Video games: A dazzling upgrade for a space cat and his sidekick
“A modern masterpiece,” Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart feels like “the first great game of the new console generation,” said
Gene Park in The Washington Post. For nearly 20 years, the Insomniac Games franchise built around a fuzzy alien cat and his robot sidekick has served up family-friendly capers full of silly characters, wacky weapons, and comic wisecracking. But everything about the “practically flawless” new Ratchet & Clank, a Sony PlayStation 5 exclusive, “elevates it above the series’ past high-water marks.” Think animation that surpasses Pixar’s in its detail, “dazzling set-piece action,” and a timeless, all-ages story. Once again, you play as the title characters, who this time are on a dimension-hopping adventure seeking to stop the evil Dr. Nefarious, said Andrew Webster in TheVerge.com.
But Rift Apart “pushes things quite a bit forward” by separating Ratchet and Clank and having each of them pair up with a new character. “A story with real heart” emerges as Rivet, a pessimistic female counterpart to Ratchet, learns to trust and work with others. You’ll feel as if you’re “inside a gorgeous animated film.” Apart from the interdimensional rifts that give the game its title, Rift Apart doesn’t innovate, said William Hughes in AVClub.com. The core appeal remains wreaking havoc with cartoonish guns that can, for example, shoot black holes or encase enemies in ice. In that sense, the game mostly offers a reunion with “the same old Ratchet & Clank.” But “there are worse things you could wish for” than reuniting with “one of gaming’s most energetically silly franchises.” her lost sister in a watery exoplanet’s polar ocean. “I was filled with wonder” as I swam through crystal caverns or alongside glowing whales in forests of giant lily pads. “It’s just a beautiful, beautiful game,” one whose sound design deepens your immersion. “The icy, oppressive, yet beckoning feeling of the arctic sea really comes alive when you hear the distant calls of massive oceanic life-forms through the shimmering gloom.”