Take a look at the first trailer for LittleBigPlanet Karting the PlayStation 3 game whose very existence is something of en eye-roller, except… that trailer actually looks pretty good.
The people behind ModNation Racers, United Front Games, are making this one (in collaboration with LBP dev studio Media Molecule), which is both fitting and weird. It’s fitting, because MNR was essentially a LittleBigPlanet take on the genre Mario Kart made famous. Weird, because, well, wasn’t LBP already supposed to be so moddable that it could be turned into any other kind of game?
The trailer shows what United Front has been able to make of this late-generation right turn, sticking to LBP‘s focus on virtual craftwork (karts that look like they’re made of cardboard!) and adding grappling hooks and jetpacks to the genre.
The game appears to be heavily moddable using in-game editors and seems to be able to support top-down, side-scrolling and behind-the-kart racing.
It all looks good, but a commenter on the PlayStation Blog zeroes in on the right question, since this is a game from the ModNation Racers people.
Commenter Rytteren: “so. loading times is the thing that will make or break it for me (and Frames pr second..)”
United Front developer responds: “Hey Rytteren, the team at UFG has been hard at work on our engine to address both of the concerns you call out here. I think you will like the results!”
Let’s hope so! Because who needs a kart-racer with multi-minute load times? We’ve had enough of that, and I think United Fronts knows that.
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