After reaching new lows with Jak 2, I was expecting very little from Jak 3. So to my surprise, the game is a fairly solid romp despite some flaws that hold it back from being a true favourite.

The guns have been tightened up significantly thanks to the new mods, which lets them design platforming challenges around the fact you can actually deal with enemies while jumping. The jetboard is just as fun as it was in Jak 2, and the leapers taking the mechanics from the flut flut in the first game was a welcome surprise.
Spargus City is a smaller, better designed hub than Haven City. Never taking more than a minute or so to get from point A to point B. And on top of that, the developers placed mission start points where the missions actually take place most of the time.
I wish the game had a heavier emphasis on platforming, but the sections it does have are solid. The minigames are a bit of a mixed bag but I never hated dealing with any of them like I hated sections of Jak 2. And the open world wasteland isn't my favourite part of the game, but it's a fun enough diversion to drive around in.

The Jak series has had an identity crisis and a half with none of the games really sharing an exact ideology in spite of sharing the same core platforming moveset. However I'm glad the trilogy ended off with a good game instead of another Renegade.

Jak 3 could easily be my favourite 3D platformer ever if it kept the quality of its first few hours through its entire runtime.

The game starts with a bang: Jak and Daxter are exiled to the desert wasteland, and find themselves in the forgotten city of Spargus, where they have to prove their worth to the citizens while unraveling the mystery of an impending apocalypse. It's deliciously intriguing, and I love the early game missions where you venture across the wasteland. Jak 3 improves just about every aspect of gameplay from Jak 2, most notably having much better checkpoints and gradually increasing Jak's health pool throughout the game. Jak also gets way more guns this time around, which are pretty fun to play around with, but some are way more powerful and make others just about obsolete. The desert vehicles are a cool addition that give the game a sort of Mad Max vibe, but a lot of them handle like crap so only a few are really viable for missions. Like Jak 2, it's a mixed bag, but Jak 3 has the edge in consistency. The biggest improvement is eliminating the brutal difficulty spikes.

But sadly Jak 3's development was rushed to get it out the door for the holiday period, and it's evident in how front-loaded it is. About halfway through the game you can see where the developers started running out of time. The maps and missions get more repetitive and in some cases are obvious reskins of Jak 2. The Light Jak powers are a cool idea but they didn't get the time to be fleshed out properly; they only have a use where they're needed to progress. The story, which starts off strong, also goes off the rails.

I give Jak 3 a high rating because I still love it in spite of all of these issues. It at least gives Jak and Daxter the conclusion they deserve, while still leaving the door open for future games. It's more than can be said for some other games in this genre.