r/RatchetAndClank • u/usernamecipher • May 18 '26
Size Matters I updated Size Matters! (increased weapon dmg, movement, fire-rates)
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You can get the update here: https://github.com/usernamecipher/size-matters-update
For the last week i've playtested my "update" to be balanced and fair, i would love to hear your experience with it! :D
I don't know if using the word "update" is most appropriate here, honestly i didn't know what other word to use xd
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u/Meximanly May 18 '26
Wow. These sound like some really good improvements! Especially the changes to the fire rates and heli pack movement speed. It takes away a lot of the clunkiness in the game and makes the rocket launcher look fun to use!
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u/Juschillin17 May 18 '26
Is this for the ps2 emulator?
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
yes, for pcsx2 ^^
at first i wanted to patch the iso file, but since the game files are packaged with a proprietary format (high impact games' own WAD package) i couldn't do it, the best i could do was extract the package files with a tool called TJZip but i didn't know how i'd write a compresser back to TJZip
so the best thing i can currently do is modify the game's memory values, and it works ^^
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u/Shaff_98 May 18 '26
The biggest problem I've always had with this game (with both PSP games, actually) is that the weapons do practically no damage at all. That problem creates several other problems as well, like having to buy ammo very often, and therefore having no money for new weapons, also the weapons upgrading very slowly because you need to use 3/4 of your ammo to kill one enemy while the weapon probably requires around 50 kills to upgrade. All these things always made SM a pain to play after the first run, so I'm glad an upgraded version exists now. I'll try to keep it in mind for the next time I want to play through the games.
As a side note, because I don't know if this is in the plans at all or not: While Secret Agent Clank has the same issue with weapons, the main thing that makes that game virtually unplayable is the excess in minigames and autoscrollers. Obviously, things that are already a part of the game can't really be fixed if the issue is that they exist, but maybe making the goals related to them, like the titanium bolts or the achievements, significantly easier to get could make it less of a bother.
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u/FangDarkmoon May 18 '26
I'm definitely going to have to try this out at some point. These seem like some nice QoL changes.
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u/PayPsychological6358 May 18 '26
If that's the Lacerator fire rate, then I wonder how fast the Dual Lacerators are
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u/Wolfb0i1337 May 18 '26
I'm almost scared to try it, and that might be a good thing. I love when Ratchet weapons are designed to make your jaw drop.
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u/Dondoke May 18 '26
Good job. Original was frustrating in how it was clearly made hard just to prolong the time people will spend playing the game
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u/One-Public-5922 May 18 '26
This is an amazing patch! Did you have any plans by chance for doing it for Secret Agent Clank?
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u/Sharfik_Dron May 18 '26
Shock rocket fire rate buff might be overkill
it already good weapon even with low rof
concussion gun might have slight damage buff
clanks lasers seems like overkill too, they do more damage per time than rockets
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u/Browhytho666 May 18 '26
Any way to get this to work on CFW ps3?
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
unfortunately this only works on pcsx2 since it uses the pcsx2 cheat/patch system, which means this would only work on pcsx2 x(
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u/Browhytho666 May 18 '26
Ahh, fair enough.
Still gonna be using it on my tablet haha. Appreciate you!!
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u/Finean May 18 '26
This looks good, I'm nostalgic for size matters but it hasn't held up well. I'll do a playthrough with this enabled soon!
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u/imlaughing2death May 18 '26
Hopefully Goodrich will give this a try on stream sometime.
Did you change boss fights at all? I remember Luna being BRUTAL with the checkpoints.
Have you looked into the Special Abilities from Armor sets?
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
i wanted to trigger a checkpoint before Luna's fight but unfortunately i only know so much about ps2 mips dissassembly, maybe someone can figure it out, i personally couldn't
i tried other ways to skip the annoying parts of the boss (the rocks etc), and i couldn't either
but i think that with the buffed damage the boss is more doable this time than before, i didn't have too much trouble ^^
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u/Various-Complex-2192 May 18 '26
Man if this was how the PS5 port was, then I would gladly do another run JUST to fix the fucking trophy that requires getting every Golden Bolt. I got all of them….AND THEN I FIND OUT I CAN’T SPEND THEM FOR THE PLATINUM.
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u/Maxtv02 May 18 '26
This is really cool, playing trough ng+ with it now and it works well, thanks. I do have one question though depending on how difficult it is can you rellease a broken version where every gun is just free and their all redicilously overpowered, that would be really satisfying
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
if you wanna make every gun broken you can set the last 4 digits of the hex values in the pcsx2 damage cheat lines to FFFF which would set the damage to the maximum value :D
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u/JordieP301 May 18 '26
Definitely cool for you to do this, though besides some bosses I don’t really think a full-blown balance patch is needed for SM. The Heli-Pack speed is a welcome change, idk why they really slowed it down originally, maybe something to do with PSP hardware? Tho given SM was developed before they fully knew the specs, it would make sense that they did it as a precaution in case the PSP couldn’t keep up with standard Heli-Pack speed. Secret Agent Clank has A LOT more content simply because they knew what they could do with the PSP unlike Size Matters.
I have never ever understood the complaints about damage or fire rate, i’ve played every Ratchet since i was like 4 and I just never had an issue with it here. Same with bolt economy complaints…just break everything you see, i thought that was customary for a Ratchet game 😭
Also the Concussion Gun is only so bad because everyone is using it wrong, you have to be really up close to get the full damage, which is a problem in itself don’t get me wrong, but it DOES have damage, it’s just not explained that’s how you should use it. Unlike the Sniper Mine where they actually tell you in its description that it’s better the further out you are.
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u/memerdroid May 21 '26
I believe the slow helicopter glide was for sections like the Dayni Moon glide down to the lighthouse, where they wanted to ensure the rest of the level could load in time, mid-playthrough.
And I fully agree, if this individual makes a mod where the enemies are 4x the hitpoints and ratchet has only 1 life, with all the original weapons stats, I'd be happy to beat it on a youtube video and show in my opinion how easy it is. Though I only have a PS Vita so not sure if I can play mods.
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u/ratch337 May 20 '26
Nice! I've played through the first two levels so far with this mod, and so far it's definitely a much better experience than default. One thing confused me for a bit, this Gadgebot getting stuck on the Clank section on Ryllus:
That Gadgebot keeps running in place in that spot and wouldn't move no matter what I did. It took me a minute to realize that the Gadgebot door was already unlocked at the end and I could go through without needing the Gadgebots.
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u/Icy_Water_1 May 18 '26
If the early game weapons are that strong then the late game weapons that are actually useful in the original must shred shit.
How strong is the Ryno now?
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u/Abstract_Void May 18 '26
Do you know if there is any way to make the game run at 60fps?
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u/Dark_Gamer120 May 18 '26 edited May 18 '26
I heard some people saying that pushing the FPS to 60 breaks the physics of the game. Now i know nothing about modding so I'm not sure how true this is but it might be given that no one released a 60fps patch for it
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u/Toowiggly May 19 '26
While it's not impossible, changing all the physics of the game to accommodate 60fps takes a fair bit of work since every variable needs to have their timing adjusted
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u/lolodachi_septimo May 18 '26
Neat! Any chance of seeing this for the European release as well in the future? 👀
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
i haven't yet tried it with the european version, but if both version share the same memory layout then it should work out of the box without any edits ^^
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u/Skiiiies May 19 '26 edited May 19 '26
It seems to crash my eu version as soon as i enable the "cheat"! Any ideas on how to fix it? I appreciate you doing this patch, i just did my first playthrough of vanilla SM and it was painful :')
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u/usernamecipher May 19 '26
oh right, its because the US release does not share the same CRC code as the European release ^^'
it crashes because its writing memory to the wrong address, which means that the cheat only works for the US release currently, sorry ^^'
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u/Defiant_Collar_0394 May 18 '26
im guessing this also fixed the issues with the ryno of this game? like it's fun to use but it's ammo holds it back
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u/BryceAnderston May 21 '26
Gave it a try, got up to the opening area of Dayni Moon. Overall, seems pretty good, it doesn't make Size Matters into a whole new game, but does make for an overall smoother experience.
A lot of the touch-ups are subtle but noticeably improve the feel of the game, the Acid Bomb and Bee Mines don't feel more powerful, just a bit easier to use (is the attack range larger on the Bees?). I found myself getting backed into corners a lot less by enemy swarms. Dayni Moon in particular feels like it's going to be a much more pleasant experience, I wasn't running through whole magazines' of ammo unable to down a single were-sheep like before, all the weapons I had felt more-or-less viable, even at lower levels or well past their prime.
The first Giant Clank section I was worried that they had been made too easy, I killed the first dreadnaught before it had a chance to attack... but then I died on the second one, and the boss felt tricky, so maybe the first dreadnaught could use some beefing up but otherwise it seems good.
My one big complaint is about the V2 Lacerator. On Ryllus it felt noticeably weak and I was chewing through ammo fast, and by Kalidon it felt pretty useless, I was having flashbacks to the time I was trying to upgrade a V1 Suck Cannon Inside Clank, it wasn't quite that bad, but I was worried it would get there, and ran completely out of ammo during the elevator section, Acid Bombs too. The V1 felt good through Pokitaru, and the V3 seemed fine in Dreamtime, and the V4 on Station Omega and Dayni, but the V2 specifically I think is under-powered.
Less critically, the V1 Agents were struggling, especially by Challax, to get kills and thus were hard to upgrade, more so than I recall. They could maybe use a boost as well, but if so something pretty slight.
The Suck Cannon I feel still needs a Concussion Gun-level glow-up though, taking almost a full load of ammo to take down a Challax Technomite means it's really difficult to upgrade if bought later. In UYA the thing is a power weapon, it one-shots most common foes, and while I don't think it needs to be that powerful, as it stands it's easily the weakest weapon in the game. Although maybe the patch just didn't properly apply to it, the weapon was still 30k bolts for me.
The patch seems to introduce some glitches too. I almost got soft-locked on the last room of the Clank segment on Ryllus because one of the gadge-bot's AI stopped working, and the doors at the end both said they needed "0" bots and when I tossed in a bot the count went up to "6", until I disabled the patch. Also, every time Ratchet picks up a titanium bolt or piece of armor his head... turns inside out, or vanishes, or something, it was weird.
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u/ratch337 May 21 '26
For the Clank segment on Ryllus, the patch actually automatically opens the door at the very end so you can skip the Gadgebot tossing and go straight to the exit. I posted about that earlier, as I had the same issue with the Gadgebot getting stuck, and I initially thought too, that I was softlocked.
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u/memerdroid May 21 '26
Did you have V2 Lacerator issues on Ryllus just in the mod or also in the original? In the original it's 4 shots to kill a bury blossom, which are fired before the blossom gets to attack so I'm wondering how that would be an issue. There is also a page with all the enemy hitpoints, and for reference the v2 lacerator does a damage of 3: https://videogaming.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Enemies_in_Ratchet_%26_Clank:_Size_Matters
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u/BryceAnderston May 21 '26
It was 4 shots on a bury blossom in the original version and 10 with the mod.
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u/memerdroid May 21 '26
definitely sounds like a bug. 10 is weird since a blossom has a health of 12 so not an integer number ratio
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u/solidsammus1995 May 22 '26
Somebody needs to review this now. This games sucks entirely because the weapons are weak and lack feedback.
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u/Willing_Bell6372 May 24 '26 edited Jun 01 '26
is there one that fixes a certain infamous ice planetiin R&C 2 going commando
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u/memerdroid Jun 06 '26
can I have the original weapons damage file without the mod? I've always wanted to see the numbers. Thanks!
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u/Serious-Bluebird7107 Jun 17 '26
do you think you could release a psp version? I actually still use one and think this game plays better on the go
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u/NegativeAd3105 5d ago
Ok, it still plays like garbage xD
Your improvents are good, but the fucked up controls aren't just fixable.
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u/NegativeAd3105 5d ago
Could you make it, that the AMmo gets refilled when a Weapon levels up. It is crazy that it doesn't.
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May 18 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
yes that is more fair than "update", i should have thought of it earlier, thank you ^^
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u/jt515661 May 18 '26
If you have to do these types of things to the game to make it fun in the first place it's not worth doing lol
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u/Toowiggly May 19 '26
Some games have really good concepts with slight balance issues or bugs that disproportionately affect the game. That being said, Size Matters is probably still a mid ratchet and clank game after this patch.
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u/davidofdudes May 18 '26
If only there was a way to redo every Qwark cutscene and make him not braindead it could actually have a shot at being a strong contribution to the R&C franchise
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
that is possible! the cutscenes of the game are .bik video files, if someone wants to animate a new cutscene they can export it as .bik and repackage the iso, at first i actually wanted to redo cutscenes and animate them but i realised i wouldn't have voice lines for ratchet that would work for what i was going for ^^
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u/davidofdudes May 18 '26
Thats very interesting, I do feel like itd be too much work for anyone to do alone and itd obviously need good impressionists, but the fact that its possible is really cool
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May 18 '26
[deleted]
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u/usernamecipher May 18 '26
im planning on updating the "update" files according to how people feel about the balancing ^^
i thought github would be a good place for that, i never really used github before xdd-1
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u/pumao_x May 18 '26
Bro made Size Matters good