What a great week to be in the ModNation!

• New kickin’ portable handheld PlayStation Vita portable: check!
• New ModNation Racers: Road Trip – your new favorite fun kart racer: yep!
• New ModNation Monday blog: fresh!
• New members of the ModNation community: boo-to-thee-yah!

We present you our labour of love – ModNation Racers: Road Trip. She’s* all yours now so take care of her. Bring her to nice places. Introduce her to your friends, neighbours, and co-workers. Take pictures with her and post them to your Facebook page. Treat her right and she’ll stay by your side forever, most importantly… take her for a spin at least three times a day! Trust me, she loves it!
(*not sure if one refers to video games in the female form but we thought we’d start the precedent. We’re cutting-edge like that!)

Keep Up On All Things ModNation

Here are some useful links to stay up to date with all things ModNation Racers!
– Official ModNation Racers Facebook Page
– ModNation Racers Website
– ModNation Racers Forums

ModNation Racers Road Trip: Track Starter Kit – Week One

So you just received your brand spankin’ new PS Vita and ModNation Racers: Road Trip and noticed the 500,000 + plus user created tracks to choose from. Let me help you with a few of my (ModNationSD: MNR Community Manager) favorites. Over the next few weeks I will post some great tracks in this “Starter Kit” section which demonstrate a great cross-section of some of the best tracks ModNation community members have made (so far!). You won’t want to miss these!

BTW… If you come across some great tracks that you think need to be seen let us know in the comments below of visit the MNR forums HERE. Who knows, a track you recommended or maybe even created could end up in this ModNation Monday blog!… “Track of the Week” maybe?

Hope you have a great week!

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In just a few short days ModNation Racers: Road Trip will be hitting the store shelves alongside the release of the much-anticipated PlayStation Vita! Our team at San Diego Studio has worked very hard to produce what we think is the best portable kart racing game on the market. We’ve added many new features (see below) to the already highly acclaimed ModNation Racers franchise and we are extremely excited to finally get them into the hands of gamers everywhere.

Sure, it may sound a bit silly to the un-initiated but the Mod, Karts, and Tracks YOU create become a small extension of yourself. You experience a sense of e-pride (just made that word up) similar to whipping out your wallet to show pictures of your gorgeous wife and kids anyone who will listen. You’ll notice a grin on your face and a slight swell in your heart (admit it or not) the first time you hand your Vita and ModNation Racers: Road Trip to a friend as they “ooh and ahhhh” at YOUR “genius” creations. Trust me, you will hear at least one of the following comments…

1. YOU did that?
2. How did YOU do that?
3. Make me! Make me!
4. Do I know you?
5. Let me try
6. Ding!, fries are done.
or quite possibly…
7. Wow, I really like your Mod! … Are you single?

We hope you’ll agree the kart racing experience in ModNation Racers: Road Trip is second to none. Perfectly tuned racing physics and spectacular graphics add to the intense yet intuitive racing. With well over 500,000 tracks to race you’ll be busy until the next millennium going through them all. We know, we counted.
So if you are a fan of ModNation Racers, the Play Create Share family, or just kart racing in general we know you will enjoy ModNation Racers: Road Trip. If you haven’t made the leap into this great game and even greater community of players then we have just one suggestion – Try it – you’ll be hooked for life!

ModNation Racers Road Trip: Tutorials Week 2

Track building has come a long way since using mom’s kitchen utensils to scrape out your course in the dirt. We’ve got some new-fangled track creating tools in ModNation Racers: Road Trip and these videos will help you get acquainted with the ins-n-outs of creating those tracks of your dreams!

Track Editing

Terrain Editing

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Remember that recent big hit movie? …the one with the buildings that were all upside-down, catawampus, and kcabwards?… Yes exactly! THAT movie! Well, we knew from ModNation Racers: Road Trip‘s inception (cough) our track creators wanted even more flexibility (and potential insanity) in their track creating process.

(more…)

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When I first started dating my wonderful wife, her mother asked how I was at playing board games. Puzzled (*chuckle*) my wife answered “why”? Come to find out you can tell a lot about one’s character from playing board games and gauging their reactions/attitudes to the games’ twists and turns. This somehow predicts their “potential spousal aptitude.” I did not know that. Yippee!

• Land on blue…you win! (good luck)
• Roll an eight…you lose! (bad luck)
• Flip a card…”move back two spaces”…start over! (no luck at all)

Pure luck dictating the outcome of a game? Narts to that!

Needless to say I’m not a fan of board games but I do now have a wonderful wife and kids and “a” mother-in-law. Who cares, Mark? (Point taken, I’ll move on.)

So here are but a few of the many reasons I enjoy playing the fun (and FAIR!) ModNation Racers: Road Trip. Less luck, more skill!

Choosable Weapons: Weapon classes are distinguished by their item pod color. This means I get to choose what weapons I want to use when and where I want to use them. If I find it necessary I can also “cash in” any weapon I posses to convert into a boost with a simple touch of my weapon icon. Cha-ching! That was me coming from out of nowhere!

Personalized/Balanced Matchmaking: With my frail ego, the last thing I need is to compete against players soooooo much better than me that I get chills from the winds they produce whizzing by me. ModNation Racers: Road Trip’s matchmaking system searches for those closest to my (we’ll call it) ability to place me in some winnable heats. I love that!

Defensible Weapons: YES! Not only will I receive audible clues (can be toggled off) of incoming attacks, but I’ll have the advantage of a visible “lock-on” reticule over my mod’s icon on the status bar, helping me time my protective shield. This means on my long plane flights I’ll finally have a fighting chance to defend myself in races. Trust me, the person sitting next to you in coach does NOT want to hear the increasing, whirling, crescendo of your warning tone. Go figure. (They must be board game lovers.)

Amnesty Shield: Have you ever experienced that gut feeling that, right as you’re about to let loose your level-three hydras, the kart behind you is about to do the same thing to you? Problem solved! The new Amnesty Shield feature protects you from any similar weapon launched from an opponent until your devastation has been imposed. Pretty fair I say.

Refined/Controlled Drifting And Braking: I like my racing straight up. Literally. That’s how I roll. Some enjoy “snaking” or frenetically “zig-zagging” down the track to build up their boost meter. ModNation Racers: Road Trip refinements allow much more controlled, subtle yet powerful drifting. This means I’ll always be moving forward on the track instead of constantly battling the under and over-steering issue present in most racing games. I think you will notice and enjoy the difference, too.

Race Assist: Although I may not have a need for racing assistance, it’s good to know it’s there for others to use. I know my mother-in-law is going to need all the help she can get when I deliver her a new Vita and ModNation Racers: Road Trip for her upcoming birthday. I’ll show you, “mom”! Mwahahaha!

Have a great week everyone!

Mark

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If you’re anything like me, you’ll be spending a lot more time enjoying this fun new feature than you would ever have expected. The Mod Postcards feature is found in the “Favourites” section of the Creation Station and for a good reason – you’ll be coming back to it over and over (and more than likely yet again).

1. Postcard Image

The first thing you’ll be asked to do is either load an image or take a photo. “Take a photo” is fairly straightforward. Using either the PlayStation Vita’s front or rear camera you’ll frame your shot using the front touch screen’s viewfinder. You’ll notice a miniature Tag and his Kart superimposed into the centre of the display awaiting the click of the shutter. Simply touch the “Take Pic” icon in the top left corner to take the picture.

The second option is “load a photo”. Trust me when I say this makes things even more interesting. Load any image you have downloaded onto your Vita as the background of your Mod Postcard or utilize Vita’s built-in web browser and you’ll have access to all the images you could hope for via the web.

2. Mod / Kart Poses

The next step asks you to tap on the Mod or Kart and thus begins the fun. Use your fingers to move, pinch, push, pull, squeeze and rotate Tag or his Kart to your desired size and position in the photo. You will also have numerous options for your chosen Mod’s expression as well as pose. Just a press of the save icon (pencil writing to disc) button and voila!!!… Your very own Mod Postcard! Oh, it doesn’t stop there – remember the two million-plus creations that you and the ModNation community have created so far?… YEP, you’ll have access to ALL of those Mods and Karts to use in your ModNation photo masterpieces. Think about the possibilities. Ba-BAM! That was your mind being blown right? Yeah, I thought so!

3. Share Your Postcards

With Vita’s connectivity you have the ability to link to your Facebook account and publish your Mod Postcards for all your friends and family to see! Hmmmmm… can’t wait to see what the ModNation “paparazzi” come up with. This ought to be fun!

Have a great week everyone!

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