14 DAY TRIAL // Racing games are all about high-paced action, fast thrills and some memorable, fun-filled races alongside your friends over the Internet. That is why the multiplayer mode for any such game is a very important one, and many developers strive to deliver the best experience out there.
Such is the case with Codemasters and its upcoming Colin McRae: DiRT 2 title, which will expand on the first game, which really took rally racing to a whole new level. Promising exciting new graphics and gameplay changes, the game will also implement a new type of multiplayer racing, as it will handle 8-players at the same time.
This is a change of pace, as last year's Race Driver: GRID, also made by Codemasters and running on the same EGO engine, supported a 12-player online mode. The decision was made, game design manager Ralph Fulton says, because when 12 players raced things became quite hectic and crashes made the racing quite fragmented.
“I'm delighted to announce that we have listened to feedback from our fans, from our community and also from the critics, and can announce that Dirt 2 features a fully integrated eight-player online multiplayer mode, a first for the Dirt series,” Fulton said. “I'm at pains to stress that's not a technical limitation. It's the same engine which powered GRID's 12-player multiplayer experience. However GRID featured a very different kind of racing.”
He went on to explain the decision even more: “In our extensive play-testing of Dirt 2, both internally and external focus tests, we found that these types of cars on these types of tracks, 12 players just gets a little crowded, and made crashing a bit too prevalent. That takes away crucially a lot of the fun of multiplayer competition. We've found in our extensive testing that eight is the magic number and eight players is the sweet spot.”
Hopefully the experiments made by Codemasters will prove successful and everyone will enjoy the 8-player online modes featured in this game. Until September, when it will appear on consoles such as the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, DS and PSP, and December, when it will arrive for the PC, we still need to polish up our racing skills.