Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is a 2021 platformer and action-adventure video game developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It is the 16th installment in the Ratchet & Clank series, and a sequel to Ratchet & Clank: Into the Nexus.[3] It was released on June 11, 2021, for the PlayStation 5, and on July 26, 2023, for PC.[2]
Gameplay[]
The gameplay of Rift Apart allows the player to play both as Ratchet and Rivet, although they both play identically, sharing weapons and gadgets.[4][5] It retains elements of previous Ratchet & Clank games, involving gunplay, collection of bolts, upgradable weapons and gadgets.
Rift Apart features both entirely new planets, as well as alternate dimensions of planets from previous games.[4] Between planets there are seamless transitions, with no load screens.[6]
Weapons[]
At Mrs. Zurkon and Ms. Zurkon's vendors, Ratchet and Rivet can purchase new weapons, ammo and use their collected Raritanium to apply upgrades to their weapons. Like in many previous games, weapons can be upgraded up to level five in which they will change form. Levelling up weapons through combat will increase their damage and unlock more cells at the vendors, allowing more additional Raritanium upgrades to be made. In Challenge mode, Omega weapons can be bought for all fully upgraded V5 ones and can be further leveled up to V10.
Ratchet and Rivet have twenty weapons in total: fifteen new and five returning. New weapons are the Burst Pistol, the Shatterbomb, The Enforcerā, Mr. Fungi, the Negatron Collider, the Topiary Sprinkler, the Ricochet, the Lightning Rod, the Drillhound, the Void Repulser, the Cold Snap, the Bombardier, the Blackhole Storm, the Headhunter and the RYNO 8. Weapons returning from previous games are the Glove of Doom, the Buzz Blades, the Warmonger, the Bouncer and the Pixelizer. The Bouncer and Pixelizer only become available for purchase in Challenge mode. The Pixelizer however can be obtained early in the first playthrough if the player has pre-ordered the game or purchased the deluxe edition.
To unlock the RYNO 8, the player must collect all ten Spybots in the game. The Spybots are found both on planets and as rewards for completing side challenges. Once all ten are found, it can be obtained for free from the vendor.
The Shatterbomb is an explosive weapon similar to the Fusion Grenade. The Enforcer is a double-barrel shotgun resembling the Shock Cannon, which uses the DualSense controller's adaptive triggers to give tension; if the player holds their finger down half-way they can fire one trigger, or two if they pull it all the way.[6]. The Topiary Sprinkler resembles the Miniturret Glove, but instead shoots streams of water, that cause plants to sprout on anything it touches and traps enemies for a brief period of time.
Gadgets[]
Though most of Ratchet's moveset is identical to that of the previous Ratchet & Clank (2016 game), he has two new glove gadgets in his Omniglove that he acquires early into the game. The first of which is known as the Rift Tether; allowing him and Rivet to pull themselves towards rifts to quickly travel across battlefields or to reach inaccessible areas. He and Rivet can also use it to pull open gaps in the damaged dimensions to access pocket dimensions, where they can complete platforming challenges to reach new armor pods. The second is called the Phantom Dash, allowing him to run horizontally along specific wall panels and perform a short dash forward that will make him intangible for a very brief period to phase through barriers and enemy attacks. Additionally, pressing whilst moving will toggle a sprint function, allowing Ratchet and Rivet to run faster. The Lombaxes also have access to their own O2 filtrator masks which supply them with oxygen, allowing them to survive underwater and in space.
The hoverboots also return with new enhancements and can be used much easier for use in and out of combat. They can be used by holding and pumped using or repeatedly to activate the accelerator.
Whilst standing on specific Mag Surfaces, Ratchet and Rivet can use their Magneboots to walk along them at any angle. Using , they can aim at another Mag Surface with a target reticle and press to Mag Jump to it.
When Clank is on Ratchet or Rivet's back, his Heli-pack can be used to glide by holding whilst in the air. When Clank is not present, the Lombaxes will employ the use of their Glide Boots to perform the same exact function.
Armor[]
The game features armor that can be obtained from collectible armor pods found in pocket dimensions or by completing challenges. The functionality of wearing them however is purely cosmetic and the system has more in common with Insomniac's previous games; Marvel's Spider-Man and Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales. Each complete armor set comes in threes, one each for the head, chest and legs; similar to Size Matters. Fully collecting a set will grant a gameplay bonus such as inflicting additional damage to specific enemy groups or bonus collected bolts. Once the armor is collected, the obtained gameplay bonus remains permanently in effect. Ratchet and Rivet's speech will be muffled if they are wearing a helmet that covers their mouth and are speaking during gameplay. During cutscenes however, the helmet becomes automatically unequipped and re-equipped once it is over.
There are eight sets to be collected in Rift Apart with five additional sets available as a pre-order bonus or as part of the game's digital deluxe edition. For the franchise's 20th anniversary, five new armor sets were made available for free to all players via a software update. This brings the full total number of armor sets in Rift Apart to eighteen. Standard editions of Rift Apart will offer players the option to upgrade to the deluxe edition from the title menu for an additional cost, granting them the bonus content including the five armor sets. The ten additional armor sets however do not grant any gameplay bonuses, only armor collected in-game has this effect.
Mounts[]
There are two rideable mounts featured in Rift Apart. The first of which is a fast running insect called a Speetle used by both Ratchet and Rivet to traverse quickly across hazardous surfaces and launch off of ramps. There are specific Speetle Nests that can be hit to summon one.
The second is a dragon-like creature named Trudi, who is good friends with Rivet and is used by her to fly around the sandbox level on Sargasso. She becomes freely available to use during the optional side mission "Help Trudi". Trudi is not riden by Ratchet and only used by Rivet.
Glitch challenges[]
Early into Rift Apart, Ratchet obtains a hacking programme named Glitch. Throughout the game, there are five challenges of sequential increasing difficulty, in which she is sent into computer systems to destroy Zeta Virus infections that are rendering the machines inoperable. In each challenge, Glitch must use her Electro-Guns and Blitz-Infectors to delete the viruses attacking her to protect herself and destroy all of the Virus Nests located in each level to clear them. Three of these challenges are completed during the story and two are optional in order to obtain Gold Bolts.
Zurkie's Battleplex[]
At Zurkie's, Rivet can partake in challenges at Zurkon Jr.'s Battleplex to win prizes, including: Bolts, Raritanium, Gold Bolts, Armor Pods, the Box Breaker and a Spybot. The arena features three Cups; Bronze, Silver and Gold with each Cup containing five challenges. The challenges vary from surviving waves of enemies with stage hazards, to riding a Speetle through an obstacle course under a time limit. The final challenge of each Cup has Rivet fight a boss.
Story[]
Introduction[]
In an alternate dimension, a Lombax Resistance fighter named Rivet is on an undercover mission to steal an infobot in a robot filled dystopian city. She uses a robot disguise to blend in with the local inhabitants and successfully procures it without being caught, but the escort she stole it from soon realize it is missing and spread out their forces to find it. Before escaping and decrypting it however, she defies the instructions of her resistance compatriot on her communicator and instead pursues an organic citizen being hunted down by one of the city's troopers and rescues them first. Soon after, the city's patrolling forces track her down to retrieve the stolen infobot and she retreats.
Megalopolis[]
Meanwhile in Ratchet and Clank's dimension, the Festival of Heroes is being held in Megalopolis on Corson V, to celebrate the duo's many achievements in heroism, although they remark it has been years since they last did anything heroic. The festival is hosted by Captain Qwark, Skidd McMarx and Rusty Pete. Qwark also announces that Clank has a gift to present to Ratchet at the front of the parade route and the two begin heading towards it. The celebration is interrupted however by the recently rebranded Goons-4-Less as a bounty has been put on Ratchet and Clank's heads. After breaking through the attacking goons, they reach the front float, where Clank reveals that he has rebuilt the broken Dimensionator from the ending of their last adventure. He presents it to Ratchet, so he can travel the dimensions and find his species; the Lombaxes, who are lost in another dimension.
Before Ratchet can voice his issues however, the device is stolen by Dr. Nefarious in his Party Crasher ship, who hired the Goons in place of his assistant Lawrence after he had been placed on paid paternity leave. After chasing him through the city and catching back up to him at the train station, Nefarious confronts the two and attempts to use the Dimensionator against them but Ratchet impulsively shoots the Phase Quartz power core, causing a large explosion that sends Nefarious and his ship hurtling into a nearby building and causes mass dimensional chaos to begin occurring across the planet. After taking a piece of the chipped phase quartz that landed near him, Ratchet uses it to pull himself towards the rifts now appearing and yank open gaps in the damaged dimension as part of a new makeshift gadget known as the Rift Tether.
Upon catching back up to Nefarious, Ratchet and Clank fight him in his ship and eventually defeat him. Nefarious; sick of frequently being defeated over the years, puts his true plan into motion with the Dimensionator and uses the device to bring the three of them to a dimension where the Doctor always wins. After arriving on a rooftop in a neon lit, rainy city, the Dimensionator finally goes critical from being damaged and explodes. Clank awakes in another part of the city and finds his right arm has been blown off and his legs are locked into their retracted state. Rivet drops down behind him and after seeing the dimensional chaos happening and hearing him admit fault to it, she takes Clank with her against his will. Dr. Nefarious awakens in a throne room and is mistaken for being his counterpart in this dimension; known as Emperor Nefarious. The Emperor's Assistant remarks he has returned early from his conquest and the Doctor ecstatically takes his place on the throne.
Nefarious City[]
Ratchet finally awakens and finds a wanted poster of Rivet, wondering where he could be. He soon finds he is in a place named Nefarious City on a dimensional counterpart of Corson V. He meets Ms. Zurkon; a counterpart of Mrs. Zurkon, who is an ally of the Resistance force against the evil tyrannical Emperor Nefarious and his Empire, who rule the entire known universe in this dimension. Ms. Zurkon offers to sell him weapons but suddenly, Rivet runs past him with Clank on her back and escapes in her ship. Ms. Zurkon informs Ratchet that only royal starships can leave the planet without being shot down and to find one he must look for a Resistance member known as the Phantom at Club Nefarious. The Phantom is revealed to be a counterpart of Skidd McMarx and has his cover blown at the Club, before being pursued by the Empire's robotic enforcers; the Nefarious Troopers. Ratchet chases after Phantom and defends him from the attacking troopers. Recognizing him as a Lombax like Rivet, Phantom upgrades Ratchet's Omniglove with Resistance tech and gives him a gadget known as the Phantom Dash, allowing him to run along wall panels, become intangible for a short period to pass through checkpoint barriers and avoid enemy attacks. Phantom informs Ratchet that Rivet always goes to her base on planet Sargasso after her missions.
He makes Ratchet a deal and agrees to help him get a royal starship to leave the planet and pursue Rivet and Clank, if he helps him with hacking a propaganda blimp at the Nefarious Day Spa. Ratchet agrees and provides cover for Phantom from the Troopers, so he can program a message into the blimp for the downtrodden citizens of the city. Phantom then gives Ratchet a hacking program named Glitch, so he can use the Emperor's private shuttle to get into Nefarious Tower and steal a royal starship. Suddenly however, Phantom gives himself up to the Nefarious Troopers to try and fight the Empire's corruption from the inside out.
Glitch initially was unhappy upon first meeting Ratchet and finding that she had been handed off to someone she was unfamiliar with. Ratchet introduced himself and asked her for her help in the dour situation he was in, she hesitated at first but decided to assist in hacking the access console in Nefarious Plaza. Glitch enters the shuttle's access console and assumes she will simply need to delete some old files but soon discovers Zeta Virus infections overtaking the system and rendering them inoperable. She at first panics that she does not have the training to handle viruses of this caliber, but she cautiously utilizes her Electro-Guns and Blitz-Infectors to eventually clear out the infection, much to even her own surprise. After deleting the viruses and destroying the virus nest pods sucking energy from the machine, the host computer came back online, allowing Ratchet access to the office of Emperor Nefarious and allowing him to leave the planet in a stolen ship after narrowly escaping Dr. Nefarious and the Troopers.
Sargasso[]
On the way to Sargasso, Clank attempts to explain what is happening to Rivet, but she refuses to believe his story. A distress call then appears on her ship's computer from her friends who live on the planet; the Morts. A Nefarious Seekerpede sent to search the planet suddenly clips her ship and sends it crashing to the ground, forcing them to make their way to the Morts' Gelatonium factory using other means. On the way, Rivet runs into Ms. Zurkon who informs the Lombax that she has added Ratchet's vendor account to Rivet's so the two now share purchases. She refers to Ratchet only as their "mutual friend on Nefarious City", leaving Rivet confused. To cross the planet's acid swamps however, they will need to ride on the back of a Speetle and attempt to track one down. Clank also attempts to contact Ratchet with his communicator but finds that it has also been broken.
Several Speetles escape but Rivet spots one heading into a pocket dimension and follows it inside by using her own Rift Tether built into her robotic arm to pull open a gap in the damaged dimensions. Inside the pocket dimension they spot the Morts' helperbot; Maynard and follow the Speetle until it hides in one of it's nests. Rivet hits the nest, causing a Speetle to jump out and allowing her to finally jump on it's back. Maynard acts as a guide and leads Rivet along a path out of the pocket dimension and back to the Gelatonium factory using the speeding Speetle. After arriving, Rivet finds that the Goons-4-Less have taken the Morts' hostage and demand they give up the location of their bounty. Clank tries to explain that they had travelled through the dimensional vortex and are looking for Ratchet but Rivet continues to dismiss his claims.
Once all the Goons at the factory are defeated, Rivet checks the Morts are okay and they assure her that they are fine but some of the other Morts are trapped inside a large, purple dimensional anomaly next to the factory. Clank offers to inspect it as he has experience with dimensional anomalies from his previous adventure with Ratchet. Upon touching it, Clank has his consiousness transported to a space between dimensions and meets the astral form of a man named Gary who has been searching for someone like Clank to help him fix the dimensions. Gary introduces himself as a cosmic prophet and resides on planet Savali, studying in it's vast Interdimensional Archives. He helps Clank with learning to repair dimensional damage and warns that the damage caused by the Dimensionator will continue to spread and eventually lead to a Dimensional Cataclysm unless it can be reversed by that which caused it; with another Dimensionator. After Clank learns more about dimensionality and how to reverse it's damage, he eventually is able to repair the anomaly and reawakens on Rivet's back.
Once the Morts are freed from inside the anomaly, Rivet meets back up with a female Mort she is good friends with and gives her a part from the Space Pirates needed to finish fixing a starship. While the Mort is fixing the ship, Rivet travels back to her secret hideout, plugs Clank into her main computer system and looks through his memory banks to find the truth about him. The events that occurred in Megalopolis play out on her monitor in which she witnesses the Dimensionator, Dr. Nefarious and Ratchet. She is shocked to see a Lombax and finally views the Dimensionator explode in Nefarious City. Rivet wakes Clank up again and admits that he was telling the truth about everything. She reveals to him that she has a rather hard time trusting robots after her many bad experiences with them from the Emperor, his followers and pirates in which she has lost friends and during one such conflict; her arm, leaving her with some degree of PTSD.
Once the Infobot she had is decryted, it begins sending out a signal and the Seekerpede that was patrolling the planet suddenly breaks open the wall of her hideout using it's giant mandibles. The Seekerpede uses a tractor beam to pull all metallic objects towards it and it mistakenly takes Clank instead of the Infobot. Rivet; plagued with guilt over her treatment of Clank, chases after the Seekerpede on a Speetle to save him and launches onto it's back, ramming the machine's flight stabilizer. Upon it being grounded, she battles the craft and eventually destroys it's Nefarious Trooper pilot. Once she saves Clank, Rivet offers to help him get a part to fix his broken communicator and the two hop into the new ship the Morts have fixed up for her. Before leaving the planet, Rivet finally checks the contents of the Infobot and finds that it is a target hitlist of the Emperor's key opposers; Phantom, Moydoy, Captain Quantum, Clatchkey and Rivet herself. She posts the list to the Resistance's network to warn them of the danger and the two take off in their ship.
Zurkie's Gastropub and Battleplex[]
On the way to their destination, Clank laments the actions that lead him and Ratchet to end up in this situation and blames himself for his short-sightedness in showing off the Dimensionator in public. The two arrive at Zurkie's Gastropub and Battleplex; a refuelling depot and Zurkon family-run business floating in the debris of the planet Scarstu that had been destroyed years ago by the Emperor. Rivet and Clank go to the Gastropub and look for Zurkie; the establishment's owner and founder. Zurkie is a counterpart of Mr. Zurkon but is instead a pacifist with a stern violence restriction in his Gastropub.
To get the part to fix Clank's communicator, Rivet searches for the Space Pirate that she knows has it and goes to the bar to ask Zurkie if he has seen them. Before Zurkie can answer however, the robot Space Pirate in question interrupts and quickly makes himself known. He is Pierre Le Fer; a counterpart of Rusty Pete and the first mate of Captain Quantum. Rivet has known Pierre for a long time and is quite familiar with his antics. He attempts to flirt with her and flaunts his ego but Rivet repeatedly and flatly demands he hand over the part. She finally decides to challenge him to a fight for it but Zurkie comes between the two and tells them to settle their quarrel in the Battleplex. The son of Zurkie and Ms. Zurkon; Zurkon Jr. is the mastermind of the Battleplex and arena announcer. He introduces Rivet and her opponents whilst providing his own brand of maniacal commentary for the fights. Rivet battles and defeats several waves of Pierre's crew until she is set to fight the pirate himself. Despite Pierre's vain boastings, he is in fact rather cowardly and feigns a sprained ankle to avoid fighting Rivet himself and sends a pirate Marauder named FranƧois to battle in his stead. After a tense fight, Rivet eventually emerges victorious against FranƧois and Pierre bitterly throws the part to her but not before first threatening that he will get his revenge for their defeat.
Rivet and Clank return to the Gastropub and sit down at a free table where Rivet inserts the part into Clank's chest compartment and is able to get his communicator working again. While Ratchet is flying the stolen starship towards Sargasso, Clank activates his communicator and is able to make contact with him. Clank assures Ratchet he is fine and is currently with the Lombax that had taken him. Rivet sheepishly greets Ratchet over the communicator and he relays the information that Dr. Nefarious has taken over as the Emperor of Rivet's dimension. Clank concludes that to begin forming a solution to their problems, they will need to build a new Dimensionator. He recounts what Gary had told him earlier about the Interdimensional Archives and Ratchet volunteers to travel to Savali and ask for his help in constructing a Dimensionator. While Ratchet goes to Savali, Clank suggests he and Rivet go to the planet Blizar Prime to acquire the Phase Quartz needed to power the device. Unbenounced to the three however, the Emperor's Assistant had been eavesdropping on their plans in the Gastropub the entire time. Upon returning to their ship, a public broadcast from the Emperor's office plays where Dr. Nefarious announces he is offering a large bounty for the dead or alive capture of Ratchet and Rivet. The Assistant's spying also informed him that they would be arriving on Savali and Blizar Prime soon, where he has already sent Nefarious Trooper strike teams to intercept their arrivals.
Savali[]
Ratchet arrives on the planet and quickly runs into Gary who recognizes him from his research on Clank's history in his book. He instructs Ratchet to make his way to the Interdimensional Archives just past the Monks' settlement and find his apprentice, who can help him with building a Dimensionator. The Nefarious Troopers however have arrived on the planet and are attacking Monktown while searching for a Lombax. Ratchet destroys the occupying troopers and makes his way to the Archives, however the structure detects an interdimensional anomaly and enters it's defensive mode; rising up on it's robotic legs to walk itself away from any danger.
Upon it rising, a small robot falls from the top and lands in front of Ratchet and he realizes she is Gary's apprentice. To get back up to the Archives and acquire the Dimensionator blueprints, Ratchet suggests to her that they team up but she is quite reluctant and insists she would not make a good partner. Ratchet makes a deal with her that in the event something goes wrong which he assures won't, they will go their seperate ways with no questions asked. She agrees but maintains their alliance is only temporary.
To get onto the Archives again they will need help from the monks, Gary's acolytes. They however have been taken prisoner at their three temples by the invading Nefarious Troopers and placed inside forcefields. The apprentice gives Ratchet a pair of Lombax hoverboots that will allow him to quickly traverse across the planet's Urfdah Mesa. Ratchet recalls he did not catch her name and she meekly introduces herself as KT-7461. They free the monks at the Badlands Temple and at the Primeval Forest Temple, where Ratchet defends KT-7461 from waves of troopers while she disables the forcefields through it's access terminal. Whilst travelling between the temples, Ratchet proposes giving KT-7461 a nickname but she is unsure about his suggestions. The Mountain Temple required Ratchet to pass a series of dangerous time trials in order to ascend to the top quickly with his hoverboots or the track he is on would collapse. After destroying the Nefarious Sniperbots guarding the monks at the mountain's summit, KT-7461 found the forcefield's access terminal was infected with Zeta Viruses and using it would cause her to be infected aswell. Ratchet sent Glitch in to clear out the viruses and bring the machinery back online, allowing KT-7461 to free the monks.
Once all of the monks are freed, Ratchet gets warped back to Monktown through one of their rifts and Gary works with his acolytes to open a path through multiple rifts, allowing Ratchet to boost with great speed up to the top of the Archives. Upon reaching the Archives however, they discover that the Nefarious Troopers are already there, seeking to plunder it's contents to present to the Emperor and convert the structure into a war machine. Whilst fighting them off, KT-7461 frets that some of the Archive's contents are irreplacable and the troopers might damage them. Ratchet succeeds in destroying the attacking troopers and powers up the Helix Generator to open the rift into the Archive's vault. Inside, KT-7461 is relieved that the Dimensional Map and the rest of the contents are safe. Ratchet discovers Lombax language writing inside the vault and confides in KT-7461 that his father Kaden was the keeper of the original Dimensionator and lamented that he couldn't keep it out of the wrong hands like his father wished. After scanning the Dimensionator blueprints, KT-7461 informs Ratchet that the only place with the facilities powerful enough to create it are at the Emperor's Kedaro Station on planet Cordelion; the most secure outpost in the galaxy. She then decides that of Ratchet's name suggestions, she liked Kit the most and began using it from that point forward.
Suddenly several Nefarious Dropships began bombing the Archives to destroy it, forcing Kit to very reluctantly transform into her aggressive Warbot form to ward off the attackers. She then points her weapon at Ratchet but snaps back to her senses and transforms back. She dourly explains to Ratchet that she was a creation of the Nefarious Empire and built to be a powerful weapon to keep the Emperor's galaxy secure. She was naively manipulated by the Emperor and fled her role in great shame after she severely injured someone on one of her patrols. Years ago she exiled herself to the remote planet Savali to keep others safe from her own destructive capabilities and devoted her life to building and preserving knowledge in the Archives with the local monk tribe. Ratchet is not soured by this however and wants Kit to continue travelling with him as a team. She is surprised at this but hesitantly accepts and remarks that she will continue to try. Once the Archives are safe, Kit and Ratchet leave for planet Cordelion to use the Kedaro station's Rubion Forge to build a new Dimensionator.
Blizar Prime[]
On the way to Blizar Prime, Rivet recalls Clank telling her on Sargasso that he repaired the Dimensionator so Ratchet could find the other Lombaxes. Rivet had also been estranged from her own kind her whole life and wishfully asks him if finding the Lombax's home was truly possible. Their conversation is shutdown however when they approach Blizar Prime and find that the planet has been shattered to pieces. They land their ship in the debris field, wondering aloud what could have happened and Clank worries that the Phase Quartz could not have survived. However they soon find a purple glowing Blizon crystal and Clank tells Rivet to strike it with her hammer.
Upon doing so, they find themselves shifted into another dimension where the planet is still intact. Like Clank had theorized, the Blizon had absorbed and stored the energy from the dimensional rifts, allowing the two to use them to shift back and forth between Rivet's dimension and another unknown one. Clank discerns they can find intact Phase Quartz here and they should speak to a miner or engineer about using the site's main drill to excavate some. While shifting back and forth between Rivet's dimension and the intact one, the two meet a survivor in the ruins who angrily curses her predicament. Rivet informs her that there is another dimension where the planet is still intact and the stranger eagerly asks how she knows this but figures out that the Lombax had used the Blizon and hastily takes off. The Nefarious Troopers sent by Dr. Nefarious pass by and scour the planet's remains for Rivet and Clank. Soon after, the two start hearing gargled transmissions from the stranger, broadcasting a warning to anyone who will listen. Her messages are unclear so Clank suggests they look into it after they have first secured some Phase Quartz.
The crumbling barriers between dimensions had been causing seismic activity throughout the intact Blizar Prime, forcing much of the mining site to undergo lockdowns for safety purposes. Rivet and Clank made their way around the lockdowned areas on their way to the main site. On the way there, more members of the Goons-4-Less emerged from dimensional rifts and had followed Rivet to fulfill their contract. The goons however have trouble differentiating their Lombax target between Rivet and Ratchet, so they attack them both. After defeating the goons' forces, they make their way to the main mining hub and take a lift to the Chief Engineer's Survey Station.
Rivet asks the Engineer if they can drill for some Phase Quartz but she claims she has been hearing voices coming from the dimensional rifts and has sent her three Science Bots to discover what the disturbance is. The Engineer states she cannot authorize use of the drill until this has been investigated first. Rivet offers to speed up this process and goes to find the Science Bots B.O.B., J.I.M. and S.A.M. herself so they can report their findings. Once all three return to the Survey Station, the Engineer begins decoding the message they picked up from Rivet's dimension and authorizes use of the drill in the meantime. On the way back to the mining hub, a dimensional anomaly identical to the one on Sargasso, appears at the site's Hydraulic Pump and needs to be repaired before they can continue further. Clank enters the anomaly and meets Gary again, who again assists Clank with repairing it. Clank asks Gary about the book he always carries with him and he explains it is the most up-to-date collection of knowledge in the universe as catalogued by his father, whom Clank knows as the Plumber. The Plumber is currently taking his first ever vacation and has left Gary in charge. Gary asks how things are going with Rivet and Clank notes the differences between her and Ratchet, namely her wariness of robots which Ratchet never had. Clank realises that he has begun to trust Rivet and that she is starting to trust him too. Clank repairs the Anomaly, and receives some parting words of advice from Gary: confidence is the key to not getting caught up in the details.
After getting clearance to use the elevator, the two continue along a grindrail system and reach the drill. Once the drill is activated, the Chief Engineer calls and plays the message fom her counterpart in Rivet's dimension. The message from the stranger implores them to not turn on the drill. The rifts had damaged it and was the cause of her Blizar Prime being destroyed. The Engineer desperately attempts a remote shutdown but is unable to. The drill excavates some Phase Quartz that Rivet knocks out of the beam with her hammer, shifting them back to her dimension where she is attacked by the Nefarious Troopers. She quickly finds more Blizon however and returns to the other dimension to save the planet. The Goons-4-Less continue trying to attack her but Rivet knocks one of their Dropships into the drill and successfully dislodges it's laser before it shatters the planet.
In the chaos, Clank and the Phase Quartz fall into the dislodged laser's trajectory but Rivet chooses to narrowly save Clank while the Phase Quartz is broken to pieces. While the situation looks bad, Rivet picks up the shattered fragments and recalls to Clank stories the Morts had told her about an individual on Torren IV known as the Fixer, who is said to be capable of fixing anything. Rivet, understanding how bad the Morts are at lying, feels their highly spoken tales of The Fixer are worth looking into. Clank takes her word for it and the two head back to Rivet's dimension again and jump in their ship to take off to Torren IV. Just before they leave, another public broadcast from Dr. Nefarious plays, where he attempts to dispel panic that the dimension is in danger and discards them as lies. He also significantly increases the bounty he had previously placed on the Lombaxes.
Cordelion[]
Upon flying down to the planet, Kit remarks on her first time seeing an ocean and Ratchet proposes that once they have saved the dimensions, she will have a whole universe to explore. Kit shares her worries of her unknown future and Ratchet opens up to his own unease about meeting the Lombaxes, feeling it may or may not be a mistake. Upon arriving at the Kedaro Station's surface entrance, the Nefarious Troopers lockdown the facility, leaving Ratchet and Kit with no way inside. They look around and are able to find a glowing purple Blizon crystal. Upon striking it with his wrench, Ratchet and Kit are shifted to an unknown dimension where the facility has been long abandoned. On the elevator ride down, Kit relates to Ratchet that she has also never known her own family with the closest person being the Emperor, to which she assures Ratchet he could not do any worse with the Lombaxes. Ratchet however feels inadequate compared to the huge accomplishments and creations of the Lombaxes. Kit tells him he is selling himself short but regardless Ratchet feels he has a good life in his own dimension and does not want to risk it.
Inside the abandoned station, they find the facility has been infested with Amoeboids after they broke out of their containers. Further inside they meet a rather mentally disturbed utility robot named Junk Bot, who despite being of unsound mind, is helpful and friendly. Ratchet and Kit look for another Blizon crystal to get back to the active facility and ask Junk Bot if he has seen any. He claims he has and leads the two deeper into the station to find it. While passing a darkened room, Ratchet spots something inside and is startled when a slavering creature lunges at him but is stopped by the door snapping shut. Junk Bot informs them that the creature is a good friend of his named Juice, despite it's attempts to kill him sometimes. They soon find that the creature is actively stalking Ratchet through the facility and upon finding a Blizon crystal like Junk Bot promised, they say their presumed farewells to him and gladly use the Blizon to get away from Juice.
Upon shifting back to Rivet's dimension, they make their way towards the Rubion Forge but are stopped by a familiar utility robot who interrogates them on how they got inside during the lockdown. Kit thinks quickly and pretends her and Ratchet are interior decorators sent by the Emperor to give the facility a surprise remodelling. The threat of upsetting the Emperor causes Junk Bot's counterpart to cower at the notion and he lets the two be on their way. Once they finally reach the controls to the forge, Kit uploads the schematics but Ratchet is unsure how to activate the machine and between the two main console buttons, he chooses against the button with the skull and crossbones and presses the blank one. Suddenly however, this causes the forge to begin badly malfunctioning. Junk Bot exclaims in panic why he used the machine with auxiliary power only when the main power button was right next to it. The forge explodes and the station's security forces pursue the two. Ratchet and Kit are able to find another Blizon crystal and use it to escape back to the abandoned dimension. In the other dimension's Rubion Forge, Ratchet asks Junk Bot what it would take to get the abandoned station's dormant Rubion Forge working again. He explains that with the power gone a virus has infected the system and nothing will work until it is first cleared. Glitch enters the forge's access console and is able to clear out the Zeta Virus infection. Junk Bot claims the last time he saw the power source, it was downstairs through a pressure locked door.
Inside they find a chamber with a broken container but no sign of a power source. They decide their best course of action is to find more Blizon and attempt to steal the power source from Rivet's dimension. While searching, Ratchet and Kit run into Juice multiple times as he attempts to attack them while they escape through more pressure locked doors. Using broken slurpion jelly cannisters, Ratchet is able to distract Juice as his weapons do not have any affect on the creature's near impenetrable shell. As Ratchet and Kit are disabling the locks to a blast door so they may advance and find more Blizon, they come across an old video log showing Junk Bot gleefully observing Juice in the Cordelion waters before being horrified as the creature is forcibly captured by the other station workers. After again escaping Juice through the large blast door and into the next room, Ratchet steps on a pressure plate and the room is immediately flooded with seawater. Ratchet luckily manages to use his O2 filtrator and magneboots in time to stay composed, allowing him to navigate Cordelion's ocean floor and walk through the Fennessy trench. Juice swims above him through the ocean, again stalking Ratchet as he makes his way towards an airlock leading back inside the station. Whilst traversing the ocean floor, Kit tells Ratchet she had been thinking about what he said earlier about the Lombaxes and risking a good life. She relates that she felt the same way, with a good life on Savali and when Ratchet asked her to be partners, she did not want to risk it either, but is glad she did. Ratchet thanks her for understanding and Kit assures that with their roles reversed, she can now be the one who believes in him. After entering the station again through an airlock, they spot the Blizon. Juice however jumps down from the ceiling and ambushes them, but Ratchet is able to escape him one last time by shifting back to Rivet's dimension.
After fighting off several waves of Nefarious Troopers towards the forge's power source in Rivet's dimension, Ratchet and Kit discover for themselves that Juice himself was the power source. Kit pleads to Ratchet that they must free him after seeing his dismal predicament. After liberating him, Ratchet tensely tried to make his peace with this version of Juice and to his surprise, the creature reciprocated with it helping Ratchet defeat the station's Elite Security Detail. When asked if he knew another way to power the Rubion Forge, this Juice then lead Ratchet to another Blizon Crystal and shifted along with him to the abandoned dimension again. While the abandoned dimension's Juice was aggressively advancing on Junk Bot, the Juice from Rivet's dimension angrily lunged at his counterpart. The two Juice's intensely sized eachother up but eventually both became calmed and collected by the other. The Juice of Rivet's dimension then gestured to his counterpart towards the forge and the two used their bio-electricity together to power it up, allowing Ratchet and Kit to finally create the Dimensionator correctly using the skull and crossbones marked button. Junk Bot happily laughs whilst petting the two now docile Juices and celebrates the inclusion of new friends. The two Juices then playfully chase eachother around the Rubion Forge while Ratchet and Kit say their farewells to Junk Bot and take the elevator back up to the surface to find another Blizon crystal, returning to Rivet's dimension once again. They agree to meet up with Rivet and Clank at Zurkie's when they are done. Kit is nervous about how to meet new people but Ratchet tells her to just be friendly, open and to not overthink it. The two then get in their ship and leave the planet.
Torren IV[]
As Rivet and Clank fly into Molonoth Gulch, Clank remarks that their mission there should be straightforward. Rivet however scoffs that things in her dimension are rarely that simple and improvisation is a critical skill for surviving, with Clank noting that he also has a talent for this. The two land their ship and make their way to a nearby Vullard settlement called Little Junktown. The resident Vullards are cautious however and have barricaded themselves in their homes due to frequent raids. They meet a Vullard who welcomes them but informs that the Fixer has been deactivated and is currently stationary on the far end of the Gulch. He explains that the Vullards asked him to help defend them from the plundering pirates due to his immense strength but after days of crushing them, he for an unknown reason broke down. Clank suggests they fix him themselves but the bridge towards him was destroyed in the last raid and the only way across the chasm is with the use of a Hurlshot; an upgrade to the omniglove that allows the user to launch themselves long distances through the air from Versa-Targets. The Vullard tells them he saw one at the local smelting pit and the two make their way there. On the way, Rivet asks Clank if him and Ratchet are planning to go to the Lombax dimension after their mission is complete. He explains that Ratchet has fears but Rivet is confused as to why and says she will gladly go herself if he does not want to.
After travelling along a grindrail system, they arrive at the smelting pit, but at that same moment the Space Pirates, lead by Pierre begin invading and raiding for scrap. The pirates were also unaware why the Fixer had broken down but were happy to take advantage of his absence. After acquiring the Hurlshot suspended from a crane, Rivet battles through several waves of pirates and defeats a Marauder named "Wee" Roger on one of the pirate's ships. Against the better advice of his crewmates, Pierre orders them to destroy the ship to take Rivet down with it but she narrowly manages to escape it's destruction and lands back in Little Junktown. After clearing the chasm with the Hurlshot, the pirates realize Rivet is trying to reactivate the Fixer and they launch another assault to stop her, as it would promptly put an end to their plundering. She breaks through their forces and defeats another Marauder named "Not-So-Wee" Roger, enraging Pierre and leading him to order his crew to regroup to launch a united attack on Rivet and stop her.
She manages to reactivate the Fixer first but notices that he is behaving strangely, despondently proclaiming that he and everything is broken and that nothing can be fixed. The space pirate's ships begin approaching and the Fixer fires a large laser from his eye and destroys one of their vessels, forcing them to retreat. To Rivet and Clank's shock, the Fixer then begins trying to destroy them with his laser and crush them. Rivet starts escaping via a grindrail, whilst the Fixer continues declaring the pointlessness of fixing and that destruction is their natural state. Upon seeing Clank's missing arm, the Fixer proclaims him a fellow broken one that must accept his brokenness. Rivet however tells Clank that if he is broken, so is she and that they are an impressive force regardless of it. When the Fixer equates mending with enlightenment and that he is not deserving of enlightenment due to his lack of wisdom in his outbursts, Clank feels he can devise a way to reason with him in his hysteric state.
The Fixer eventually catches Rivet in his hand and tries crushing her while she struggles to hold him back. Here Clank appeals to his psychology and declares that he has been fixed, with the Fixer helping him realize that despite his changes, he is still who he was. This gets through to the Fixer and he utters that he is quite relieved to hear this and lets Rivet go. He explains that when the Vullards asked him to protect them, it opened his eyes to a great many broken things that overwhelmed him with despair. Clank's declaration restores the Fixer's hope in being able to fix another. To thank Rivet and Clank for this, he happily restores the broken pieces of Phase Quartz back together with a beam from his eye. With everything they need, they decide to all meet up at Zurkie's with Ratchet to finally complete their rebuilding of the Dimensionator.
Building the new Dimensionator[]
Whilst landing her ship, Rivet rehearses her first meeting with Ratchet and admits to Clank she is nervous about meeting another Lombax. He assures her Ratchet is friendly and with a tone of melancholy she remarks that her and Clank's adventure is almost over. In the weapons confiscation room, just before the Gastropub, Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit all meet eachother for the first time. Ratchet nudges a nervous Kit on to meet Rivet. Rivet and Kit clumsily can't decide on how to greet eachother and eventually settle on a simple fist bump before each of the Lombaxes take out the Dimensionator and Phase Quartz to finally fix the dimensions. Before entering the Gastropub, Clank motions Rivet towards Kit and she happily jumps onto the Lombax's back. Inside however, several Nefarious Troopers are waiting for them and train their weapons on the Lombaxes, forcing them to surrender. The Emperor's Assistant takes the Dimensionator and Phase Quartz off of the two and presents them to Dr. Nefarious, who steps out into the open. The Doctor gloats how good this dimension is to him as he loads the Phase Quartz into the Dimensionator. The Lombaxes both nod to eachother and Ratchet surprise attacks the Troopers behind them with his wrench while Rivet runs ahead and tackles Dr. Nefarious through a window into the Battleplex.
Rivet and Kit then fight Dr. Nefarious in the arena where he begins displaying great overconfidence in his new position of power, declaring himself as the one true emperor that cannot be defeated and is beloved by all his subjects. Soon the Doctor begins using the new Dimensionator and sends them through a rift to the intact Blizar Prime. Nefarious begins losing his patience on Blizar Prime and attempts to simply make Rivet fall into the lava pits below so he can continue enjoying his new reign as emperor. They fight on the roof of the Chief Engineer's Survey Station until he sends them through another rift to Sargasso, where he sets a wild Grunthor on them. After beating the creature, they continue the battle again until Nefarious attempts to send them through another rift into the heart of a supernova. He mistakenly brings them back to the Battleplex again however, as he frustratedly demands to know why the buttons on the Dimensionator are not labeled. Eventually Rivet and Kit are able to defeat him and he drops the Dimensionator.
Rivet and Kit wave to the cheering audience, until Ratchet and Clank suddenly yell and are knocked into the arena behind them by an unseen source. The lights dim and Rivet looks towards the broken window of the Gastropub to see their assailant. The real Emperor Nefarious makes his return and slowly descends towards the arena where he picks up the untended Dimensionator. Rivet and Kit apprehensively ready themselves against the Emperor with Rivet blocking Kit to stay behind her, while the Emperor readies the Dimensionator and brandishes it at them. He boasts that he is almost finished ridding himself of the last of his enemies with the exceptions of Captain Quantum and Rivet. Rivet mocks him that the universe were cheering his defeat and in response he spitefully shoots a rift behind him, sucking in several of the audience. Ratchet and Rivet run at the Emperor in anger as he walks away and he uses his telekinesis to roughly throw Rivet into Ratchet, knocking them both to the ground. He walks up to the injured Dr. Nefarious and points the Dimensionator at him, where the Doctor pleads for an alliance. The Emperor finds the notion tantalising and accepts. He opens a rift on the floor and proposes a home game to Rivet before dropping in Dr. Nefarious and entering it himself. Rivet understands and knows this to mean the Emperor is going to Sargasso. Ratchet wishes to go with her too but Clank implores that they get to Captain Quantum first before the Emperor can. Rivet instructs them to go to planet Ardolis and find Pierre as he will lead them to the captain. The two teams then split up and set off to complete their respective missions.
Saving Sargasso[]
On the way to Sargasso, Rivet frets aloud how much more dangerous the Emperor has become now with the Dimensionator but Kit assures they will not lose her friends on the planet. Kit's reassurance helps cheer her up and Rivet changes the topic of conversation to the concept of Ratchet and Clank being their dimensional counterparts, wondering if this means her and Kit were meant to have a similar relationship. Kit and Rivet however both maintain that they are much more used to being on their own and Kit states that their alliance is only temporary, although Rivet is disheartened by Kit's words and glumly flies the ship down to the planet. At Outpost L51, the Emperor's forces are indiscriminately attacking the planet and the local inhabitants. The Emperor has been using the power of the Dimensionator to create rifts in the area for his armies to quickly advance through. Rivet destroys the attacking Nefarious Troopers and rescues the Morts taking cover. The Morts here inform Rivet that they have repaired the Seekerpede she fought on the planet earlier and it can be used to help fight the invasion back, but it has become partially stuck inside of a dimensional anomaly. Rivet quells their worries and tells them to leave it to her and Kit. The Morts' helperbot Maynard again leads Rivet to her destination and flies through the battlefields towards the trapped Seekerpede. On the way there Kit realises the Troopers are not just going after the Morts but seeking to exterminate all life on the planet. Rivet encounters holograms of the Emperor and Dr. Nefarious, who taunt her and attempt to demoralize her efforts to stop the invasion.
They break through the Emperor's forces and finally reach the Seekerpede, where Kit makes contact with the anomaly and has her consciousness transported to the space between dimensions like Clank had done. She meets Gary's astral form the same as Clank and he helps her with fixing the anomaly, where they have a happy reunion and catch up on all that has happened recently. The two discuss their thoughts on Clank, and how it's not so surprising that he is Kit's dimensional counterpart. Gary comments that the dimensional cataclysm has been intensifying faster than he expected, with Kit citing the reason being the Emperor's reckless overuse of the new Dimensionator. Kit repairs the anomaly, and she and Gary are overjoyed to see how far the other has come through so much adversity. With the Seekerpede freed, the Morts take the pilot controls and use it to attack the Emperor's battle cruisers.
Rivet and Kit take down a cruiser themselves by overloading the ship's power generator and the Morts send Rivet's Pterafoid Flyer friend Trudi to pick them up to help in the fight. The Emperor then orders his battle cruisers to activate their Destruct-o Beams to blast through the planet's crust and destabalize it's core to destroy it. This can be done in a matter of minutes so Rivet and Kit fly on Trudi's back and use her fireball attack to quickly destroy the ship's power generators on their decks. Upon destroying one however, the Emperor orders the cruisers to put up their energy shields, making them invulnerable to any weapon Rivet or Kit have. Just when the situation appears grim, a Mort calls Rivet and informs her they had created bombs out of the Gelatonium waste stashes from their factories that are powerful enough to penetrate the shields. Whilst Trudi picks up the bombs to toss at the ships, the Seekerpede provides a distraction by attacking the invasion mothership. The bombs begin to work and the battle cruisers' numbers start to whittle. The Seekerpede however is eventually shot down by the Emperor's forces and the final cruiser is ordered to concentrate all it's power on destroying the planet. Trudi tosses a bomb at the last Battle Cruiser, causing it to start exploding and flying out of control into the side of the Mothership. The Cruiser collision then causes a chain reaction of explosions and the Mothership crashes to the planet below. Trudi flies Rivet and Kit back to a crowd of cheering Morts to celebrate their victory.
Once the crowd disperses and Trudi flies off, the Emperor emerges from a rift behind the two and sends them into a pocket dimension with the Dimensionator. Rivet is not worried however and knows to use her Rift Tether to escape but needs to find a damaged piece of the dimension first to open a rift out. Whilst looking, Kit asks Rivet about her history with the Emperor. She mentions she had spent a long time fighting his regime and in the process lost friends and her arm. Rivet explains she lost her arm whilst on a mission in Nefarious City, she had found a secret entrance into Nefarious Tower and attempted to enter alone but was suddenly attacked by one of the Emperor's warbots. Her attacker for an unknown reason to her did not finish the Lombax off and she was able to escape, but built herself a new robotic arm to replace the one she lost. Upon hearing this, Kit is hit with a dread realization and attempts to speak to Rivet, but the Lombax brushes it off and at that moment finds an exit out of the pocket dimension back to Sargasso. They decide to head back to Zurkie's to plan their next move and see if Ratchet and Clank have any good news to share.
Ardolis[]
Whilst flying his ship down to the Pirate Base, Ratchet narrowly avoids more rifts suddenly appearing in his flightpath, to which Clank notes the dimensional cataclysm is getting worse. Ratchet worries how they will fix this situation but Clank assures him they will find a way, as they have done many times before. On the ship's space radio, a pirate announces that Ardolis is closed for the day for a private event: the execution of Pierre Le Fer. All trespassers are to be shot and/or stabbed on sight. Pierre had violated Article 4 of the Pirate Code in his earlier battle against Rivet on Torren IV by destroying his own ship; a written rule no pirate should break under penalty of death. Ratchet and Clank hurry through the pirate's caves and barracks to save Pierre from being fed to a giant Kraken the pirate's have named Bubbles. On the way there, Ratchet asks Clank if he will help him find the other Lombaxes once their mission to save the dimensions is over, to which Clank of course agrees. Ratchet confides he has been having second thoughts. He previously thought the Dimensionator would only bring him trouble but without it, the two would never have met Rivet or Kit and he feels this means something more.
After rescuing Pierre, he tells Ratchet and Clank that if they want an audience with Quantum, they will need to complete the Pirate Trials located at Skull Mountain, however upon getting there they find the trials are actually a theme park attraction. Nonetheless, they partake in the trials, which include a shanty karaoke challenge, battling a Grunthor named Snoojax (this trial is temporarily out of order as the Grunthor's food dispenser was broken and it has long since starved to death) and fighting several waves of pirates, as well as a Marauder named Crabcakes McGee. After they save Pierre from it, Bubbles the Kraken began following Ratchet and Clank as they made their way to Captain Quantum and attempted to attack them numerous times.
After finally meeting Quantum, he reveals to the two that he has the Emperor's Assistant bugged and using the bucket-like, helmet device on his head, is able to listen in on and know all of Nefarious' plans. Ratchet immediately recognises that Quantum is not a robot like the other Space Pirates and this annoys him, causing him to lunge at Ratchet and for his helmet disguise to fall off of his head. Upon seeing Quantum's true face he remarks that Rivet's dimension has it's own version of Qwark. At this moment the other pirates arrive and through a misunderstanding, they believe that Quantum has decapitated their Captain, leading them to vengefully launch a full on assault on the three. Quantum promises Ratchet that if he helps him escape the pirates he will give him the device for spying on Emperor Nefarious. Ratchet then fights off waves of ambush attacks from the pirates and deactivates their plunder beam, leaving them to use their Scuttler cannon, protected by two Marauders named the Tide Twins. With no other options to stop the Scuttler, Ratchet rings the large bell used to attract Bubbles and the Kraken pulls the ship under the sea.
After finally getting clear of the pirates and having fulfilled their deal, Quantum gives Ratchet and Clank the spybug device. Quantum is intrigued about his counterpart and Ratchet informs him of Qwark's many deplorable past acts but concedes that he never stops trying to be a hero in spite of them. Right at this moment however, the Emperor emerges from a rift above them and opens a large rift beneath their ship to send them to Zordoom Prison. Quantum, having been inspired to attempt being a hero again after so long, sacrifices himself and allows Ratchet and Clank to both escape with the helmet spy device while he is pulled into the rift. Ratchet rows him and Clank back to the Pirate Base in the helmet using his wrench and the two decide to head back to Zurkie's to plan their next move with Rivet and Kit.
Retrieving the Dimensional Map[]
While Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit are on their way back to Zurkie's to meet up again, a public broadcast from Emperor Nefarious plays. After sending Quantum to Zordoom and believing he had trapped Rivet in a pocket dimension, he announces that he is now rid of the last of his enemies and the galaxy is finally his. After the broadcast is ended, Ratchet and Clank use Quantum's helmet to continue listening into the Emperor's talks in his office. The Emperor feels depressed that he seemingly now has everything he sought to accomplish in his life but does not feel any different for it. Dr. Nefarious infers that the Emperor had mistakenly equated happiness with success and having now fully achieved it, his life has no meaning anymore. The Emperor angrily discarded this notion however and concluded that the true reason is that he has not yet conquered all dimensions in existence. The Doctor reminds him that finding them would not be easy, as it took him years personally just to find the coordinates specifically for Rivet's dimension. The Emperor however was already aware of exactly what he needs; the Dimensional Map. Upon hearing this, Ratchet and Clank understand this to mean the Emperor is going to Savali to steal the Map from the Interdimensional Archives. Rivet and Kit hear this too and the four change course for Savali.
Ratchet and Clank arrive at the planet first and regretfully inform Rivet and Kit that Nefarious had gotten there before them and has destroyed the Archives. The Nefarious Troopers attempt to stop anyone from entering the Archives and Ratchet defeats them. The Emperor's overuse of the Dimensionator had been causing the boundaries between the universes to begin coming undone, allowing skeletal creatures from a nightmare dimension to break into Rivet's dimension through rifts. These undead monsters indiscriminately attacked both the troopers and Ratchet and appeared to be counterparts of the Goons-4-Less. Ratchet nicknamed them Bone Goons. Upon breaking through both the troopers and undead Goons, Ratchet and Clank entered the Archives' vault and found that the map was missing. The two contacted Rivet and Kit just as they arrived at the planet and informed them that the Emperor must have gotten there first. Rivet flew her ship up to the Emperor's Flagship and assured they would get it back. Kit asked if Gary and the Savali Monks were safe and Ratchet in turn stated he and Clank would find them.
Rivet and Kit sneak onto the Emperor's ship and fight their way up to the upper levels to find Nefarious and the map, but instead they find Gary being held prisoner. After freeing him, Gary explains the Emperor had him captured after he and the monks hid the map inside of a dimensional anomaly to keep it out of his reach. However, with the Emperor using the Dimensionator so recklessly to open rifts everywhere, it would only be a matter of time before he finds it. Rivet and Kit relay this to Ratchet and Clank, who then make their way out of the wrecked Archives to the Urfdah Mesa. While Rivet and Kit get Gary out of the ship to safety, Ratchet and Clank make their way to the anomaly inside the planet's catacombs. To reach them, they first need to activate the Excavation Towers by using three nearby pressure locks, all while combating relentless numbers of undead goons. Once this is done, the excavation machine's laser is activated and a path underground to the catacombs entrance is created. Ratchet and Clank enter the catacombs, ride a Speetle through the aqueducts and eventually reach the chamber containing the anomaly. The other monks here have found the rift to the skeletal ceatures' dimension and they ask Ratchet to hold them back while they seal the portal the army of undead are emerging from. Once the Undead Grunthor and Bone Goons are defeated, the monks close the rift and Clank makes his way to the anomaly to now retrieve the map. Clank repairs the anomaly on his own as Gary is not present and he finally learns enough about dimensionality to stop the Cataclysm. All he needs now is the Dimensionator to reverse the damage that has been done.
Clank retrieves the Dimensional Map but finds that the two Nefariouses were waiting for him. The Emperor holds Ratchet by the throat and threatens to kill him if Clank does not give him the map. He very reluctantly hands it over to Dr. Nefarious and the Emperor sends both of them through a rift to be incarcerated at Zordoom Prison, where he gloats he will be hosting a viewing party of all his victories. Just as Rivet and Kit arrive, the Emperor inserts the map into the Dimensionator and Kit tells Rivet to run, knowing that transforming into her warbot form will expose the truth about her past to the Lombax. Rivet refuses to do so and Kit dourly utters that she is sorry. With no options left, Kit turns into her warbot mode and Rivet is horrified to discover her new friend was the same assailant that caused her to lose her arm years ago. Kit mournfully turns away from her, knowing this revelation would destroy their budding friendship and she makes a dash towards the Emperor, shooting the Dimensionator out of his hand. He cowers in fear when a rift is suddenly opened behind Kit and she is sucked inside and sent to Zordoom aswell, with the Emperor left looking confused at what had happened. It is then revealed that Dr. Nefarious quickly used the Dimensionator and had saved the Emperor's life. The Emperor then snatches the Dimensionator back from him, opens a rift and roughly pushes the Doctor inside before jumping in himself. Rivet looks at the scene before her in despair whilst clutching her robot arm then despondently throws it to the ground. Overlooking the Urfdah Mesa, Rivet returns to her ship feeling painfully shellshocked over what had just happened. After a moment she gathers herself, activates her ship and leaves the planet.
Zordoom Prison[]
Over the stormy seas of planet Viceron, Rivet determinedly flies her ship and low-key lands on the outskirts of Zordoom Prison. She melancholically recounts aloud to herself on her previous experience at the prison in which she made an escape. Rivet makes her way through the Boneyard and heads for the prisoner Processing Centre. With knowledge from her prior ordeal at the prison, Rivet remarks aloud that this is where Ratchet and Clank should be being held and with a scornful tone to her voice; also Kit. After passing through the Disposal Centre, Rivet reaches the Processing Centre and enters the building through it's ventilation system. She finds in many of the cells that the Goons-4-Less and the Space Pirates have also been captured by the Emperor's forces, along with many of the Resistance and unlawful patrons from Zurkie's. The Emperor's Assistant had recently been given the job of Warden at the prison and she begins becoming maniacally drunk on her new position of power. Ratchet, Clank and Kit are designated as priority prisoners and the Assistant orders the Nefarious Troopers to send Clank to incineration. Rivet destroys the troopers and rescues Clank just in time. She unlocks all the cells and releases the Resistance prisoners, including Phantom and Quantum. Phantom points Rivet in the direction that Ratchet and Kit were just taken out of the Processing Centre. He offers to help Rivet but she tells Phantom and Quantum to instead help the other prisoners escape the planet first.
Rivet and Clank exit the centre and spot Ratchet and Kit's cell being transferred via a crane platform to the prison's rail system. They pass through the Prisoner Transfer Centre and latch on to their cell, just as it is being tranferred to the main prison. Clank frets how Kit must be feeling but after avoiding the subject of her for awhile, Rivet flatly summarizes to Clank that Kit is the warbot that took off her arm. Clank is stunned and left speechless at this revelation. Ratchet and Kit's cell continues to be moved through the prison and into the V.I.P. West Wing. Upon catching back up to them, Rivet deduces that to free them, she will need to power down the prisoner cells and doing so can only be done from the Warden's Office. On the way there, Clank asks Rivet if she could ever forgive Kit for what happened and persuades her to try. Rivet is unsure if she can but maintains it will not stop the Lombax from saving her. Upon breaking into the Warden's office, the Assistant fearfully hides herself in a forcefield and feigns that she was only following the Emperor's orders. Rivet initiates a shutdown of all the prison's cells and accidentally causes the main reactor to begin going critical. In the chaos, the Assistant escapes the office, reroutes power to the VIP section and sends in several Nefarious Troopers to destroy Rivet and Clank.
With all of the cells unlocked, a huge prison riot takes place with the goons and pirates against the troopers. After escaping the office back to the West Wing, Ratchet and Kit's cell is transferred again and begins being moved to Maximum Security. Upon Rivet freeing them all, the goons and pirates both team up together and form an alliance with Rivet to battle the Nefarious Troopers. Rivet catches back up with the cell again and the system's priority transfer is initiated. During the transfer down an elevator shaft, Ratchet and Rivet both question Kit for ideas but the robot is utterly dejected and states she has none, eliciting frustration from Rivet at her self-defeating attitude. Once at the bottom of the shaft, the cell is again transferred at high speed on the rail system, forcing Rivet to quickly chase it with her hoverboots as the area is being sealed off. Due to the riot in progress, the Prison V.I. announces the activation of it's giggle gas protocol, causing Rivet to laugh uncontrollably and behave deliriously.
After following the cell through the backup generator room and outside, the affects of the gas wear off and they eventually track Ratchet and Kit to the emergency evacuation platforms. A large rift opens and a huge Nefarious starship emerges overhead. The Priority Transfer is activated and their cell is prepped for emergency evacuation. Clank implores to Rivet that it is imperative they stop their cell from being airlifted to the ship as they will have no way to track them anymore and may lose Ratchet and Kit entirely. Rivet fights her way through waves of the Assistant's Nefarious Troopers and destroys the Royal Guard Escorts. After the billions of bolts in damages caused under her watch and numerous prisoner escapes, the Assistant is fired from her job by an unheard voice, to which she angrily replies aloud that they can't fire her and that she instead quits. Using a hammercrank, Rivet reverses the direction of the cell's transfer and brings it back to the platform, where it crashes open and Ratchet and Kit are finally freed. Suddenly Phantom arrives on the platform piloting Rivet's ship to pick them up.
Kit remains in the cell and Rivet asks Ratchet and Clank to give them some time to talk. Rivet attempts to speak to a despondent Kit after Clank had asked the Lombax about trying to forgive her but Kit immediately declares she is going back to Savali and regrets leaving her isolation. Rivet is aggravated that Kit is deciding to leave them at such a critical time in their efforts to stop the Emperor and save the dimensions. Kit tells Rivet she is truly sorry for the pain she has caused her and reiterates that she is not fit to be anyones partner. Rivet is again aghast in frustration at Kit's self-defeating attitude and asserts that things could have been much different for the two had the robot not been so afraid. Kit becomes distressed at Rivet's shrewd abrasiveness and exclaims that none of them properly understand how broken she truly feels. Kit turns her back to Rivet and the Lombax spits that she go hide as she wishes to while reiterating that she does not need a partner. For a moment Rivet mournfully looks back in Kit's direction but soon reaffirms her frustrated mix of emotions and heads back to the ship with Ratchet, Clank and Phantom. Ratchet asks where Kit is and Rivet apathetically states she is not coming. Kit turns back around as the ship takes off and watches it leave the planet.
Planning the final assault[]
Rivet flies her ship with Ratchet, Clank and Phantom to Zurkie's and lands. She immediately gets out and walks on ahead, still feeling deeply frustrated at her current mental state. Ratchet confronts her about what happened with Kit and declares that she should be there with them, to which Rivet retorts that she did not want to be. Ratchet tries to reason with her that Kit feels she is dangerous and needs help. Rivet turns around to Ratchet and lashes out at him, exclaiming that Kit may well be a danger. With a very concerned look on his face, Ratchet argues that Rivet is behaving this way out of fear and it's not fair to simply give up on Kit completely because of it. In turn, even with an extremely angry look on her face, Rivet derides Ratchet's own seemingly irrational fear of looking for the Lombaxes and how Rivet's own fears of Kit all made sense. The two suddenly stop themselves from going any further in their argument and quickly apologized to one another. The four of them enter Zurkie's Gastropub together where they meet back up with the escapees from Zordoom. Across the Gastropub, Quantum stands at the bar calling out to the new arrivals, claiming that he knows a way to find the Emperor and for them to come talk to him when they are ready.
Quantum begins explaining his plan to find the Emperor but soon enough he makes himself easy to find. The power to the Gastropub suddenly gets cut except for the monitor screens and the Emperor's insignia appears on them. A public broadcast plays in which he explains to the denizens of Rivet's universe how they are merely a part of a single dimension and his personal stance on subjugating everyone equally means that all of the others must also follow suit. He reveals he has a large war fleet assembled in orbit of Corson V prepared for invasion. Before beginning, he states he wishes to thank Dr. Nefarious for being the one to inspire this journey in the first place with his recent foray to this dimension. He hands a glass of champagne to the Doctor, before clinking it with his own in a toast. However, the Emperor's definition of thanking the Doctor is to invade and conquer his home dimension personally. Dr. Nefarious spits out his drink in shock and becomes angered upon hearing this. The Emperor however suddenly pushes the Doctor to the ground and grabs the Dimensionator off of him before declaring his first destination to be Megalopolis, which he intends to redub New Nefarious City. He creates an enormous rift in front of Corson V leading straight to it's counterpart in Ratchet and Clank's dimension and laughs as his armies advance into it. Ratchet watches the broadcast from Zurkie's looking dismayed until Rivet puts her hand on his shoulder and asks when they leave. They turn around to see their many allies from the Resistance and Savali Monks to their new unions with the Goons-4-Less and Space Pirates; all ready to help them in the fight. Ratchet responds they leave immediately. Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and all their allies' ships then soon later follow the Emperor's forces through the huge rift leading to Megalopolis.
Cross-dimensional invasion[]
Ratchet and Clank fly into the city and the two find Corson V resembling it's counterpart in Rivet's dimension with Nefarious Tower standing at the heart of the city and the Emperor's insignia brandished on many of the buildings. The walls between the dimensions have continued to deteriorate, causing structures from other realities to materalize in Megalopolis. Ratchet and Clank land their ship amongst the invasion and are informed by Rivet via their communicator that the two Nefariouses are just up ahead of the Midtown Mall. Trudi is brought to help and Rivet rides on her back, instructing Ratchet that if he can distract Nefarious, she can try and grab the Dimensionator off of him from above. Ratchet runs ahead to help and joins in with the goons and pirates in the fight against the Nefarious Troopers. He clears out a squadron of Nefarious Sniperbots and successfully forces the troopers to retreat back to the Emperor. The Emperor fires the Dimensionator wildly whilst laughing alongside a rather disgruntled Dr. Nefarious. A pair of citizens exclaim in relief to see Ratchet and Clank arrive and the Emperor deduces that the two are the heroes of this dimension, which he finds to be quite humorous. He declares that this occasion calls for a special sort of annihilation and creates a rift to which he and the Doctor quickly disappear into. Rivet riding on Trudi suddenly flies overhead and she just misses her opportunity to seize the Dimensionator.
She flies down the Midtown Skyway and ponders aloud what the Emperor's next move is before a large rift suddenly opens just ahead and an enormous robot in the form of the Emperor emerges. The giant mech spooks Trudi and Rivet is sent hurtling off of her back through a rift and onto a nearby rooftop. The Emperor announces the appearance of his Imperial Power Suit and remarks that Rivet coming out of her exhile to fight him head on is rather uncharacteristic of the Lombax, as he feels he had gotten too used to her being dull after so long. He uses the Power Suit in conjunction with the Dimensionator to fight Rivet from a distance by creating rifts near her and attacking through them with lasers fired from the ends of the Suit's arms. The monitors on the ends of the arms are deduced to be the only vulnerable parts on the Suit's exterior and Rivet attacks them with the goons to hold it back long enough for Ratchet and Quantum to put a plan they have into action.
Pierre arrives on a pirate ship and picks up Rivet, bringing them alongside a kamikaze ship loaded with explosives being piloted by Quantum with Ratchet, Clank and Qwark onboard. After Quantum delivers a heroic speech to Emperor Nefarious with Qwark's blessing, he and Qwark jump onto Pierre's ship and Ratchet steers the kamikaze ship towards the Power Suit. Ratchet jumps off the ship just before impact and it explodes into the Suit's head. The attack does not have much affect on the Suit however and Ratchet lands on some dimensionally displaced pirate structures where he continues the fight against the mech with the Space Pirates. The Emperor laughs that this dimension thinks it will get the best of him and announces to permanently retire it's heroes. Ratchet instructs the pirates to keep shooting at the monitors on the eyes and ends of it's arms as the Power Suit's head continuously appears out of closeby rifts and shoots energy attacks from it's eyes and mouth at them. The Emperor proclaims that this method is how to properly make your dimension respect you, citing it as unconventional but effective. Dr. Nefarious' tolerance of the Emperor begins to reach it's breaking point and he angrily grumbles that his methods are also lacking in artistry, imagination or elegance before he furiously bellows that this is rightfully his dimension to rule. After damaging the Suit's monitors enough, the mech is blinded and the Emperor demands it be fully brought back online to his underlings.
Ratchet and Clank are sucked into a rift and land in a floating debris field near the flailing Power Suit, where Rivet informs them that Gary and the Savali Monks have a way to help. With the Suit blinded, Ratchet is able to get close enough to the Suit and for the monks to stabilize a rift on it's chest, allowing the Lombax to enter it's heart chamber and destroy it's power source to finally take it down. The Emperor begins becoming enraged while Dr. Nefarious relishes at his struggling. As Ratchet attacks the heart and fights off the attacking troopers, the Emperor shouts in bewilderment as to why they will not submit to him. Dr. Nefarious illustrates that this great tenacity from his enemies is the true reason his dimension is so hard to take over and not the notion that the Doctor was incompetent as the Emperor had believed. Ratchet destroys the bio-mechanical heart and escapes through another rift stabilized by the monks. In the chaos however, Ratchet and Clank are thrown through the rift to the other side of the city as the Power Suit collapses, leaving Rivet alone against the Emperor.
Dr. Nefarious pulls himself out of the wreckage onto the Suit's head whilst brandishing the Dimensionator and holds it up in triumphant laughter. The Emperor quickly cuts him off however and savagely punches him in the face, knocking him off of the Suit's head and taking the Dimensionator back for himself again. The Emperor then turns his attention towards Rivet and in an intense rage proclaims he will bring in every last one of his armies to force Rivet to bow before him. He then begins wildy firing the Dimensionator, creating several rifts in the sky and further fragmenting the already crumbling dimensions. Thousands of Nefarious Troopers pour out of the rifts, laughing and surround Rivet with their weapons trained on her. Just as they are about to attack, several missiles from the sky blast them. Rivet looks around in startled confusion, then sees the source in the sky. Kit in her warbot form, quickly flies down and performs a landing punch onto a Nefarious Juggernaut, before turning to Rivet. She admits to Rivet that the Lombax was right and proclaims that she is done running away from her problems anymore. Rivet declares she will not let Kit do this alone. Kit accepts her help and instructs Rivet to take down the Emperor while she holds back his armies.
Whilst fighting Rivet, the Emperor begins hysterically pronouncing that he is loved by everyone and is the destined ruler of every dimension. Rivet attempts to reason with him and cries out that he has gone too far with him tearing reality apart and needs to stop or all of existence will be destroyed. The Emperor however mocks her pleads and sarcastically demeans the dimensons as being thankless and uninspiring. After sustaining damage, the Emperor attempts to hide behind the wreckage of the Power Suit and orders his troopers to attack Rivet to protect him. Rivet in turn ridicules his cowardice and that everyone can see him now for what he really is. Kit helps Rivet with the attacking troopers and Nefarious remarks that she would come back after so long just to betray her Emperor. Kit however fully denounces her previous life to him and that he is not her Emperor. On the cusp of being defeated, the Emperor again orders all his remaining troopers to protect him. Rivet and Kit then fight off the last of his forces together, leaving him utterly alone now.
The Emperor suddenly however starts to lose his mind and absolutely refuses to accept a defeat. He goes mad and begins overclocking the Dimensionator to collapse every dimension in existence into nothingness. Rivet jumps into Kit's hand and the bot hurls her through the air towards Nefarious, where she strikes the Emperor with a powerful blow to the face with her hammer, knocking him flying onto the head of the wrecked Power Suit. The Dimensionator is launched into the air and as it falls, is caught by Ratchet aboard a pirate ship with Quantum and Pierre. As the Emperor almost falls from the Suit's head, Ratchet shoots a rift under him but he is able to pull himself back up before getting sucked in. Ratchet turns to Clank, who rings a large bell on the pirate ship, calling a large kraken tentacle to emerge from the rift and grab the Emperor. He manages to grab onto a ledge and stop himself from being pulled in but Dr. Nefarious then confronts the Emperor and stands over him. He pleads to Dr. Nefarious for help and proposes they can still win this fight together. Despite the Doctor's attempts to form a legitimate partnership with the Emperor, he however had felt nothing but loathing for his self-obsessed counterpart in the time he came to know him and easily sees through him. Using the same words the Emperor had used against him previously; the Doctor coldly asks "What do you know about winning?", before kicking his hand off the ledge and sending him into the rift below. The rift closes and Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit reunite in celebration. Dr. Nefarious leaps into the air in his own celebration but slips off the head of the Power Suit, which falls over ontop of him and pins him to the ground.
Upon again noticing the dimensional chaos around them, Ratchet holds the Dimensionator down for Clank to use, so he can finally reverse the damage to the dimensions. Clank inputs commands into the Dimensionator and his eyes turn purple. A bright light shines from the Dimensionator and the dimensional chaos throughout Megalopolis begins to vanish as all of their allies celebrate. Gary closes his father's book looking contented that the dimensions have been saved while Nefarious Tower disappears from the city and the last of the damage is finally repaired. Sometime later, Kit sits on the edge of the Midtown Atrium with Rivet on her shoulder and the two have a much needed conversation. Rivet apologizes for the things she had said in her hysteric state to Kit at Zordoom and fully recognizes her as her friend. She thanks Kit for ultimately coming back and for saving her life. Kit holds out her hand; proposing they continue to be a team again and Rivet happily agrees. Ratchet walks up behind Rivet and Kit holding Clank and concludes that this is where they return to their respective homes. However, Ratchet suggests before doing so they make a pit stop on the way to a place Ratchet presumes Rivet already knows the answer to. Kit is seen looking excited at this notion while fireworks are shot into the sky, exploding into the shapes of Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit in celebration of their victory.
Ending Credits[]
Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit are seen being carried by a celebrating crowd of Megalopolis citizens. The four are then seen at Zurkie's where Clank finally has his missing arm replaced with one of a yellow color scheme the same as Rivet's. On the monitor screen in Zurkie's, a breaking news report from earlier is being broadcasted showing the four in Nefarious City, where Kit in her warbot form and Rivet pull down a giant statue of the Emperor to mark the liberation of the planet. Dr. Nefarious is next seen bidding an end to his brief stint as emperor in Rivet's dimension and leaves Emperor Nefarious' office to go visit Lawrence and his family where he dotes on their newborn, robot child. On planet Sargasso, Trudi is seen flying through the skies with her own newborn offspring after Rivet had collected Zurpstones for her to eat earlier and was told about her pregnancy.
Next, Gary is seen with his father the Plumber as the two look through their book of universal knowledge together and catalogue the events that just transpired. Within the book, one such event shows Zurkie, Ms. Zurkon and Zurkon Jr. at their Battleplex, brandishing their weapons after destroying a large number of Nefarious Troopers together. On planet Savali, the Goons-4-Less and Savali Monks begin teaching the other about their own respective lifestyles, with the goons being taught the art of peaceful meditation and the monks learning more about body building. In Rivet's homebase on Sargasso, she hangs up a new picture on her wall along with the one of herself and her Resistance friends Quantum, Moydoy and Clatchkey. In the new picture she hangs up, Rivet is having a picnic on Sargasso with the Morts along with her new friends Ratchet, Clank and Kit.
Next, Ratchet is seen finally introducing Rivet, Clank and Kit to Glitch, the nano-systems IT bot that helped him through his journey by destroying the Zeta Virus infections that were hampering his progress. Glitch was eventually able to overcome her insecurities in her own abilities, successfully destroyed the Zeta Master Virus and with the reparation of the dimensions, the threat of the virus continuing to spread was halted indefinitely. Back in the Emperor's office, the Emperor's Assistant is seen attempting to slip into his throne to usurp some of his power that she had longed for, but she is soon chased out by Ms. Zurkon and Phantom. On planet Ardolis, Bubbles the kraken grasps Quantum's helmet in one of it's tentacles while a group of pirates stand around one of the creature's feeding pits, which Pierre throws an Emperor Nefarious statuette into.
Talwyn accompanies Ratchet and Clank as they go to the Savali Archives and return the Dimensional Map to it's pedestal. Earlier, whilst standing on a balcony in Monktown, Ratchet comments that he wishes Talwyn could be there to see Savali with him, and so he brings her to the planet here. Ratchet looks into one of the map's holographic viewscreens and sees the Archives' exterior where Rivet and Kit are seen helping Gary and the monks in fixing the damages caused by Emperor Nefarious during his invasion. The Archives here are also shown to be thoroughly repaired and has regained it's defensive walking capability again after the Emperor's attacks disabled it.
In the debris of Blizar Prime, the Fixer is seen putting the planet back together piece by piece. In front of him stands the Blizon Mines' Chief Engineer of Rivet's dimension; whom was previously only known as the "Mysterious Stranger", along with her Science Bots. Qwark and Quantum are next seen trying out heroic poses together. Back in Nefarious Tower, Rivet and Kit go through the Emperor's record collection, comprised entirely of music created and sung by himself. Rivet laughs and shows Kit the recent record cover for "Join Me at the Top", a song in which the Emperor forced Dr. Nefarious to sing a duet with him.
The Junk Bot of the unknown, abandoned dimension is seen on the surface of Kedaro Station happily greeting several more benevolent members of Juice's species in the Cordelion waters. In Zurkie's again, Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit are seen dancing and enjoying the festivities in the crowded Gastropub while Pierre and Quantum stand at the bar drinking together. Chef Tulio and the Sous Chef are then seen on the unknown dimension's Blizar Prime, serving the Chief Engineer and the rest of the miners their Sirangian Honey smorgasbord after Rivet had earlier helped Tulio harvest it from a Fendersax wasp hive. Finally; Ratchet, Clank, Rivet and Kit are seen together and Ratchet powers up the Dimensionator. He creates a rift with it and the four all jump in, leaving to an unknown destination of which is heavily implied to be the Lombax dimension.
Development[]
Background[]
Rift Apart was built from the ground up for PlayStation 5, and directed by Insomniac Creative Director Marcus Smith,[6] who had previously directed Sunset Overdrive and Resistance 3.
In the announcement trailer, Ratchet and Clank are seen running through rifts that take them through several planets, including alternate reality versions[4] of Sargasso, Torren IV, Ardolis, as well as a city named Megalopolis.[3] The Goons-4-Less[3] and a giant hologram of Dr. Nefarious are also seen, as well as Rivet, a female lombax. The scenes depicted in this trailer differ from those of the final game.
The PlayStation 5's increased horsepower allowed more enemies, effects, and objects to be loaded per world, as Insomniac intended for each planet to feel real and alive than was possible on previous generations. The Solid State Drive of the PlayStation 5 also allowed gameplay in which players could be projected to other worlds at near-instantaneous speed, creating the first Ratchet & Clank with no load screens between planets. The PlayStation 5 also allowed for 3D spatial audio, creating greater immersion.[6][3]
On the 11 of February in 2021 the release date of June 11 in the same year was revealed on the PlayStation website blog. It also included information on the game's pre-orders for the Standard Edition and Digital Deluxe Edition. The former includes a graphically remastered version of the carbonox armor from Going Commando (for both Ratchet and Rivet), as well as the Pixelizer (also visually improved) from Ratchet & Clank (2016 game). The Digital Deluxe edition contains, aside from the full game, five armor sets (four plus the carbonox armor), a sticker pack for the new Photo Mode, 20 Raritanium used to upgrade weapons, and a digital soundtrack and artbook.[1] Standard editions of Rift Apart will offer players the option to upgrade to the deluxe edition from the title menu for an additional cost, granting them all of the aforementioned bonus content.
Most of the voice actors from previous games, such as James Arnold Taylor as Ratchet, David Kaye as Clank, and Armin Shimerman as Dr. Nefarious, reprise their roles in Rift Apart. The only longtime voice actor that did not reprise his role was Jim Ward, who voiced Captain Qwark, as he developed complications of precocious Alzheimer's Disease and COVID-19 in 2021, which forced him to retire from voice acting. His new voice actor is Scott Whyte.
Soundtrack[]
The soundtrack contains the music that is featured in the game. It was composed by Mark Mothersbaugh and Wataru Hokoyama, and released on June 9, 2021 with 20 tracks.
# | Song title | Length |
---|---|---|
1 | Rift Apart | 3:19 |
2 | Festival of Heroes | 3:54 |
3 | A Most Nefarious City | 4:06 |
4 | Sweet Home Sargasso | 4:08 |
5 | Ride Through the Omniverse | 2:16 |
6 | Ode to Nefarious | 1:58 |
7 | Meet Me at Zurkie's | 3:00 |
8 | Urfdah Mesa Major | 3:34 |
9 | Blizar Prime'd and Ready | 4:47 |
10 | Molonoth Means Paradise | 4:44 |
# | Song title | Length |
---|---|---|
11 | Cascading Entropic Fissure | 4:02 |
12 | A Tale of Two Cordelions | 5:01 |
13 | Glitch in the System | 3:05 |
14 | A Late Arrival | 2:10 |
15 | The Battle for Sargasso | 1:49 |
16 | Urfdah Mesa Minor | 1:41 |
17 | Y'Ardolis | 3:53 |
18 | Zordoom and Gloom | 4:03 |
19 | Culmination at Corson V | 5:36 |
20 | Join Me at the Top | 2:29 |
Reception[]
Aggregator | Score |
---|---|
OpenCritic | 88 (based on top critics' reviews)[7] and 95% (recommended by a total of 197 critics) |
Metacritic | 88 (based on 136 reviews)[8] |
Publication | Score |
Easy Allies | 8.5/10[9] |
Electronic Gaming Monthly | 5/5[10] |
Game Informer | 9/10[11] |
GamesRadar+ | 5/5[12] |
GameSpot | 9/10[13] |
IGN | 9/10[14] |
Rift Apart received highly positive reviews. Critics praised the visuals, the introduction and writing of Rivet, and the refined gameplay mechanics. Most of the praise focused on the game as a strong showcase of PlayStation 5 hardware, as critics were most impressed by the SSD's fast loading between levels, the DualSense making weapons feel different, and the graphical fidelity and high performance the hardware provided. As an adventure in its own right, it was commended for its heartfelt and humorous story, the weapons, and the traversal mechanics, though some critics noted that some of the side missions were poorer than core gameplay.[10][11][13][14] Rachel Weber, writing for GamesRadar+, called it the "best Ratchet and Clank adventure yet".[12]
Rift Apart was noted for taking advantage of the PlayStation 5 hardware. Andrew Reiner, writing for Game Informer, praised the graphics at both its Fidelity and Performance RT modes (while recommending Performance RT), calling the game a "visual dynamo that lights up the screen with cluttered sci-fi cityscapes, colorful aliens, and intricately detailed texturing".[11] Weber, of GamesRadar+ agreed, saying the game deserves the "like a Pixar movie" comparison, and looks pristine even with a high-speed pace. Weber also mentioned finding collectibles by accident after wandering around to take in more of the scenery.[12] Praise also went towards the use of the SSD for fast loading. Steve Watts, writing for GameSpot, said the lack of load times made the game feel "feel cinematic and harmonious in a natural, unselfconscious way". He also said the DualSense controller made a significant difference in how the weapons felt, helping the functionality feel "more impactful than a mere gimmick".[13] Weber also said the use of the DualSense in Rift Apart was "a great exhibit A in my campaign to convince the world" of the controller's merits.[12]
The story also received a positive reaction, with many comments focused on Rivet's character. Jonathon Dornbush, writing for IGN, said Rivet's distinctive personality made her feel like more than a gender-swap of Ratchet, calling her one of Insomniac's best-written characters and praising Jennifer Hale's performance. Dornbush said that she, and other new characters, were so indelible they it was "hard to imagine the series without them", but also said the old characters felt fresh.[14] Watts of GameSpot agreed, highlighting voice actress Jennifer Hale's portrayal of self-doubt and loneliness while maintaining her "heroic determination", and called Rivet the real star of the game and a "fantastic addition to the larger Ratchet & Clank universe".[13] Weber more broadly said that Rift Apart had evolved the series' storytelling, and said it was the first game in the series she had engaged with emotionally.[12]
Reaction to the core gameplay was positive. Most critics highlighting the Topiary Sprinkler as a standout weapon,[10][11][14] and praise also went to the traversal mechanics. Watts of GameSpot praised the newly introduced Phantom Dash and Rift Tether for combining well with Ratchet & Clank mainstays to allow for "breathless, harrowing setpieces" in platforming segments, and for being fun to use during combat.[13] Goroff of EGM also praised the use of the hoverboots, saying that their smoothness and ease of use made other ground-level traversal systems in gaming feel "pedestrian" by comparison.[10]
Critics were more divided on the game's secondary gameplay, with Clank and Glitch's missions receiving a positive reaction while the mount riding sections were criticized. Dornbush of IGN felt that moments spent riding mounts were the only times the game lost momentum. Conversely, he felt that the Clank puzzles were successful in making the player feel clever while not being too challenging, and said that Glitch's segments were fun due to Glitch's personality.[14] Watts of GameStop agreed, saying that riding Trudi felt "sluggish and temperamental" in comparison to Ratchet and Rivet while noting these segments were short enough to not detract too much from the overall experience, and praised the puzzle gameplay of Clank and Glitch.[13]
Gallery[]
Citations[]
- ā 1.0 1.1 Smith, Marcus (2021, February 11). "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart arrives on PS5 June 11". From PlayStation Blog. Archived from the original on June 11, 2021.
- ā 2.0 2.1 Huijbregts, Julian (2023, May 30). "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is coming to PC on July 26". From PlayStation Blog. Archived from the original on May 30, 2023.
- ā 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 (2020, August 27). Gamescom: Opening Night Live 2020 (Live, Thursday August 27 - 8 PM CEST / 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT) [Video]. YouTube.
- ā 4.0 4.1 4.2 Smith, Marcus (2021, April 26). "Meet Rivet, the mysterious new protagonist in Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart". From PlayStation Blog. Archived from the original on April 28, 2021.
- ā Insomniac Games [@PlayStation] (2021, April 26). Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart ā Gameplay Trailer I PS5 [Video]. PlayStation. YouTube.
- ā 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 Smith, Marcus [@PlayStation] (2020, June 20). Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart - Insomniac Insights | PS5 [Video]. YouTube.
- ā (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart for PS5 Reviews". From OpenCritic. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart for PlayStation 5 Reviews". From Metacritic. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā Huber, Michael [Allies @Easy Allies] (2021, June 8). Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart - Easy Allies Review [Video]. Easy Allies. YouTube.
- ā 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 Goroff, Michael (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart review". From 'Game Informer'. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 Reiner, Andrew (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Review ā Dazzling Dimensional Duality". From 'Game Informer'. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4 Weber, Rachel (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Review - A Riveting Adventure". From GameSpot. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā 13.0 13.1 13.2 13.3 13.4 13.5 Watts, Steve (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Review - A Riveting Adventure". From GameSpot. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.
- ā 14.0 14.1 14.2 14.3 14.4 Dornbush, Jonathon (n.d.) . "Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Review". From IGN. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021.