to create terrain that both causes drift and is filled with so many sharp turns and twists that driving through it is a complete nightmare, but that is a choice that the team at Naughty Dog made when building these sewer-themed tracks.

It has the unfortunate side effect of leaning into all of the worst aspects of Jak X’s systems, shown by the Freeze Rally we participate in. Because vehicles are floaty and fragile, we’re getting destroyed even when there are no other racers on track to fight us, swerving uncontrollably into walls and awkward angles.

And unfortunately for us, there’s yet another that we’ll need to deal with.

With two Cups under our belt, it looks like it’s time for the finer details to make themselves known.

Of course, it could never be anything as simple as a racing championship. Now we know that between Krew and Mizo, the winner shall have full rights to all organized crime in both Haven and Kras City.

I’m particularly fond of the exchange between Ashlin and Rayn after this reveal. The fact that Rayn is wondering whether or not Mizo will agree to hand over his empire is strong foreshadowing, and I like how Ashlin states outright that it doesn’t matter to her as long as she gets her antidote. It’s a good way of subtly broadcasting to the audience that something’s not right with this picture.

That said, we still need to race either way, so next time we’re back on the circuit.

The Green Cup Grand Prix is proceeding apace. All we have left to do is close out the competition and stay on top.

Shouldn’t be too difficult.

It’s so odd to see a TV show host lose his cool and ask contestants what they think about possible death threats. I certainly hope that’s not some kind of foreshadowing to indicate he may have ulterior motives.

We’re almost finished with the Green Eco Cup, and once we are we’ll be halfway through the game. I hope Mizo is nervous because we’re ready to win the whole damn thing.

I can’t believe I missed that I still had a qualifier to do. Oh well. Mistakes happen. And assuming we go back for full completion, it’s one fewer race than we’ll need to complete later.

As far as the story is concerned, we still haven’t made any meaningful advancements. We still don’t know why Mizo is still trying to stop us. Thankfully, we’ll start to get some answers next time!

With each successful race, the competition only grows in skill. Fortunately, so do we! Right?

Right!?

Looking back on the tape, while theirs a floatiness to the vehicles in the game, a lot of what happened appears to actually come down to operator error. I don’t remember hitting the breaks to power slide as often as I did, but the footage doesn’t lie. And that might be a large part of my problem. Fortunately, that means it’s something I can work on.

Unfortunately, it means I’m colder towards the game than I realistically should be. We’ll just have to fix that as we keep going.