As someone who adored Ratchet & Clank since I was little, seeing Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart announced for PS5 was one of the main reasons I wanted to get a PS5 before the end of 2021. In my review of the PS4 remake, it is no secret that I was concerned for the future of the series, and concerned for large sections of Rift Apart when it launched based upon the issues I had with the remake. That being said, upon playing Rift Apart, all those concerns vanished. With that, my childhood love for Ratchet & Clank came back after all these years. Here is what I thought of Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart.
Story & Cut-Scenes –
In Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, Dr. Nefarious has stolen the Dimensionator, a device built by Clank as a gift for Ratchet to allow him to visit other Lombaxes. Through stealing the device, Nefarious is able to transfer himself to a universe where he has become emperor, separating Ratchet and Clank from each other as a result. As the story progresses, other dimension counter-parts of characters come into play. Such as Ratchet’s counter-part, Rivet. Clank’s counter-part, Kit, and even Dr. Nefarious’ counter-part, Emperor Nefarious. Throughout the adventure, the stakes higher. Ratchet, Rivet, Clank, and Kit overcome personal obstacles and join forces with a selection of other characters to try and stop Emperor Nefarious from fully controlling all the dimensions.
The story is nothing to bring tears to the eyes, but for Ratchet & Clank, it is one of the best yet. Compelling characters with an interesting plot-line creates a universe and concept that grips the player by the shoulders and pulls them into what Insomniac have fully fleshed out. This is in stark contrast to the story of the PS4 remake, in which nothing made sense due to choppy movie tie-in scenes being thrown around. This is along with the cut-scenes and conversational moments between characters being as lifeless as a cemetery. That being said, these issues are fully addressed and fixed in Rift Apart.
Characters –
In reference to my review of the Ratchet & Clank remake on PS4, it should be known how much I value character depth in a Ratchet & Clank game. My biggest flaw with the remake was the lack of animation or memorability of the characters. They were lifeless husks that had no believability when it came to trying to convince the player that they were actually interacting with each other in a meaningful way that felt earned.
I was very concerned that this would be the case in Rift Apart. Luckily, I was incredibly wrong. Characters are fully animated, with completely developed emotions and expressions. Despite me still wishing Ratchet could return to his egotistical, rash personality of the old days, I was able to bare his soft and nerdy persona more so in this game due to the development of the characters around him playing into his change in personality.
Characters like Rivet and Kit in particular provide great moments in contrast to Ratchet and Clank. I think pairing Kit with Ratchet and Clank with Rivet for the first portion of the game also created many memorable moments and bred a lot of situations in which character composition and development was ripe for the picking. There are plenty of new characters, such as Pierre, Gary, Emperor Nefarious and of course, Kit and Rivet. All of these characters are fully realised and earn their place in the world of Ratchet & Clank, especially Rivet and Kit, once again, they are brilliant.
Mental Health –
Many journalists have written on the tones of mental health in Rift Apart already, so I’ll just briefly go over the tonal backgrounds of it in the game. Throughout the characters, almost all of them have their own insecurities and mental battles. Though not fully frontal at times, they are always reminded as being present within the characters’ minds.
For example, Ratchet has a fear of meeting other Lombaxes, as he shows signs of insecurity and imposter syndrome. He feels he has not lived up to their intellectual and almost mythological past. Rivet struggles with loneliness and forgiveness, as she spent most of her life alone, fearing to trust others. All the while struggling to forgive Kit for what she had done to her arm. Kit is probably the most prevalent mental health advocate story in the game though. Her story is one of isolation, self-hatred and self-distrust. She was born as Warbot, and as a result, was programmed to have a bad side that ruthlessly attacks all in her path. Despite this, she learns to accept that side of her that she cannot change, and build relationships with those she loves rather than isolating herself out of fear for what she could do to them.
Even the villains such as Emperor Nefarious even has subtle mental health challenges, though not really explored much, there was one line that I related to a lot. Emperor Nefarious had suddenly won, he had conquered everything and yet he still had only realised that his life had to go on as normal. Emperor Nefarious says ‘why don’t I feel any different?’, in response to his assumed resounding victory. Obviously I have never achieved any giant success, but I can relate to the feeling of achieving something and then feeling empty afterwards once that instant moment of gratification has passed.
Mental health isn’t front and centre in Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, but it does play a role in almost all of the main characters. Even if only subtle, the advocation of mental health and representation of some internal struggles that those of us go through, through these characters, is something that I think will allow many to identify with and should have further representation in future games. Kudos to Insomniac for including so many relatable internal struggles within their characters in this game.
General Game-Play –
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart has the best game-play of any Ratchet & Clank game to date. Usually games in the series are rated upon their gun-play and satisfaction that stems from that. In this game, the DualSense allows the gun-play to take front and centre, but along with that, there is also another inclusion that I think helps freshen up the game-play.
The freshener within this game is the use of alternate lines of game-play. This has been used in quite a few big Sony games as of late. In particular, The Last of Us II utilises it to full effect through the branching paths that Ellie and Abby take you on. The same technique is used here through Rivet and Ratchet.
One complaint with the branched paths, despite it doing a great job at keeping the game fresh, is that Rivet never really feels like a different character in terms of game-play. Generally, she feels like a re-skin of Ratchet, this is due to them sharing the same move-sets, weaponry, and bolt balances. I think if Rivet were to have some weapons and moves exclusive to herself, that would allow the branched paths approach to reach its full potential. It would also allow Rivet to truly feel like her own full character, completely separated from Ratchet.
Speaking of re-skins. There is also an element of character customisation that has made its way into the game. You can collect a selection of armour for both Ratchet & Rivet, these are cosmetic changes to their design, but also play a beneficiary function on your adventure. For example, some suits of armour offer better bolt yield, or better resistance to certain types of enemies. If I am honest though, I never really cared much for the armour as I preferred to look at Ratchet & Rivet’s default designs.
Collectables are present in the game as usual through the form of Golden Bolts, which offer cheat-like options in the options menus, such as alternative designs for Wrenches, or other early 2000s elements such as Big-Head Mode. Other than that, they really play no other role outside of trying to obtain all the trophies though.
A major complaint that I do have with the general game-play in Rift Apart comes with the performance vs fidelity options. This is more of an issue with the PS5 rather than with Rift Apart individually, but in many cases, having the option to choose between performance or graphical fidelity feels completely redundant. When choosing graphical fidelity, the game is almost too unbearable, with awful, choppy frame-rate. Although not as unplayable as Demon Soul’s, it is still incredibly annoying to the point where choosing graphical fidelity just doesn’t feel like an option whatsoever. This just begs the question, what is the point in making this an option if performance is only the ever true choice that you have at your hands if you want to actually enjoy the game?
Gun-Play and Weapons –
Guns have always been the main aspect of Ratchet & Clank. Ever since I was young there was nothing like purchasing a new weapon to give it a try. In Rift Apart, the weapons have hit new heights, mainly thanks to the DualSense controller. Though not as immersive as I would have expected, it is still something that takes the experience to another level of immersion from older generations of consoles. Although generally the gun-play does follow the same format as all Ratchet & Clank games. That being, strafe and spam.
With the weapons, there is a large variety, and as mentioned, due to their differing nature, they are made all the more distinct from each other through the use of the DualSense controller’s features. Personally, I found that in the beginning of the game, I stuck to my staple weapons, but as the game lengthened, I went on to try and fully upgrade every weapon, even the more useless ones. Rift Apart does a good job at making every weapon feel distinct, and even if they feel worse than another, they still ensure the player feels compelled to use and fully upgrade them at some point or another.
Music –
Generally, I don’t think many Ratchet games have matched the level of influence and uniqueness that the original game had on PS2. Rift Apart is no different. Similarly to the PS4 remake, a lot of tracks sound like they blend together, being loud and bombastic. Occasions where I arrived in a location and took in the music were few and far between. That being said, I did love the tracks ‘A Most Nefarious City‘ and ‘Zordoom and Gloom‘. I think Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart has similar issues to Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time, that being, just not being able to make the soundtrack sound as legendary and specific to their new entry in the series as they did with older games.
Visuals –
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is easily the best looking game on the PS5 at the moment. There were so many occasions where I found myself absolutely awestruck at the depth of every single piece of scenery. There are moments in outer space where clusters of destroyed debris aimlessly hang, with it backgrounds seemingly going on forever.
There is also grounded moments on planets, where the tiny details of dirt and water particles on the ground just immediately caught my eye.
There isn’t much to say regarding the visuals of this game that pictures themselves wouldn’t do alone. All I can say is it is a beauty, with depth and care put into every single nook and cranny of the universe that Insomniac have created. Even as someone who is a big disagreer with the new €80 price tag for games, this time around, it really does feel like the game has the market value of €80 based upon its visual scale alone.
Technological Marvel –
As mentioned earlier, the use of adaptive triggers and haptic feedback performs its role well in Rift Apart. It allows the player to feel more immersed in the mixture of weaponry at your disposal. I wouldn’t say it is anything special for a game that primarily seems built for these types of features, but it is a better experience for the inclusion of these features regardless.
However, where Rift Apart truly excels is through its performance in terms of load-times. This game is a prime example of what people called next-gen. The SSD of the PS5 has allowed for quite literally, instant load times in Rift Apart. They show this off well through the use of rifts and portals, which allow the environments to instantaneously transfer from one area to another, without any blackening or waiting. It really is something that is hard to get your head around having become accustomed to checking my phone in between load-screens or transitional sections of old-generation games.
Conclusion –
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart calmed all my fears that the PS4 remake had planted in my mind. It is a game with an enjoyable story, fantastic characters, and great messaging in some areas. As well as this, it is also a technological marvel, best displayed in the areas of game-play, visual depth, and load times. Despite this, it still does have a few issues here and there that I think would have made the game better. Such as making Rivet more distinct from Ratchet, the lack of a real choice when it comes to choosing between performance mode and graphical fidelity on the PS5, and slightly, I think the DualSense could have felt more distinct in this game, given that it is based entirely around trigger-usage and distinct weaponry. Other than those minor complaints, all I can say is, what a game. I am so glad I had a PS5 in 2021 to play this when it came out.
Final Score – 8.5/10
Nathan Brennan 