It's less than a week until the Friday release of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart. It could be the PlayStation 5's biggest exclusive release yet and PlayStation's been hyping it up as its biggest release of 2021 yet. It seems that PlayStation and developer Insomniac have one left secret left to share before the game arrives, however. Players who purchase Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart and download the game's day one patch will gain access to the game's Performance and Performant RT visual modes.
The Performance mode for Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart is confirmed to prioritize a healthy 60 frames per second. It achieves this by deprioritizing the game's resolution, which will drop below 4K as necessary. The Performance RT mode will also prioritize 60 fps. However, it will also prioritize Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart's ray tracing visual features. That means that the resolution will drop all the more significantly, but that's a tradeoff many will be willing to make.
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It has been previously confirmed that Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart will offer a 60 fps Performance mode, of course. The news was shared as far back as August 2020. What's new is that these modes what be immediately accessible out of the box. Insomniac appears to be clarifying that players have to download the day one patch in order to access both Performance and Performance RT modes. It's also informing players who may not be familiar with the previous announcements.
To further clarify, these performance modes won't require Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart players to download the patch on launch day. The patch will be available from launch forward. The language in Insomniac's message makes it sound like an exclusive feature for early adopters. That's not the case. Everyone will get access to it, so long as they connect to the internet and receive Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart's updates.
As for what that means for Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart's standard mode, Insomniac has previously said this mode will be 4K and 30fps. It's unclear if this mode will feature ray tracing inherently, or if there will be a separate 30fps mode with ray tracing that takes a bigger resolution hit. All modes assumedly use a type of dynamite resolution to ensure smooth framerates.
Choosing between visual modes will be the hardest decision Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart players have to make when they install their game for the first time. Both 4K at 30fps and lower resolution with 60 fps are great options. Not having a 4K 60 fps mode is a shame, but given the kind of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart visuals being offered, it's an understandable accommodation.
Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart releases June 11 on PS5.