(for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)
Good morning killers and survivors, welcome to Day 30 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.
One month.
One month since I got made redundant, and felt like my world had collapsed.
One month of writing every day to document my journey through unemployment.
One month of trying to share joy about the things I love.
It has not been easy, to be completely honest. Whilst a love of writing comes naturally to me, keeping on this route does bring some stress and strain to me, which feels weird to say given… every previous review I have written.
Possibly due to self-doubt, I currently find myself sitting here wondering if it is worth it to try to push towards writing professionally, especially as I return to the tech sphere on Monday. I still intend to write the Redundancy Review with no name change, but part of me wonders if I should just keep this a hobby, a passion I share with the world with no hesitation or desire for compensation.
Make it my escape from the world of tech rather than a new career path entirely – I still want to create, I still have plenty of stories to tell, I just do not know how best to… be a writer I guess. For someone who has been writing different pieces for around nine years now (think I got started in 2016 with GeekOut), albeit with very little consistency, you would think the self-doubt would go away.
Regardless, I am going to try to enjoy my time before I return to work. This period of unemployment has let me explore my different hobbies a lot more and make some improvements around the flat, but I am looking forward to having a regular source of income for a short amount of time.
Should be having some social time with friends today as well, which should be fun and give me a bit of time out the house.
Going to skip the call to action today, instead I want to ask for any encouraging words from other writers about getting past self-doubt. Wondering if I am doing good enough just by telling my story.
Time for the review, and considering I 100%ed another game last night I think that makes it a good time to talk about it – especially considering it comes from possibly my favourite franchise of all time.
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is currently the latest entry in the beloved series, releasing in June 2021 for PS5 and later receiving a PC port in July 2023. For those unaware, I really like Ratchet and Clank, having almost every game collected in physical copies and having even written a full retrospective on the trilogy years back. Having skipped out on the PS5 because of being a broke ass bitch, I was excited to give the game a go.
It did not disappoint.
First off, this game is absolutely gorgeous. The characters are well lit, the models are extremely expressive & bouncy, and for the most part the framerate stays at a consistent 60fps even at 4K on my rig. Both Rift Apart and previous iterations of the franchise have been called “playable Pixar movies” with it not being difficult to see why, the art style really lends itself to that whimsical feeling.
The premise of the game is the return of series favourite villain Dr Nefarious stealing a device known as the “Dimensionator” and using it to cause a dimensional cataclysm that sees our titular protagonists thrown into a new world, meeting another Lombax in the form of Rivet.
After getting a certain way into the story, the perspective shifts between the two Lombaxes across different planets, letting Rivet become more familiar with Clank and Ratchet getting a new robot on the scene named Kit to open up and trust others a bit more.
Despite there only being nine planets in the game, one of the smallest amounts next to Into the Nexus, there is plenty of variety across all of them.
Quite a few planets are revisited as part of the story with new areas being unlocked upon return, either due to actions happening in the story or, in the case of the battle arena, new sets of challenges being unlocked – good for making sure players have a reason to return, bad for me because I love the battle arenas and want to do everything in one go.
The core of the Ratchet and Clank franchise are the weapons, with Rift Apart being no exception in producing phenomenal weapons with unique traits across all of them. Rosalia Rambles Ratchet tradition dictates I do a rule-of-three rundown on some of my favourite weapons, so that is what I am going to do.
The Topiary/Toxiary Sprinkler is your typical enemy disabling weapon present in the franchise, giving you a chance to switch to a more powerful weapon to deal unabashed damage, In this instance, it takes the form of a sprinkler that will turn any enemies (even big massive bosses) into decorative topiaries of themselves for a short while. A silly and entertaining take on a standard weapon class.
One of my favourite entirely new weapons is the Ricochet/Wreckochet, a weapon that fires a seeking projectile that will hit an enemy before bouncing off it, hanging in the air and allowing you to press the trigger to use the projectile to enable a follow-up attack. With fun sound effects and having uses in both crowds & against larger targets, it quickly found a place in my heart.
Finally, we have the Blackhole Storm/Blackhole Vortex, a rapid firing gatling gun that is unlocked fairly late into the story, but is incredibly worth it once picked up. Taking some time to spin up, it will unleash a torrent of miniature black holes, raining antimatter death upon your enemies… until it overheats, after which point it needs some time to cool down.
What is unique to note that due to this game being on PS5 originally, it does support DualSense controllers with plenty of unique vibration patterns across different weapons, and the majority of weapons having a system where half and full trigger pulls do different things.
As shown in my achievements image, it did not take me long to 100% this game, having finished the remaining achievements only an hour or so into my New Game+ save, but I consider that time fully worth it. There were no instances of me being disappointed by any planet, the setpieces were fantastic and the combat has evolved for the modern day with features such as a dodge move and the rift tethering mechanic.
I would like to end off my review with a tribute to Captain Qwark’s original voice actor, Jim Ward. The captain returns in this game however briefly at the start, being voiced by a new actor, with Jim Ward having retired due to a double whammy of a severe case of COVID-19 and developing Alzheimer’s Disease.
Mr Ward, thank you for being one of the most recognisable voices of my childhood. I hope you can enjoy retirement.
That calls it for today, thank you so much for reading the Redundancy Review. With a heatwave on the way in the UK, I am going to focus on trying to stay as cool as possible.
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is available on PS5 and Steam.
Rosalia Rambles 
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