It's official - Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is Steam Deck Verified

Rift Apart has earned its reputation as one of the few games that truly encapsulates the power of the PS5, and this is largely attributed to the console's lightning-fast SSD. The NVMe SSD allows the titular character Ratchet to jump across completely different worlds seamlessly without any stuttering or bothersome load screens.

This is made possible by the console's unique architecture, which enables the APU to directly load data into memory and decompress it in real time. Since both the CPU and GPU have access to this data, the GPU can directly retrieve assets from the SSD without the need to pass through the CPU first.

Rift Apart's seamless performance on the PS5 owes its success to the integration of Microsoft's DirectStorage 1.2. Leveraging the power of GPU decompression through the DirectStorage API, the game effortlessly renders high-quality textures and immersive environments with a high level of detail as players traverse through portals.

For the PC version, this remarkable achievement is made possible by NVIDIA's cutting-edge technology, NVIDIA RTX IO, which effectively bypasses the bottlenecks associated with traditional I/O processes.

Unfortunately for the Steam Deck, it lacks both DirectStorage and NVIDIA RTX IO. So, while the game manages to run reasonably well at 30 fps on low settings, frequent freezes occur when transitioning between different dimensions.

Reddit users have even reported more severe stutters, going as far as labeling the game as "completely unplayable." These issues have raised doubts among fans about the validity of the 'Steam Deck Verified' tag, as it appears to signify only playability rather than optimization. Of course, forums like Reddit also like to exaggerate drama.

Currently, the PC port appears to be the most viable choice. At the minimum, all you need is a GeForce GTX 960 or Radeon RX 470 graphics card, along with 8GB of RAM. Have you tried out Rift Apart on the Steam Deck? We'd love to hear your honest review and experience in the comments section below.