POLL: Playtonic Kart Racer + Online Multiplayer

[Taylor]

[Meinhard1]

Kart Racer:

Undoubtedly an exciting idea. Part of me would like to see another game to develop the cast, settings, and story a bit more.
It was cool how Diddy Kong Racing preceded Banjo, Conker, and Star Fox Adventures, but I think the characters and environments lacked the strong sense of personality of the best Mario Karts.

Would be great if the title built on a solid Playtoncic Universe foundation, while still alluding to future titles.

Online:

Would rather not. Playing Mario Kart games online never felt very interpersonally interactive. You can't really gauge another players personity by how they time a power slide, or which item they happen to use on you ... you can still tell they're not cpu, but only just. Kart games seem best played locally, where you can yell and see each others faces, from my experience.

[Gorjo]

Not making it online would be a waste in this age of internet videos and streaming. Being Playtonic's hypothetical second game would mean they could use the atention, especially since I'm sure the game would be full of surprises to make it stand out.

[Taylor]

[Tek]

These days I think it would be very important that a kart racing game have online multiplayer. Racing games by their very nature are well suited for multiplayer, so making it as easy as possible for someone to find other people to race against is important. Local couch-based multiplayer is fun and should be an option, but what if your friends live far away or just don't like the game or racing games in general? That's where online multiplayer comes in. Of course the game could make up for this with computer controlled players, and that's good, but that's generally not going to feel the same as playing against real players.

For a PC version, I would go so far as to say that it's absolutely essential to have online multiplayer for a racing game. This is because playing local multiplayer splitscreen on a computer monitor is...well it's small. Given the choice between local splitscreen multiplayer on a TV for a console game, and local splitscreen multiplayer on a computer monitor for a PC game, which would you prefer?

My ideal kart racing game would include both online and local multiplayer, and the option of racing against computer controlled players as well.

[bigfanofoldrare]

[Taylor]

[Tek]

[bigfanofoldrare]

[Yavga]

Playtonic could make what Nintendo won't
The mission mode from Mario Kart DS was awesome. I think PT should give something like that a chance. With awesome bosses ofcourse!

[Scrubber]

Yeah its necessary. Split screen is history.

[bjaxx87]

It won't be easy to capture the feeling of DKR and resist the urge to create a Mario Kart clone. It even happened to "old" Rare: Mickey's Speedway USA was a decent fun racer but ignored everything that made DKR great while copying a lot of Mario Kart's characteristics.

But yeah, in theory I'm all in for a spiritual successor to DKR! My wish list:

- explorable hub world
- collectibles to unlock new courses
- selectable vehicles
- actual VEHICLES (no animals)
- fixed and upgradable items > item roulette
- special races where you need to collect items and win (silver/play coin challenge)
- challenging boss races
- new characters that'll get their own games later
- secret characters
- a consistent theme for each cup

Add some new twists and ideas and there you go! I agree that "missions" would be a nice addition to a game like this.

DKR was always a lot more about skill than Mario Kart. The single player mode was quite challenging and you just couldn't win with dumb luck - you had to know the courses, which items to use, which character to pick and how to use a combination of sliding and braking to take tight turns.

I have to agree that this is also a disadvantage of DKR... In Mario Kart everyone can pick up the controller and play since there are many items and random circumstances to help lesser talented players. It's not enough to beat some high scoring Japanese pro gamer you meet online but with a little luck they might reach the podium after a few races. In DKR's multiplayer people usually lost their interest pretty quickly when they realized they couldn't beat me due to my single player experience... That's why I was excited to check out the online mode of the NDS version - unfortunately I didn't meet a single player because the online community was pretty much dead when I finally managed to set up the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection a few years ago.

tl;dr: I'd love it to have an online mode since in a true DKR successor you probably won't have a lot of fun in local multiplayer due to the possible lack of skilled combatants.

[mickeythelegend]

I would be up for a kart racer. Something different to Mario Kart, kind of like diddy Kong but different. Probably best to avoid strange racing styles though. Planes were alright in Diddy Kong Racing but a different story in Banjo Pilot. I'd quicker go back to Mario Kart 64 than Diddy Kong Racing nowadays basically.

[GeneralWalnut]

Mario Kart 8 is so so good, way better than I ever thought a kart racer could be. I adore that game, and honestly the online is a pretty big reason for that? I felt like it worked a lot better than one would expect, and I'm looking forward to jumping back into it in April with MK8 Deluxe.

So in that regard, yeah I think online is absolutely necessary at this point. Not at the cost of local multiplayer of course, especially not in that genre, but I would be sorely disappointed if I wasn't able to play with people online.

I would love to see the adventure mode stuff and the different vehicle stuff make a comeback in a game, though unlike YL I would hope that they paid more attention to modern design trends with racing games when it came to handling and controls.

[Taylor]

[GeneralWalnut]

[Taylor]

The question on my mind is whether a Playtonic kart racer will be profitable. Mario Kart seems a bit untouchable; I cannot think of any other kart racer in recent years that can compete with it in terms of popularity.

I don't think anything can surpass Yooka-Laylee's hype and interest in the general public -- it was a revival of a genre by the veterans who essentially made the genre in the first place. The obvious next game would be a sequel to Yooka-Laylee, but I really don't think Playtonic will go down this route right away.

I guess it's quite hard for me to fully distinguish between what I selfishly want to play as a fan (kart racer), and what will work commercially for the company. Then again, maybe Playtonic shouldn't pay any interest to trends and simply make what they want to make!

[Rueckkoppler]

While I adore Diddy Kong Racing for everything else, the controls were a pain (or much rather, they are a pain when I go back to this game). It's very slippery and I not really that logical to me. They'll need to reach a MK8 standard of precision. This is going to be the biggest effort they would have to make for such a game. Well, this and online multiplayer. Unlike Fast RMX, this will probably have a lot of items, which makes coding much more complicated. We believe in you, Chris!

[DarkTone]

Let them concentrate on YL first.

[dotEXE]

The game that comes out next week? I think they have a couple minutes to look to the future now.

I'd love a Kart Racer. My own 2 cents is - I hope they do another adventure game first to expand the Playtonic Universe a little bit, and THEN do a Kart Racer. I agree with some of the above sentiments that I like how every character in Mario Kart has its own world and story.

But of course, if a Kart Racer came next I would totally still buy it. I'd love to see a world-based Kart Racer like DKR was. Themed worlds with themed races. I wouldn't be mad if they were cup-based though. Maybe a hybrid approach could even world. Some world exploring like DKR, and then every world has 3-4 cups or something. I don't necessarily need the boss races from DKR though.

I'm rambling now but whatever Playtonic does I'm sure I'll buy it and I'm sure I'll like it.