Nostalgia is a hell of a drug.

I think the platforming zeitgeist has shifted to 2D.

• Metroid Dread, Hollow Knight, Mario Wonder, Shovel Knight.

But 3D platforming is still alive as a genre.

• Mario Odyssey, Sonic Frontiers, Yooka-Laylee.

And the remake scene for 3D is popping off right now.

• Crash, Spyro, Ratchet, Mario 3D All Stars, Metroid Prime Remastered.

Specifically for the subgenre of 3D third-person platform-shooters, check out Splatoon 3. For 3D first-person open-world platform-shooters, Metroid Prime 4 is in development.

But for "3D open world third-person platform-shooter," that genre is essentially Ratchet & Clank. But these days I think Insomniac is busy with Spider-Man. You can maybe count Jak in there, but Naughty Dog hasn't touched that franchise in ages.

I think the take away is that each franchise has it's own niche. What you've described is so specific that you're really just talking about Ratchet. Open your requirements a bit more, and you'll find plenty of great, new platforming experiences.

Also, if you think there's untapped potential, I encourage you to make something! Unity is actually pretty easy to use.

Thing better when I was a teen that now that im adult. It also works for music and basically everything.

Can't comment on the 3rd person shooter/3d platformer hybrids, but games like Mario Odyssey are fantastic modern 3d platformers. Meanwhile I've recently replayed some 3d platformers from the n64-gamecube eras and found they didn't hold up as well as I remembered.

Can you give us better lists of games that fall into both your good and bad categories?

My hot-take answer was going to be that it's all nostalgia and there haven't really been any good ones (at least that I ever was aware of). Given your edit on nostalgia, maybe it's not nostalgia for an individual game or games, but rather a a time and a style?

You've answered your own question. You like 3rd-person shooter platformers, a genre which isn't as prevalent as it was in the 6th generation of consoles. Not as many games are coming out that fit your tastes. You're also nostalgic, which is perfectly fine, but you have to take off the goggles sometimes. I like Mario Sunshine better than a lot of modern 3D platformers, because I've been playing it for years and it was a big part of my childhood. But just because I love revisiting that game more than playing a new game sometimes, that doesn't mean modern games aren't reiterating and improving upon the things that made it great. A Hat in Time, Psychonauts 2, The Cosmic Shake, Spark the Electric Jester, Orbo's Odyssey, SEUM, Frogun, New Super Lucky's Tale, Supraland, Crash 4. So many great 3D platformers in recent years, with a ton of improvements to quality of life and control compared to where we were back in the day, as well as many new concepts.

Also, claiming that PS2 platformers as a whole look better than modern platformers as a whole is ridiculous, and you're also giving no examples of either case.

You're remembering the cream of that era and comparing it to all of the current area. It's natural, but misleading.

Ratchet and Clank had at least three good games on the PS3, and Rift Apart definitely counts as a modern game. I wish Insomniac (and other game devs) woul devote more resources to making hybrid shooter/platformers, but the devs who made those great PS2 games are being replaced by newer devs who want to make different things. Also publishers want to cash in on big money-making trends like live service games.

A Hat In Time is great.

As much as you deny it, you are just experiencing Nostalgia. I was an N64 and GameCube kid and never really had much to do with PlayStation. I played Ratchet and Clank and Jak and Daxter well into the PS4 days and was underwhelmed with both.

Every now and then I think about this and I keep going back to Yooka Laylee. In theory that game should be everything people want from a 3D collect-a-thon platformer, but something (at least for me) felt wrong. I think the game is too big. Like, the developers in this modern era had all this space to go, "I can fit everything," whereas in the past on there were much harder limits. Sometimes a limit forces creative solutions that feel better. Kinda the same idea of a huge open world with nothing in it vs a small map filled with things to discover.

Can't really work with this without examples. I don't think 3D platformer quality went down but I also think it's always been all over the place.

Like Hat in Time wasn't that long ago.

let's see...got a picture of "3D platformers in past 10 years"

https://libreddit.kylrth.com/img/ad57oxhe2pfa1.png

I'm looking at it and honestly I need examples as to where you think Ps2 beat out this list so blatantly that there's a clear issue.

Does stuff like Uncharted/Tomb Raider count? I mean those were solid games that are basically platformer shooters?

What modern 3D platformers?

There is a lot of games that are like that that are very high quality. Splatoon 2 and 3 have pretty extensive single players that focus massively around platforming and shooting, plus online multiplayer. Mario Odyssey is an obvious one, Mario 3D world/Bowsers fury. A hat in time. Sonic frontiers. Yooka-laylee has two games. Psychonauts 2. Super Lucky's tale. There's remakes like Spyro reignited and crash insane trilogy. Ratchet & clank rift apart. It takes two. Bomb rush cyberpunk. Hell, I know it's not quite the same genre but I would count Fall guys.
I know that 3D platformers are nowhere near as commonly developed, especially by big companies, but let's not act like there's a drought of good quality games to play that are as good if not better than the PS2 platformers...

Would you consider Jet Set Radio a platformer? If so then Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is really, really good (and it has a kickass soundtrack like the JSR series did). Other than that, I haven't really spent a lot of time playing platformers. At the very least there have been some good remasters like the Spyro Reignited trilogy and Crash Bandicoot remaster.

I think I've heard some of the recent Sonic games have been good, though I don't really play Sonic stuff so I can't verify that myself.

I've heard Super Mario Wonder is really good, but that's not really 3d (though iirc there are some 3d wonder flower sections).

Warframe might help scratch the 3d platformer itch, it's got a decent amount of platforming tiles, especially on Jupiter (the maps are proceedurally generated from a tile set, the Jupiter tiles have a lot of verticality); though platforming isn't by any means a focus.

If you're okay with foregoing 3rd person view, you might give Mirror's Edge a try. It's a 1st-person parkour/freerunning game.

If you like the collect-a-thon aspect, check out the Lego games, especially stuff like Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones, etc. those are very much collect-a-thons and tend to have platforming elements to them. They're a lot of fun.

Otherwise... Maybe platformers just need a revival like the boomer-shooters got. From what I've heard, Yooka-Laylee kinda tried, but it ended up being nostalgia-bait and not too great standing by itself.

is microwave dinner good

I loved the 3D platformers from back then, including the ones based on whatever movie was out at the time

I know the feeling of "these games should exist" and then the disapointment of them just not existing.

I remember back in the super smash bros brawls days wondering why there were no good smash clones and nowadays we have several, so don't lose hope. The day of the PS2 style platformer renaissance may yet come!

Speaking on PS2 though have you ever heard of/played Alien Echo? Its more of a hack and slash than a platformer but it does have shooting and its a lot of fun. Cheap too, I got my copy at a local store for $10.

I really enjoyed MDK/MDK2 as a kid. I don’t know any modern platformers to comment on quality now vs then.

Nitrorad covers games old and new in this genre, but the shooter hybrid 3d platformer is short of a niche inside a niche. I think 3d platformer are having a bit of a resurgence at the moment, but I don't think it's trickled down to that subgenre. I will shout out pseudoregalia I almost didn't give it a chance with the furry bait protagonist but the platforming is so satisfying. I hope the dev makes some sort of sequel

I thought Tinykin from last year was really good. A bit short, and certainly not the hardest game on earth, but still fun.

I've been playing Journey To The Savage Planet lately, and while the gunplay is not awesome, and the unlocks involve collecting materials, the "rare" materials for each enemy are behind a boss or mini-boss, and it's effectively a 3D metroidvania. There's enough hard platforming that I take more fall damage than enemy damage (or at least close), even in the boss fight I'm currently stuck on.