Rockstar has pulled off the covers that have been hiding its multiplayer plans for Midnight Club: Los Angeles. The game will ship with 10 different Muliplayer modes when it releases in October on the Xbox 360 and PS3 along side the single player portion which we had a play of a month or two ago.
The general feel that I get from reading through the various race modes is that Rockstar are trying to create a very aggressive and competitive online environment. The capture the flag variants along with the power-ups (detailed after the break) seem more at home in a shooter than in a racer, so it will be interesting to see if the insane speed and pace of the game combined with these elements create something completely unique from the racing pack which is admittedly getting a little top heavy this holiday season.
The game will have a buying/selling interface much like Forza 2 but it will not be performed via an auction system, rather cars will be sold/purchased at cost (for car/part) plus an additional $10,000 of in game currency. A rating system will also be available for people to vote for their favourite creations.
Power-ups will play a part in the online game and range from the almost expected Nitro Boost through to the strangely combatant Pulse. The powerups will be able to be toggled on or off depending on the participants desire. I am slightly skeptical as to how this will work out but given that they are completely optional I don’t have a problem with them being there, should they turn out to add to the gameplay in a manner similar to WipEout’s attack system I won’t be complaining at all.
There are 10 multiplayer modes allowing 16 players in addition to being able to freeroam with your friends without a specific goal, first up are the traditional race types .
Circuit Race as you would expect in any car game involves racing around a set course as fast as possible for the designated number of laps. Ordered Race will see players taking out checkpoints in a designated order until the final red checkpoint. Things start getting a little more open ended with Unordered Race which like Ordered Race will have set checkpoints across the map which must be passed through, the difference though is that the racers can choose to pass through them in any order they choose, learning the layout of the city will obviously assist getting a place on the podium in this one.
Landmark Race is very similar to Unordered Race if you take away all the checkpoints minus the last one. You are given a location to get to and the first person there wins. There is no designated route, you just need to get there as fast as you can.
There will be six variants of capture the flag, three of which will be very familiar to any well versed shooter fan. Free for All, Spit Base, and Base War. Split Base sees two opposing bases with one neutral flag in the middle while Base War has two flags, one is each base. Free for all? one flag, lots of people, one winner.
Keep Away, while still a flag based game, has more in common with Juggernaut in Halo3 or Playground Tag than a flag capture mode. The goal being to maintain possession of the flag for the longest time possible. The remaining two modes are both called Stockpile and involve multiple flag spawns one as a team and the other as a free for all game mode.
The Midnight Club franchise hasn’t released a title into the market under a situation as competitive as it will find in November, it has two other racing titles releasing in a similar timeframe and probably it’s biggest obstacle in Burnout Paradise, which released earlier in the year, however if Midnight Club Los Angeles lives up to the promises from Rockstar and their aspirations then it will fare very well.
Tags: Games