5 Hard PlayStation 2 Games Nobody Could Beat As A Kid
The PlayStation 2 is, in the eyes of many, the greatest video game console of all time, and across its many years in the Sun, there have been some spectacular titles. Of those, many were actually genuinely quite hard to complete, particularly if you were still a child and hadn't developed all the motor skills you might need.
In particular, there were some sleeper titles that appear perfectly normal at first glance, but which really sneak up on players and become super difficult for one reason or another. Of those, we have rounded up five of the best games that many kids simply wouldn't have seen out to the end of proceedings.
Jak II
Jak II isn't an incredibly hard game, but it is much more difficult than the first, and there are certain moments where the spike goes far beyond anything a ten-year-old might be expecting. In fairness, this was a step the developer took after complaints that the first game was too easy, but for youngsters coming into the franchise who didn't have those complaints, it must have been a bit of a culture shock. Jak was considerably weaker, and checkpoints were few and far between, meaning this one set you up for a lot of frustrating restarts.
Star Wars: Bounty Hunter
Star Wars games are always bound to reel in their fair share of the youth, and Bounty Hunter was no exception. What they weren't expecting was just how punishing it could be before the end. Later levels have so many enemies that, if you get hit once or twice, you'll quickly be locked into a series of hits that entirely drain Fett's health bar. Also, having to restart the level from the start every time you lose your life feels extra harsh in an otherwise good game. A few checkpoints would have made a huge difference.
Rayman Revolution
Rayman Revolution (the PlayStation 2 version of Rayman 2) isn't really a difficult game at its core, but navigating its early 2000s foibles as a kid was a nightmare. The camera was difficult to rein in, there were A LOT more enemies than little me was expecting, and checkpoints weren't particularly forgiving. Rayman 2 is undoubtedly one of the best games of the era in the genre, but there's every chance that many kids simply gave up before getting to the end.
Sonic Heroes
Most Sonic games have difficult moments that test your reaction times and skills, but none pulled the rug out from a generation of kids quite like Sonic Heroes. The game starts off innocuously enough, but it quickly becomes apparent that the game is filled with moments that are designed to undermine your expectations to kill you off. As a child, you suddenly went from cruising through quite happily to dying over and over again, and I'm certain that would have been enough to stop most finishing.
Crash Twinsanity
Crash Twinsanity is one of those games nobody finished, largely because the developers didn't get it into a state where it felt rewarding to do so. While all the hallmarks of classic Crash are there, the game's physics are really tough to deal with, precision jumping is near-enough impossible, and checkpoints send you so far back that it feels like you're playing the whole game again every time you die.