Well, back in the day when these games were coming out, R&C2, Jak 2, and Sly 2 were all my favourite of their respective trilogies. Over the years, as I replayed them, my opinion on Jak and Sly changed. The first of each is now my favourite. But R&C2 kept it's top spot.
So I was wondering if after replaying these I would also end up thinking R&C1 was the best. I'm only about halfway through R&C2, and haven't got much into the cool aspects I remember such as weapon modding and ship modding and just endlessly repeating it for bolts to get the RYNO and seeing all the secrets and so on.
But so far, it's not quite as good as good as R&C1. The thing that really stands out is that the levels look a bit drab and lifeless in comparison to the first one. Each planet in R&C1 has an immefiate visual impact, a distinct colour palette, lots of movement, and lots of detail. The R&C2 levels look quite flat and plain.
The look of Ratchet too, with the armour suit and helmet, isn't as nice. I remember the final armour you buy completely covers his face, which I never liked. But from the start having his face slightly covered doesn't look good.
Gameplay is great though. Having a normal strafe is wonderful. There's one in the first game, but you need the hoverpack and I could never actually figure out how to do it on the Vita. In R&C2 it does require holding the touchpad but it works and is actually pretty reliable, which is a first in my experience with the touchpad. The space battles are fun, upgrading weapons is a good addition, and the feature where you get free weapons from the first game if you have a save file is still intact.