[PS3] Modnation Racers

[patsu]

Make sure you pester them regarding serious beta issues so we all get to see a polished game at launch. ^_^

 

[patsu]

Walkthrough with the game designer:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/12/modnation-racers-racing-walkthrough-with-designer-mat-thomas/

Essentially, they focused on the following highlights:
* Kart Handling/Steering
* Abilities: drift, spin, hop, draft, and weapon use
* Weapon ladder
* AI.

The AI sounds interesting:

Fundamentally, approaching the AI has been a very complex process but the goal has been clear – the AI has to be competitive, the AI has to be fun to play against and it needs to feel fair. Also layer on top our biggest challenge: how do you develop AI when anyone can create a track that contains anything?

Traditional racing games rely on the fact that the tracks never change, and good racing lines can be recorded or generated during development. Since we did not have this luxury, our development team followed a river analogy for the AI. A river flows along its path, around any obstacles such as rocks, forming rapids through tight spaces, and slowing down in wide open areas. Similarly, we have created a flowfield that is interrupted by avoidable objects, and flows towards the apex of corners or special objects such as boostpads. The AI racers then “flow” along this “river”. Everything is computed in real time, ...

 

[GTAce]

Hi everyone. My name’s Liam and I am the European Product Manager for ModNation Racers! As promised last year I can now finally reveal the dates of the ModNation European Beta.

ModNation Racers

On the 22nd of January 100,000 of you lucky folks will be able to get your hands on this amazing Beta test. Jump, boost and drift your way around tricky racetracks, picking up weapons with every twist and turn in a battle to the finish line, then have a go at creating your own courses and challenge the world to race on them.

So how do you get hold of a place in the Beta?
Well just simply be one of the first to log on to the PSN store on Thursday 21st and download the Beta. Once Downloaded the fun will start when the lights turn green on Friday 22nd of January.

Is it free?
Well…. Ermmm…. Hmmmm…. How do I break this to you?
YES!

What happens if I’m the 100,001 person to get to the PSN store and try to download the Beta?
Sadly the tracks will be full of racers and you will be out of luck. The Beta will disappear in to PSN Store history vault.

What’s in the beta?
If you’re one of the lucky testers, you’ll be given the opportunity to race on four premade tracks; two of which are exclusive to Europe as promised.

You can also enter the Creation Station and design your very own character, kart and an alpine themed race track, ready to share with other Beta Trial testers.

ModNation Racers

When does the fun end?
Sadly all good things do come to an end. The Mods will be melted down, the karts will be dragged to the pit stop and the tracks will be condemned on Valentines Day February 14th.

Will I be able to look at kart racing games the same again?
Dunno you tell us….

So get ready to start your engines, grab that controller, make sure your PS3 is hooked up to the net (and its working) and get downloading, creating and sharing!

Be Good

NOTE: this ModNation Racers Closed Public Beta Trial is still a work in progress and is not representative of the final game.

http://blog.eu.playstation.com/2010...aign=Feed:+SCEEBlog+(blog.eu.playstation.com)

Will try to grab it.

 

[JPT]

So to get this one, I got to bring my PSP on my next job trip

 

[patsu]

I'll go where the creators go (Quaz51, Jaeyden, deepbrown, Shifty, and many others !).

ModNation Racer's focus on easy user creation, plus a simple gameplay (just Karting !) may be even more suitable for casuals than the old school LBP.

 

[patsu]

Modnation Racer post-beta report:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/01/modnation-racers-beta-recap/

... the beta is over and we wanted to give everyone an update on how things went. First and foremost, we are absolutely astounded by the sheer amount and variety of user generated content that was created during the online beta. Thousands upon thousands of karts, mods, and tracks were created, remixed, shared and uploaded. On the racing side of things, there were over 95,000 total races played during the beta.

...

All of us at UFG and SCEA would like to thank everyone who participated in the beta for your help

In comparison, I believe the original LittleBigPlanet beta supported 10,000 users and created 1,000 levels.

 

[patsu]

Modnation Racer beta for PAL territories: 21st Jan 2010
http://blog.eu.playstation.com/2010/01/19/modnation-beta-release/

One thing we were disappointed in was that we weren’t able to release the European Public Beta simultaneously with the North American version. Because of this, we have decided to open up a couple of new tracks and we hope you really like them. They will give you a taste for a little more of what the ModNation Racers experience will have to offer and hopefully they make up for the wait

I also just heard that the Public Beta will be released in Australia and New Zealand as well.

 

[GTAce]

Thanks for the reminder!
Totally forgot about this.

 

[Antan]

Downloading as we speak.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Me too! 2GBs! There's also a video on GT showing drift at CES, and the framerate is rock-steady*, but it's only a single car. Is there any reason to think this EU Beta will be an improved build over the NA one, or will we have the same issues that may be fixed by release?

*Edit - scratch that; it's jumping all over the place, at least playing on this PC. You can't have a kart game with a poor framerate, United Front Games!

 

[patsu]

Ha ha, looks like it's the same framerate issue in the US beta. Modnation Recer runs on PC ?

 

[Gradthrawn]

Modnation Recer runs on PC ?

I think he's referring to how the video plays on his PC.

 

[Arwin]

Yeah, I actually put it in my calendar so I got a reminder to download it just now ... Downloading ....

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I think he's referring to how the video plays on his PC.

Yep. Thanks to ridiculous resource-hog flash adverts everywhere these days, I can ndever be sure if framerate issues are a video-feature or a problem of not enough system resources. "Avatar" adverts were the worst so far. I frequently get a "Flash 10 a scripting error" at B3D ATM too. What a world - even our advertisements are buggy these days!

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Very brief review after 40-50 minutes editing and one timetrail race :

Editing tools are very flexible, and if creating stuff is your thing, there's lots here
Visuals are bland
Driving and drift mechnics seem solid and could result in good races if the pickups are good.
Framerate is appalling to make the game nigh unplayable. Sure, you can get around the track, but control is hard to guage. As it stands, I have zero interest in the game if it can't hit a consistent 30 (and it should be 60 with the simple look IMO!).

 

[patsu]

Ouch, I hope the dev sees this ! What is it coming ?

 

[JPT]

I am not sensitive to framerate at all it seems, never noticed the drop in framerate.
But since I have no interest in desiging a char, kart or a track and did not care for the gameplay at all, it looks like i wont be getting this game.

 

[Arwin]

I didn't have much trouble with the framerate either, though I think it could be smoother. There is a strange camera judder effect though that I'm not sure is actually a framerate issue. But I'm sure the framerate gods will give us the real deal soon enough, and I agree that it would be good for the devs to get the framerate sorted if that's an issue, because it is important for a game like this.

That said, I did create a track and liked how easy it was to create a cool track fast. I got something nice in my first effort, and the auto-fill option to spruce up the track works absolutely great. It's really possible to be with friends and race a brand new designed track each time this way, good stuff.

The actual racing, well, I never cared much for kart racers, but I think this seems enough fun so far.

 

[Crossbar]

Damn, this was a beta I would have loved to participate in. I got in on the UC2 MP beta, and that was really wasted on me.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It's got serious potential I think. Will have to try some racing tomorrow. The same game on next-gen hardware with a sophisticated lighting engine with convincing AO/GI, stable framerate and high IQ, will be pretty excellent. If they can get the framerate up, it'll be okay. The scenery artstyle isn't bad by any stretch, although it's a bit generic. And I do dislike the 'attitude' of the character design. Everything's a bit 'street', of more appeal to younger males who'll go 'cooool' a lot, with not much cutesy for a wider audience. That said, the list of mods do include cute and weird, like a hamster-wheel engine (which casts a broken engine shadow. Dunno if other engines have this trouble too?). I've played the other tracks on timetrail and there is plenty of scope for interesting levels and gameplay I'm sure. The actual mechanics I think may be quite excellent for a kart game that isn't Mario Kart! A lot will depend on the pickups. Although I do feel that they are balanced in favour of gamers, so those with good drift skills will obliterate more casual gamers. But the drift method and optional counter-steer is easy and intuitive and makes for a more involving game.

But the framerate is causing me eyestrain! I haven't noticed any tearing, so I guess it's frame locked dropping frames all over the shop. Disabling V-sync would likely improve things a lot but with the horrors of a ripped screen. There is camera judder on the desert level to signify a rough track, which coupled with a low and inconsistent framerate makes things really horrible!