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ModNation Racers
PlayStation 3
A Cruel Mistress
3.5/5 stars
Ever since “LittleBigPlanet” captivated me with its combination of old-school gameplay, customization, and infinite diversity of levels, I have been sold on the concept of “PLAY. CREATE. SHARE.” When I heard that a kart racing game was forthcoming that used the same core philosophy, I immediately predicted it to be the long-awaited “MarioKart” killer that would provide much needed competition in the party racing sub-genre. And while it is true that I have spent a huge amount of time playing United Gaming Front's “ModNation Racers” (“ModNation”), I have also spent a huge amount of time avoiding playing “ModNation.” This is not a good thing.
Presentation
I am not overly impressed with the overall style of “ModNation's” presentation. While the visuals look really sharp, with clean polygons and clear details, they are obviously inspired by and intended for an inner-city audience of motor-heads. If I had to describe “ModNation” in one word, that word would be ‘ghetto.' Everything from the slouchy characters to the ear-assaulting soundtrack just screams at me that I am not the game's target audience. While I'd be okay with that in other games (the “Tony Hawk” franchise, for example), as not every game needs to be for every person, in a game that prides itself on customization and having something for everyone, targeting taggers, skateboarders, and inner-city car enthusiasts doesn't seem like the best way to go.
The customization aspect of the game, though, is quite amazing. It's possible to create an accurate representation of nearly any character or vehicle from the entire history of culture. Seriously! The only real deficiency in the customization system is that it's impossible to attach decorations to a character's body. While irritating, I know this limitation is in place to prevent the obligatory genitals that appear in every game with character customization.
By using created or downloaded characters and karts, it's almost possible to forget how specifically-targeted the art style is… except for the soundtrack. In a game that prides itself on customization, the fact that “ModNation” features no custom soundtrack support is unacceptable… especially when all of the included music tracks are so ear-bleedingly awful. Xbox 360 games have supported customs soundtracks for years. Why can't PlayStation 3 developers get it together?
Technically, “ModNation” is surprisingly solid. While the initial release of the game had moderate load times that wouldn't bother anyone who owned a PlayStation 1, the current patched version of the game has reduced these times (and added the ability to skip the annoying splash screens on startup). Other than load times, there aren't any really noticeable glitches except for a few server issues that won't matter in a couple years when those same servers go dark and the online portion of the game is no more.
Story
Most racing games don't have, or need, much of a story. “ModNation” is no different. The only story present in the game is small bit of narrative that gives cohesion to the single player ‘career' mode in which the player unlocks all of the customization pieces.
The story begins with a flashy, young mod (all the people in the game world are called mods) named Tag who wants to be a famous champion kart racer. His secondary motivations seem to be a desire to help his mother's paint business take-off by making garish colors and outlandish designs popular. Tag is assisted by an elderly ex-racer named Chief who serves as his crew chief and mentor (even though there is no actual crew besides Chief and Tag's mom). Chief's motivations for helping Tag largely revolve around a certain abrasive racer whom Chief wants to see taken down a peg or two.
Between each of the races, the game shows a cutscene (rendered by the game engine) featuring conversation between the mute Tag, Chief, Tag's mom, and occasionally other characters. These cutscenes unfold in a fairly predictable way for anyone who has ever seen a movie (or preview for a movie) about car racing. Aside from these story segments, each race is provided color commentary by two characters who are arguably the real stars of the game: Biff Tradwell and Gary Reasons.
Biff and Gary have a hostile kind of chemistry that could make them amusing to watch/listen to, if it weren't for the fact that nearly everything they say and do is so forced. Biff is a complete blowhard while Gary is a complete limp fish. There is very little depth in these characters (much like real-life color commentators).
Gameplay
“ModNation” is a game with a split personality, gameplay-wise. Out of the three main facets of a racing game, “ModNation” does two of them better than any other kart racer I've ever played, but the third facet nearly makes the game unplayable.
First, and most important, is how the game controls. I've played plenty of old kart racers and ‘serious' racing games to know that very few of them have had decent controls, and those that did were the ones that ended up spawning successful franchises. “ModNation” features a default kart control style that can be tweaked on two axes: drift/control and acceleration/speed. Changing these two settings can result in a kart that controls exactly how the player wants it, from slow and sloppy to nimble and tight. The default configuration should suit most players, and is very reminiscent of the wonderful light bikes from “MarioKart Wii.” The default button setup is also very useable (though I would have liked to see mappable buttons in the option menu). R2 is accelerate, R1 is a context-sensitive trigger activator, L2 is reverse, L1 is boost, X is hop and drift, Square is weapon (and when held for a second allows the weapon to be dropped as a mine behind the kart), O is shield, and Triangle is the fairly-useless rearview mirror. The game uses the left analog stick exclusively for steering, as the d-buttons are assigned to emoting, much like in “LittleBigPlanet” (though I don't know who has time to emote in the middle of a hectic race). The right analog stick is used to perform side-swipes and to spin the kart in mid-air.
This control setup revolves entirely around the Boost System. By drafting, drifting, K.O.ing enemies, getting big airtime, and performing acrobatics, the player fills up the Boost Gauge. At any point, the player can expend Boost from the gauge to temporarily speed up, deflect an attack with their shield, or perform a weapon-free sideswipe attack. This system adds a significant amount of strategy and skill to the gameplay that is absent from other kart racers and overall just works really well.
The weapon system used in “ModNation” also differs slightly from other kart racers in that it has a relatively small pool of items, but all of them can be leveled up to 3 tiers by picking up more item pods before launching the weapon. Level 1 items are practically useless, Level 2 items have a limited homing capability and can take-out a small group of close-together karts, while Level 3 items unleash an apocalyptic fury that hits everyone in front of the user. Like the Boost System, these weapons encourage strategy, as it's possible to lose them or have them de-leveled by taking hits. So it boils down to weighing the pros of using/holding a weapon vs. the cons of using/losing a weapon.
This incredibly solid gameplay engine makes the second facet of racing games, multi-player, a blast. I've had an incredible amount of fun playing the local multi-player via split-screen with my friends, which makes me wonder what United Gaming Front was thinking when they initially planned to release this game with only online multi-player. A universal kart game is the perfect way for friends (even non-gamer friends) to spend time together while having fun. Limiting the interaction to whatever surly teenagers and leaderboard junkies frequent online racing games seems like the complete antithesis of a good idea. Thankfully, the beta testers pointed this obvious fact out to the developers, and they added a great 4-player split screen mode. Depending on the number of human players participating, these races can also include a number of bot racers. Unfortunately, the number of available bots decreases with the number of human participants, so while 2 players might get to face off against 8 bots, 4 players don't get any bots.
The track editor is also an incredible piece of software. It is easy to use and has tons of options, but never feels quite as overwhelming as “LittleBigPlanet's” level editor. It's possible to put together an amazingly fun track in as little as 45 minutes. While, as one would expect, not all user-created tracks are solid gold, the fact that they take so little time to download (even on a horrible 512k connection) means that it's easy to grab a bunch of random tracks and play, sorting the good from the bad in the process.
However, not all that glitters is gold, and “ModNation's” third facet, single-player, is essentially a rusted-out hulk filled with rubber bands. Actually, “ModNation” doesn't feature rubberband AI, as many accuse it. Rubberbanding implies that the AI racers are able to immediately recover from mistakes and quickly 'snap-back' and catch up to the player. The AIs in this game DON'T MAKE MISTAKES! Perhaps the biggest offenders are the 'ringer' characters who inhabit all of the courses between the first and last race circuits. These things race perfectly everytime and are usually so far ahead of the player (and all of the other AIs) that they may as well not even be in the same race. Many fans cried foul of this ridiculous AI, and United Gaming Front promised to release a patch that would allow players to change the difficulty in career mode to ‘Casual' for an easier experience. Unfortunately, the patch is a complete joke. My colleagues and I have three theories about the difficulty switch that was added: 1) It is reversed, and thus the Casual difficulty is actually harder than Expert, 2) It is a placebo that doesn't actually do anything, and 3) The programmer in charge forgot to hook it into the game. Regardless of difficulty, career mode is an incredibly frustrating experience, as it usually took me around 2 hours to complete a single race (that is, finish the race in first place and perform all of the irritatingly-Trophy-like 'challenges' required to unlock customization pieces). While the difficulty certainly provides a lot of game time for the money, it's not the good kind of game time. Forcing the player to repeat the same 3-minute race over and over for hours on end is the equivalent of an RPG forcing the player to grind for ten hours between each town. It's just poorly-designed padding that makes a game that would otherwise be a great experience into a torturous one. The worst part about the frustrating career mode is that I KNOW the developers are capable of making an actual ‘Easy' AI setting, as the bots in quick races and split-screen races have ‘Easy,' ‘Medium,' and ‘Hard' settings that are actually representative of their descriptors. In the end, the physical distress I experienced while trying to defeat the AI in this game made me quit playing for long stretches (i.e., months) in order to play other games that didn't make me feel ill. Even playing a single race was a daunting task because I knew it would involve the dedication of at least 2 hours and at least 3 hours to calm down. This is not the type of game to play before bed.
Overall
“ModNation Racers” is a game I'd like to love. The customization aspects and local multi-player have led to some incredibly fun evenings spent with friends, designing, racing, and laughing. But once the party is over, all that's left is a cruel mistress who mercilessly bludgeons me while I try to unlock customization pieces until my hands tremble and I feel my heart will burst from the potent cocktail of adrenaline and frustration. Players who want a great single-player kart racing experience need to look to Nintendo. But anyone who is comfortable with downloading a completed save file (thus foregoing worthless Trophies and a lot of frustration) or who likes their games to be excessively intense should definitely check this one out.
Presentation: 3.5/5
Story: 2.5/5
Gameplay: 4.5/5 Multi-Player, 1/5 Single Player
Overall (not an average): 3.5/5
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