Hands On: ModNation Racers

The Beta might have ended, but I’m fortunate to have spent a good few hours with a near-final version of ModNation Racers, and I’m happy to say the customisable racer has surpassed my expectations in almost every aspect.  Let’s get the downer out of the way first: the load times are still too long, and although they’re better than they were a couple of months back (and there’s still time for them to be fixed before launch) there’s too much time spent staring at a static screen waiting for the next area to load up.

There, that’s it – the rest is all good.  For starters, I’ve been able to sample all four themes in the track editor, and a far greater selection of track elements including more props, dynamic switches and triggers, smarter track branching and far more low-level tweaking for the hardcore.  It’s now possible to mould the width, height and bank of each invididual piece directly (or in groups) and the increased number of track and terrain manipulation tools and brushes means that there’s far more potential for truly unique user courses.

The editor menu, now a couple of layers deeper, is better laid out to enable expert users to dive in and out of options as they build their tracks, and feels far more robust as a result.  Coupled with a much smoother framerate, the improved track editor is an absolute treat now, with massively complex, looping layouts just as possible as simple straight races and in a fraction of the time it should given the professional looking results at the end of it.  The RAM available seems to have increased, too, meaning more room for your creations.

The superior framerate has been carried over to the races themselves, too – it’s still not perfect but it’s much closer to a nice round thirty than the previous versions of the game.  This, naturally, means that the in-game action is smoother and as a result the handling seems sharper and more precise – there’s still a little bit too much oversteer but the drifting is intended to balance out the kart-like handling anyway, so no complaints there.  Split screen needs a bit of work in terms of fluidity, but it’s a generous addition and most welcome.

Apart from that, it’s business as usual – the Mod creation is sublime, the Kart garage equally so and the game is still pushing the user generated content at every possible moment.  The version I have sadly doesn’t have online functionality enabled yet so I can’t comment on how well everything works away from the comfy confines of local multiplayer, but the Beta proved that developers United Front know exactly what they’re doing and I’ve every confidence that ModNation Racers will excel in this area too.

I’ve glossed over most stuff because I want to come back and cover each area in more detail over the next week or so – especially the track editor which is where I’ll probably spent most of my time once the game is released.  However, the single player mode also looks just about complete so there’s scope for future discussion there, too, with a progressive, story-based campaign at the heart of the game that comes complete with gorgeous pre-rendered movies and a wickedly light sense of humour.

Like everything else in the game, it’s packed with stuff to do.  Indeed, there’s so much to ModNation Racers that we could fill the site with it.  Stay tuned for more.