When Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart first debuted on PlayStation 5, it was touted as taking advantage of the console’s SSD for the insane dimension-hopping experience the game has to offer. Now that the title is heading to PC, it doesn’t interestingly need an SSD to run, which understandably, makes us wonder if all of that was just marketing jargon for the PlayStation 5. To answer that question, Julian Huijbregts, an Online Community Specialist at Nixxes Software, took to the PlayStation Blog to explain the wizardry behind the PC port of the game.
According to Huijbregts, the team at Nixxes Software implemented DirectStorage 1.2 in Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart on PC, including GPU decompression. This allows it to run on all storage types, including traditional hard disk drives. To elaborate further, here’s what Senior Lead programmer at Nixxes Software, Richard van der Laan, had to say: “To enable quick loading and instant transition between dimensions, the game needs to be able to load assets quickly. DirectStorage ensures quick loading times, and GPU decompression is used at high graphics settings to stream assets in the background while playing. Traditionally, this decompression is handled by the CPU, but at a certain point, there is an advantage to letting the GPU handle this, as this enables a higher bandwidth for streaming assets from storage to the graphics card. We use this to quickly load high-quality textures and environments with a high level of detail.”
More importantly, that means we now have the full PC specifications for Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, so you can determine just how good of an experience you’re going to get with your particular gaming PC. The minimum specifications might come as a surprise, since the game will only require a GTX 960 or RX 470 video card and an i3-8100 or a Ryzen 3 3100 paired with 8 GB of RAM. This, of course, means the game will run at 720p at 30 fps with very low graphics setting, but those are some very minimal requirements.
To achieve 1440p at 60 fps or 4K at 30 fps with high graphics settings, players will need a 3060 Ti or RX 6800 minimum, along with an i5-11400 or Ryzen 5 5600 processor and 16 GB of RAM. For “Ultimate Ray Tracing” that equates to 4K at 60 fps and Ray-tracing Very High settings, players will need an RTX 4080 and an i7-12700K or Ryzen 9 5900X with 32 GB of RAM. The game will require 75 GB of hard drive space.
While you don’t necessarily need an SSD to enjoy Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, it is recommended “to experience the game’s signature dimension-hopping gameplay as originally intended.”
We loved our playthrough of Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart. It’s a gorgeously stunning game on the PlayStation 5, with lovable characters, comical villains, and a surprisingly emotional story.
