ModNation Racers is an upcoming Playstation 3 exclusive that blends the racing action from games such as Mario Kart with the insane amount of customization options Little Big Planet offers. Just last week the developers of the game, United Front Games, opened a beta to subscribers of Quore.
When I jumped in, I found myself in a hub type area that reminded me of Playstation Home. I wanted to get straight to the racing so I practiced a little in the time trial section, and found myself at the starting line of a fairly simple in-game track. The controls are intuitive, and comparable to most driving games; the right trigger is the gas, while the thumbstick directs your driver. The levels have various power-ups, boosts, and even fun shortcuts. The games visuals are pretty unique and fun, with the driver’s kind of reminding me of Munny Dolls, and cars that look like Hot Wheels. The environments are stylized, but without looking so cartoony.
After feeling comfortable with my racing skills I decided to hop online for a few competitive races. They took quite a while to load up(I would guess the first race took close to ten minutes to finally start, with the second only taking about 2 minutes), but once they finally did, the race went smooth and they had no noticeable lag.
On to the mod center I found there to be an overwhelming amount of customization options for both the avatars and the cars. I dabbled with that for a little while and found it to be quite a bit easier than Little Big Planet, but I’m really not into that kind of thing so I only spent a few minutes with both the avatar and the car. I moved onto the level editor and that had to be the best part of the game. They made it so easy, all you do is drive and the track is laid. You can lower the terrain and raise it to make all kinds of cool effects. Once you connect the track you can have the track auto-populated. What this means is that boosts, power-ups, trees, houses, and ramps will be placed where the game thinks is appropriate, and let me say it does a very good job. On the other hand, if your one of those OCD types, or just have a specific layout in mind, its simple to do, and all the options are there for it.
Final thoughts: ModNation Racers is full of potential and is looking to be quite a fun game. Although the comparisons to Mario Kart are inevitable the game really does stand out on its own because of its own distinct identity. What I’m looking most forward to is what the community will come up with. ModNation Racers is quite possibly one of the most promising games of 2010.
Title: ModNation Racers
Platforms: Playstation 3
Release Date: Spring 2010ESRB: TBD
No comments:
Post a Comment