Review: Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Makes Everything New Old Again

Despite its title’s declaration of intent, Rift Apart isn’t willing to stand on its own.

Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
Photo: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Of all the wild and wacky devices that have appeared throughout the Ratchet & Clank franchise, the Dimensionator, which opens portals into other dimensions, offers the most versatility. This is readily apparent at the start of Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, wherein an innocuous aerial parade in honor of titular protagonists Ratchet and Clank becomes an interdimensional rollercoaster ride. Giant beasts fall from the sky, taking out bridges, and our heroes fall through gateways to several different planets in their attempt to reclaim the stolen weapon. It’s a celebration all right, but not of Ratchet and Clank so much as this beloved series’s debut on the PlayStation 5. All this chaotic action and visual whimsy is the team at Insomniac Games all but announcing that they can do anything.

That’s why it’s such a bummer when the Dimensionator winds up in the hands of Dr. Nefarious, who only has one monomaniacal use for it: traveling to a dimension where he—or at least his doppelganger, Emperor Nefarious—always wins. Tethering the narrative to such an unimaginative objective makes it difficult for Rift Apart to feel like anything but a reskin of prior games in the series. The 2016 reimagining of the original Ratchet & Clank was already treading familiar ground under the guise of showcasing a new console (the PlayStation 4), and now Rift Apart does much the same for the PlayStation 5, essentially retelling Ratchet and Clank’s origin story through their female counterparts, Rivet and Kit. Everything new is old again, which feels like a real misfired opportunity to build upon the franchise’s core.

Iterating formula is playing things safe, but it’s served the series well. Which is to say, if you liked any prior Ratchet & Clank game, then there’s no doubt that you’ll like this one too, as it dutifully checks off the requisite boxes: over-the-top weapons, run-and-gun action sequences, chaotic environmental platforming sections, and the occasional palate-cleansing puzzle room. The 20-odd weapons that Rift Apart makes available to you across its campaign are fun to handle, even if many fulfill the same function (from guided rockets to homing drills, sawblades to lightning bolts). And the game’s various planets each feature neat vistas, from the dysfunctional pirate theme park of Ardolis or the junk-filled chasms of Torren IV, even if the clearly marked objectives often turn them into glorified guided tours.

Occasionally, Rift Apart proves that it’s capable of doing more than just ticking boxes, and the game is never better than when it leans into its more novel concepts. Bizarre weapons like the pinballing Ricochet or flesh-to-hedge-transforming Topiary Sprinkler feel not just out of this world but, well, out of this dimension. And this is quite literally true on the two planets that feature Blizon Crystals, which, when struck, warp our heroes into an alternate timeline.

In one dimension, the forge-planet Blizar Prime has already exploded, leaving asteroid-like islands behind in the void of space; by swapping to an alternate version of the planet, where it’s still a bustling hub of volcanic mining, you can proceed and help to make sure it doesn’t meet the same fate as its twin. This is a substantial change to Ratchet & Clank’s modus operandi. You’re no longer just traveling from gimmicky planet to planet, hoverbooting around the vast wastelands of Savali in one level and riding turbo-charged Speetles across the toxic swamps of Sargasso in the next. You’re now also flipping between versions of the same planet, which pushes the developers to draw sharper contrasts in gameplay. This is particularly notable in the underwater laboratory of Cordelion. One version is a horror movie—the power’s out, and you’re hunted by an unstoppable beast—and the other version is a nautical odyssey where, because the base is on high alert, you’re forced to detour through the watery trenches.

Despite its title’s declaration of intent, though, Rift Apart isn’t willing to stand on its own. That’s most evident in the game’s Anomaly puzzles, where you must interact with physical representations of all of Clank’s and Kit’s dimensional possibilities. This is predetermination in action. There’s only one acceptable route for you to guide these representations, like lemmings, down, and that’s the one that has them marching in lockstep along the same path that has defined every Ratchet & Clank to date. In the end, Rift Apart is a superficially entertaining but deeply unfulfilling adventure—one that, like the latest Star Wars trilogy, mistakes a shiny new coat of paint as reason enough to exist.

This game was reviewed with a retail copy purchased by the reviewer.

Score: 
 Developer: Insomniac Games  Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment  Platform: PlayStation 5  ESRB: E10+  ESRB Descriptions: Alcohol Reference, Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence  Buy: Game

Aaron Riccio

Aaron has been playing games since the late ’80s and writing about them since the early ’00s. He also obsessively writes about crossword clues at The Crossword Scholar.

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