Rifts is one of the best games and settings of all time.
You will either think I am crazy or agree. There is really no middle ground here. I know about Savage Rifts, and while that is a fun, game-balanced version of the game, it does not do it for me. You know that scene in Avengers: Endgame where Captain Marvel is flying through the ships of the enemy battlefleet and destroying them by treating them like she is flying through paper?
That is Rifts.
That is what it lets you do.
I have a softcover in the mail, and the hardcover is still out of print. It is nice to see Palladium selling out of books, and they deserve all the praise and success they can get. This is one of the OG pen-and-paper role-playing game companies, and they make excellent games that are still very affordable.
You can be that powerful, and there are enemies out there that can out-power-level you and crush you like an ant under a shoe. Forget D&D 5E and its "managed power levels" that only let you go so far. Rifts is roleplaying with the rails removed. Does your 50 SDC/30 hp super-character get caught without their MDC armor, and someone vaporizes you with a low-power 1d4 MD laser pistol? Tough luck.
It is like one of those Heavy Metal scenes where the main character gets vaporized, and the audience sits in shock. That's life. Deal with it. You should have done that to the other guy before they pulled on you. Live and learn. Oh, and even if your character has 600 MD of hit points like Captain Marvel, a battlesuit could roll up on her doing 1d6x1000 MD, and it is basically the same thing. That's life. Deal with it.
Take your fake assumptions of fantasy superheroes and throw them in the trash, this game ain't that. Even a level 20 D&D character rigged for maximum damage still is not doing that 1d4 MD per attack, so those power levels are laughable and small. Sorry to burst your ego bubble, but that "D&D balance bubble" is a tiny, small, almost insignificant thing to beings that can harness the power of suns and atomic fusion blasts.
Just like your level 20 D&D fighter could not stand in front of an M1 battle tank and block the 120mm APFSDS shell flying at them, Rifts teaches you "you ain't all that." One cloud of red mist later, you realize that was probably a dumb idea as 20 levels of XP get torn up with the character sheet, and tiny bits of magic armor go flying.
In Rifts? Well, magic gets naturally amped, so your fighter could bounce that 120mm round off their shield and redirect it into another tank or battle robot. You are just that awesome.
D&D is a fantasy superhero game that operates in a limited power envelope.
Rifts is a superhero anything game that operates in an infinite power envelope.
In D&D, you are being given a tiny power envelope to play in by the gods and the game designers, and you are expected to play nice. Some people cannot exist outside of that cave, and they need that illusion of balance to construct a mathematical framework of how the world works with its numbers. They need to know, well, an Orc can only do this much damage, and anything outside that is a reason to start a fight with the dungeon master. Suppose that Orc just did 1d6x20 hit points of damage with a longsword. In that case, the DM is a terrible person, not worth playing with, breaking the game for everyone, hurting the community, attacking online play, and needs to be called out online as a blight on the hobby.
In Rifts, none of that matters. That Orc could have been bathed in massive amounts of arcane power. He could be a very strange OCC, an arcane summoning swordsmith. In Rifts, not much is a "stock something out of a monster book," and roleplay comes first. You need to gauge your opponent's strength before the MDC goes flying. If your tails are getting kicked, you need an escape plan.
Rifts is extremely "roleplaying meta." Your characters from the Forgotten Realms? They could all be in here, converted to Palladium classes and MDC power levels. Here they are. Comic-book characters? Right over there, anyone you want, created in Heroes Unlimited or TNMT and converted up to MDC. Characters from movies and fiction? Right over there, anyone you want, created in Ninjas & Superspies or any other Palladium system that fits, and pulled into the Rifts world. Anime? Rifts has Robotcech in its design DNA, so it is one of the first anime-inspired roleplaying games.
Harry Potter meets Happy Gilmore? It works in Rifts!
Rifts is the ultimate roleplaying sponge. It will soak up every idea, character, movie, role-playing game, comic, anime, monster, music band, or idea it can and find a place for it.
Drow? You don't get these game designers telling you, "they aren't in our world anymore." They are in the SRD now, even the name, so get outta here. You want them? They are in Rifts, one of them or billions. Rifts doesn't care about game designers with control issues. The game was designed to give you control and put your ideas first. Even down to rules customization and how the game is played, your ideas come first.
Tiny little sandboxes, designers who have too much control over your world, games that feel more like tabletop MMOs, games that tell you that there is no room for your ideas, and surrendering your ideas of the world to a set of rules is what Rifts is designed to destroy.
The Rifts game is freedom.
And once tasted, it is hard to go back to anything less.
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