If you couldn’t get into a game of Rocket League over the weekend, you’re not alone. Because of some weird technical difficulties, players were removed from the game’s servers while it was put into “maintenance mode” on and off over the last few days. It couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time either, as the issues caused a bunch of official esports matches to be pushed back, too.
If you use a power wheelchair in your day-to-day life, you likely use something that looks an awful lot like a gaming joystick to get around. It seems AbleGamers COO, Rocket League fan and wheelchair user Steven Spohn thought so too, and set about trying to bridge that gap. A little bit of hardware tinkering later, and the Freedom Wing Adaptor was born – a nifty little box that lets you plug a power wheelchair into an Xbox Adaptive Controller.
Last week, Psyonix revealed they’re going to stop supporting Rocket League on Mac and Linux, ending the ability to use any of the online functions on those platforms. They explained that it was “no longer viable” to support Mac and Linux as they continued to upgrade the game with “new technologies”.
This was a bit of a vague reason that naturally left a lot of fans asking questions – but now they’ve said they can’t justify upgrading the tech on platforms that house less than 0.3% of their active player base.
It’s bad news if you play Rocket League on Mac or Linux – in March developer Psyonix are stopping support for the platforms, taking away online multiplayer in one final update. Players will still have access to all of the offline stuff though, so you’ll still be able to play with your friends either locally or using split-screen. You just won’t be able to join any online matches, or make any in-game purchases.
Football is so 12th Century. Thank God for Rocket League, which took football and transformed it into flying rocket car daftness. The onward march of human progress didn’t stop there, however. Modders have since transformed Rocket League into flight combat sims, obstacle courses, and Quidditch.
It’s all impressive, but I’m most enamoured with the work of pro player “Lethamyr”, who moonlights as a modder turning Rocket League into pinball, pool, beer pong and prop hunt.
Videogames are always willing to pounce on excuses to sell you hats, so naturally Rocket League is celebrating the Chinese New Year. The event kicks off on Monday. There will be new rims and such, available to buy on the recently reworked and now slightly cheaper store. I’m more interested in the new Forbidden Temple Arena, which looks like a colourful escape from this dreary January.
High-octane ballsport Rocket League yesterday reduced cosmetic item prices, having started selling them at high prices with new systems replacing DLC and loot boxes in last week’s Blueprint Update. Our Matt said only yesterday that “Rocket League’s new Blueprints are too expensive, but still better than loot boxes” then a mere six hours later, Psyonix announced the price cuts. This is response to a solid week of complaints from players but the timing does make us look dead influential so yeah, yeah, you’re welcome, everyone.
I knew from my first few hours playing Rocket League that it would become my most played game on Steam. It took me nearly a thousand hours to reach the coveted top rank of Grand Champion. It remains, in my eyes, the perfect competitive multiplayer experience: easy to get into, difficult to master, and far more focused on tactical decisions and reading your opponents than about who has the twitchiest reflexes or the highest APM.
Rocket League is, simply put, my jam.
Last Wednesday, Rocket League did away with loot boxes. You’d think that would be cause for celebration, but developers Psyonix have replaced them with Blueprints that many players consider overpriced.
The short version is that yeah, they are, but it’s more important that this replaces an exploitative model that profits from obsessional gamblers doing themselves serious harm. For the longer version, we need to descend into the murky world of value propositions.
Big changes are coming to car football today. Rocket League has replaced its lock and key lootbox system with an item shop and blueprints for items. The new system is still random, but takes away the risk that you’ll spend any actual money on an item you don’t want.