Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart looks an impressive offering for the PS5
A first look at Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, due for release in June.
What does it take to make a great game? It takes great people. We recently had the chance to attend a developer stream for Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, where a number of the developers were on hand to show the game in action and answers questions.
Rift Apart is a PlayStation 5 exclusive that is looking every bit the blockbuster, cinematic game that the series has consistently delivered. This time around, Ratchet and his trusty robot sidekick Clank are swept up in an adventure across alternate worlds, where other versions of reality cast a different shade on our heroes and their own universe.
One of the most interesting elements of the developer sessions was hearing the freedom that this approach gave the team. For example, the creative director Marcus Smith noted that the female Lombax who will debut in the Rift Apart, named Rivet, took a different role as the team began to work with her. She grew on them so much, he said, that she started to become a reflection of Ratchet, showing how the base qualities of a person shine through, regardless of circumstances.
Rivet’s world is a darker, more oppressive place than Ratchet’s, but the two are kindred spirits nonetheless, the team said. The love for Rivet could not have been more apparent on the Insomniac team, with the Senior Animator Lindsay Thompson gushing with affection for the character, calling Rivet "the best project she has ever worked on". When we asked her what aspect of the game she was most excited for people to see, her answer was: "I’m biased, but it’s Rivet."
Rivet aside, what else does Rift Apart have to offer? As usual, the Ratchet series will be full of crazy and fun weaponry, taking full use of the new DualSense controller on PS5. One of the cooler features is a delayed trigger effect, where you press halfway on the trigger to fire a projectile, which latches to an enemy, then fully down on the trigger to explode it at will. There were also examples of pressing halfway down a trigger to fire one shot and fully down to fire a full load.
Rift Apart will be scored by Mark Mothersbaugh, who was lead singer with the New Wave band Devo in the 1970s but has also scored the likes of Thor: Ragnarok and The Croods. Mothersbaugh was also a part of the developer sessions we attended and it was fascinating to hear him talk about the differences between composing for gaming and cinema. With gaming, he said, the score has to be reactive and build with the gameplay, which leads to a very different creative process.
Rift Apart creative director Marcus Smith couldn’t help but show his excitement at working with Mothersbaugh, and even pulled out a Devo album from his youth, saying that he never would have believed he would be working with one of his heroes.
If nothing else, that sense of passion is why we are excited for Rift Apart when it launches on June 11. They are hard-working creatives who truly love what they do. The development team at Insomniac may not be heroes themselves – but they sure know how to create them.
Meanwhile, another team of developers with real love for their work is Super Massive Games, who created one of the best titles of 2020 – the underworld-escape adventure, Hades. For those who haven’t played Hades, which is a large portion of console owners, there is good news.
A ratings board in Korea has listed Hades for PlayStation 4, which indicates the game is almost certainly coming to that platform soon. Although Hades reached a sizeable audience on PC and Nintendo Switch, there’s an even bigger audience to be found on PS4 in Ireland, with most casual gamers on that console.
Hades is a must-play game, combining brilliant story-telling, world-building and an exceptional roguelite structure. Despite being made by a relatively small team of developers (where the composer also voiced several characters, and the writers tested early builds) it dominated the awards season last year and won several Game of the Year titles. Alongside Paradise Killer, it was one of our games of the year too. Something to look forward to, for PS4 owners.
