Radical Summer is motoring into its second phase: a celebration of '80s culture. That means there are brand new items in the Event Store featuring the tightest trends from the 1980s. Pixelated Wheels? Totally. A VCR topper? Duh. An enormous cell phone? Like, for sure! Plus there's an all new limited-time game mode called Spike Rush that you'll dig big time.
To celebrate Rocket League's 4th Birthday, we're taking the action back to Throwback Stadium, but gameplay is taking a sharp turn. Radical Summer's second phase introduces the all new limited-time game mode Spike Rush. In this 3v3 mode, every player has the Spike power-up from Rumble. Players who have possession of the ball lose all boost, but can disengage their spikes to perform some wicked shots or passing plays. But be careful! The ball carrier is demolished on contact. We can't wait to see what smooth moves you're able to pull off in this wild mode.
Be on the lookout for the new Totally Awesome Crate, which will start dropping today. The Crate itself fits perfectly with Radical Summer's '80s style. As for what's inside, check out the new hot hatchback Fennec pictured below. The Totally Awesome Crate contains over a dozen customizations. In-game items from this crate are subject to the same drop rates as our previous Crates, which you can find here.
Radical Summer's Culture phase will be live until July 22, so jump into Online Matches, start earning Cassettes, enjoy Spike Rush, and stay radical!
Radical Summer is in full swing, and the new Totally Awesome Crate is ready to bring some righteous in-game items to the party. You can expect the crate to start dropping on Monday, July 1 at 10:00 a.m. PDT (5:00 p.m. UTC).
The Totally Awesome Crate will have more than a dozen customization options including the brand-new, bodacious Battle-Car, Fennec. Plus, the three new Wheels being introduced will have Special Edition variants. In-game items in the Totally Awesome Crate are subject to the same drop rates as our previous Crates, which you can find here.
We hope you're digging the '80s celebration throughout Radical Summer. As always, stay radical!
Join us for the biggest ’80s summer bash Rocket League has ever thrown! Radical Summer is now live, and it all starts with a totally awesome celebration of '80s Blockbusters.
The first phase of Radical Summer celebrates some of the most beloved franchises of the decade, starting with Ghostbusters, which is celebrating its 35th Anniversary this June. The Ghostbusters Ecto-1 Car Pack Premium Licensed DLC includes the Ecto-1 Battle-Car, Ecto-1 Wheels, Slimer Topper, Proton Pack Boost, Ghostbusters Avatar Border and Player Banner, and the Stay Puft Goal Explosion. The Car Pack is now available for $1.99 USD (or regional equivalent).
Also try out the new limited-run Ghost Hunt mode! Two teams of three enter a spooky version of the Urban Central Arena and attempt to trap the ball with their proton stream power-ups in the Containment Zone. Ghost Hunt will be available throughout the Blockbusters phase of Radical Summer.
There are plenty of tubular in-game Event Items to earn throughout Radical Summer. The Blockbuster phase features items inspired by '80s movies like Back to the Future, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, The Goonies, and The Karate Kid. You can earn these items in the Event Store by redeeming Cassettes. Cassettes can be earned by playing Online Matches in Casual, Competitive, and Extra Playlists. Check out some of the rad event items below.
The Blockbusters Phase will last until July 1, when the extremely excellent celebration of ’80s cultures begins. The event store will refresh with new items for each phase of Radical Summer with the most choice 80s-inspired items. But, don't have a cow if you didn't get a chance to score your favorites. All three Event Stores from each phase will open for a short redemption period after Radical Summer ends in August.
Expect more info on the Culture and Television phases of Radical Summer very soon. Stay tuned, and start earning those Cassettes for some of the most radical items in Rocket League! Stay gnarly!
You're totally invited to Radical Summer—a summer-long celebration of all things ’80s. Grab your aviator shades and mixtapes, and prepare to go back in time to experience the most righteous movies, television, and culture from the decade.
Radical Summer is an in-game event, kicking off on June 10. The 9-week event will feature free items, new Premium Licensed DLCs, limited-time game modes, and more! (shhh, it’s a secret)
This extremely choice event is split into three celebrations of the 1980s: Blockbusters, Culture, and Television. Each celebration lasts three weeks. Similar to previous events, play Online Matches to earn ‘Cassettes’ and redeem them for in-game, '80s-themed items all summer long. Radical Summer's Event Store will change for each phase of Radical Summer, bringing in new items for your Battle-Car. And don’t worry, at the end of the event, we’ll give you a week to redeem Cassettes for any items you may have missed.
Celebrating the biggest franchises of the '80s
You can't throw a summer bash without friends, and we're inviting the biggest '80s franchises to Rocket League. Here's every '80s franchise you can expect to see in Radical Summer:
Ghostbusters
Knight Rider
Back to the Future
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
The Goonies
Karate Kid
DreamWorks Voltron Legendary Defender
WWE
Plus, Golden Eggs are back as part of Radical Summer, and this time will contain items from Elevation, Victory, Turbo, and Nitro Crates. Up to five Golden Eggs can be acquired for each phase of the event.
Ecto-1 and K.I.T.T. enter the arena
Radical Summer will start and end with two new Premium Licensed DLC with the Ghostbusters Ecto-1 and Knight Rider Car Packs.
Get ready to go ghost hunting in the Ecto-1. The Ghostbusters Ecto-1 Car Pack will include a bunch of fan-favorite items from the iconic Ghostbusters, which is celebrating its 35th Anniversary, including the Ecto-1 Battle-Car, Ecto-1 Wheels, Proton Pack Rocket Boost, Slimer Topper, Ghostbusters Player Banner and Avatar Border, and the Stay Puft Goal Explosion.
K.I.T.T., the high-speed, talking futuristic car outfitted with high-tech gadgets and a personality of its own from the hit '80s show Knight Rider, is reporting for duty and will come as part of its own Car Pack later in Radical Summer!
The Ghostbusters Ecto-1 Car Pack will be available for $1.99 (or regional equivalent) on June 10. Stay tuned for more info on the Knight Rider Car Pack later during Radical Summer.
New Limited Modes
The Radical Summer party starts on the field with three new limited-time game modes that will be featured individually throughout the event. To celebrate the arrival of Ghostbusters' Ecto-1 Battle-Car, jump into the new wickedly spooky Ghost Hunt Mode. Ghost Hunt, which will be featured in the Blockbusters phase of Radical Summer, is a 3v3 mode where each team uses their proton stream power-ups to try to trap the ghostly ball in your opponents' Containment Zone. Ghost hunt features new, scary lighting and ghostly sound effects on the Urban Central Arena and will be playable until July 1.
Kicking off Radical Summer's Culture phase will be the high-octane Spike Rush mode. In this 3v3 mode, each player has the Spike power-up from Rumble Mode that can be activated to carry the ball, and deactivated to pull off some wild psych outs. It all goes down on our Throwback Stadium Arena to commemorate Rocket League's fourth anniversary.
Hit the beaches of Salty Shores to close out Radical Summer in our Beach Ball Mode. Beach Ball Mode features 2v2 action with a larger ball, low ball gravity, and the Curveball mutator activated. So enjoy this sunny, feel-good mode that is worthy of a classic '80s beach volleyball montage.
Here are the start and end dates of Radical Summer's three event phases. Each phase will begin at 10 a.m. PDT (5 p.m. UTC) on their respective start dates:
'80s Blockbusters: June 10 - July 1
'80s Culture: July 1 - July 22
'80s Television July 22 - August 12
A game update will be ready for download today at 10:00 a.m. PDT (5:00 p.m. UTC) that will get everything ready for Radical Summer next week. We're excited to share everything that we've packed into this event. Stay tuned for even more info on the next phases of Radical Summer. Until then, stay rad!
The World Championship of the Rocket League Championship Series (RLCS) are mere weeks away. Starting June 21, the best in the world will compete for the title of World Champion live at Prudential Center in Newark, NJ.
But, these pros didn't get to that level overnight. It took thousands of hours of practice and perseverance. Nobody knows Rocket League like these players do, which is why you're not going to want to miss the latest featured Training Pack if you're trying to elevate your game. This batch of Training Packs has been custom made by current and former RLCS pros. They'll help you brush up on high-level mechanics like redirect shots and backboard reads, and hone your skills for fundamentals like defense and striking. Check out this batch of Training Packs below.
Think you've created the next great Custom Training Pack? Let us know by sharing it on Discord, Reddit, and Twitter. We go through fan-submitted Training Packs each month, and could even choose yours in our next Community
Photo modes have become a mainstay in video games across a wide variety of genres over the past couple years. They give players an up-close look at every distinct detail that goes into the visuals of our favorite games, plus allow content creators to craft truly amazing, unique images.* Rocket League's* most recent update added a similar feature called Replay FX—a suite of controls that made it possible for fans to heavily edit the look of their best plays from the pitch.
Replay FX adds the ability to adjust the look of saved replays by adding filters, focus points, vignettes, and greenscreen effects that make the fan art possibilities endless. The controls are still in beta as this is the first time a feature of this type have been added to the game. The development team is still exploring how content creators are using these tools, what's working, and what can be added in the future. But, just because it's in beta doesn't mean it came together overnight.
The team leading the charge behind Replay FX is led by senior graphics engineer Art Mata, graphics engineer Nate Danque, and tools engineer Mark Masilionis. A photo mode for Rocket League had been in talks for a while, and it took the team roughly a year to make it a fully-fledged feature. What would eventually become Replay FX started as a series of behind-the-scenes tools made for different teams at Psyonix. The video producers wanted a mod that could give their highlight or promotional videos a different look and feel, and give them more freedom when capturing gameplay footage. Mark's job as tools engineer is to create those types of tools.
Adding a couple tools for players to adjust replays was a good start, but changing the depth of field wasn't quite enough to pursue as a new game feature by itself. Then Mark got a new request to make a greenscreen effect for the creative services team, the group that creates graphic designs for Rocket League websites and high-resolution screenshots of Battle-Cars and items. "That project took me a couple of days," Mark said. "Obviously, it didn't have to be production quality or anything. They just needed it to work."
Mark made these tools designed to be used by these different parts of Psyonix development. Then game director Scott Rudi took notice. "We just had gotten it to a point where we were comfortable giving it to the video producers," Art recalls. "Then a week later, Scott asked, 'hey, what's it going to take to get this into a patch?' We had to take a long look at the work ahead of us." The reality: console work to make sure Replay FX would run smoothly on all platforms, and a user interface (UI) that worked the way they wanted it to, and still made it easy to use for players. UI can be a particularly daunting task since the UI team is often busy on different Rocket League projects.
At that time, Nate had just joined the Psyonix team, and was handed the Replay FX project roughly a month after his start date. From there, his job was making sure the feature was working properly. Plus, the team kept coming up with new ideas for filters.
"I prototyped a few more filters, but we had to make sure we were staying within performance budgets and ensure frame rates were staying stable," Art said. "I whipped up a few, Nate put some together, and we added what we thought would be some really interesting features that the community could use for utility. We started going in that direction and it started getting more complicated."
After roughly a year's worth of time and effort, the team would eventually get it in its beta form as a part of the Esports Shop Update. According to Nate, there is still room for improvement and opportunity to add features in the future. Those features may be additional filters, or perhaps even the ability to equip different wheels, decals, and goal explosions in replays, which is one of Mark's dream features.
"For now, we're listening and tuning according to feedback," Art says. "We'll definitely have more filters on the way, and right now we're just seeing what's possible and what we can fit and what works."
Art, Nate, and Mark agree that the best part of Replay FX has been the community reception. They have been overwhelmed by the positive response and the creations made by fans. Check out some of their favorite creations here and here.
"Honestly, it's cool that it's being received so well, but even cooler to see what they're making with it," Mark said. "I love seeing the amazing things everyone is creating. It's just so rewarding that they're able to make all of this art."
"It's humbling," Art said. "Whenever we put out stuff like this, we know it's going to go to a community that's passionate, and they want to share that passion with their friends. That's always exciting. It's inspiring. It makes me want to go back and do more for the community. Let's see how far we can push this thing."
If you're enjoying Replay FX, be sure to share your creations with us. Tag @RocketLeague on Twitter and use the hashtag #RLReplayFX. We feature Fan Art every Friday, and may even use one of your creations.
It's hard to believe that we're almost to the halfway mark of 2019, but believe it you should, because it means that we're ready for a brand new Roadmap that sheds some light on the new features and improvements we're bringing to the game over the next several months.
Of course, you've probably already read this month's "Epic News," which is why we also want to assure you (and the rest of our community) that Rocket League will continue to be shaped by the same development team that it always has even if our family is getting quite a bit bigger. The game will also continue to be fueled and inspired by the passion and feedback of our dedicated playerbase just as it was before.
With that in mind, let's take a closer look at what you can expect to see in the next few months of 2019!
Summer Event with Limited-Time Events
Next month, we will kick off the biggest in-game event that Rocket League has ever had, featuring several limited-time events. While the event on the whole will share the same in-game currency for items that can be redeemed inside the event store, the items found in the event store itself will change as we move through different points in the promotion; giving you more in-game items to earn than ever before.
We know that players can sometimes earn more event currency than they sometimes use, so we're addressing that by adding XP Level-Up Packs in the event store as well (a Rocket League first)! That means that players will be able to redeem event currency for XP Level-Up Packs that grant 10 Tier Points for Rocket Pass -- allowing you to boost your Rocket Pass Tiers in a super-fast and super-convenient way!
Party-Up System, Inventory Management, and Trading
The community has been asking us for quicker ways to party-up with strangers following a good match. That functionality will be coming later this year. Soon, you'll be able to easily party-up with teammates from the post-game screen.
Inventories are growing too, and that calls for better ways to organize all of your in-game items. We're happy to say that additional inventory management tools will also be added via a future update.
Finally, one of our long-term goals for 2019 and beyond is to make a number of under-the-hood, quality-of-life updates to our trading system. We’ll have more to share on that later this year.
RLCS Season 7 World Championship Incoming!
The RLCS Season 7 World Championship at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ is just around the corner and tickets are selling fast. Get your tickets now to catch all the live action from the world's best Rocket League teams. Also, Competitive Season 10 ends on Monday, May 13, so make sure you fulfill your Season Reward Level wins at your rank to earn the appropriate goodies.
Stay tuned next month for the full reveal of our upcoming event. Plus, you can expect to see the aforementioned features (and more) later this year. For fans looking to find out more regarding what our acquisition by Epic Games means for Rocket League and Psyonix in the long-term -- there's nothing new to report just yet, but we'll keep you informed as soon as we have an update.
Big things have humble beginnings. Learning to pull the most insane aerial backboard double touches starts out by just trying to strike a slow-moving ball with all four wheels firmly planted on the ground. Becoming one of the biggest content creators in the Rocket League community—someone who produces seemingly impossible freestyle goals—can start as a quick upload of someone practicing freekicks in soccer. That's Joni "JHZER" Humaloja (now simply known as "JZR"). Before he was pushing the limits of what was possible on the virtual pitch, this is precisely how the aerial extraordinaire started his YouTube career.
His very first upload was a simple, single-cam video of him practicing his soccer skills in his hometown of Nummela, Finland. Like so many who have turned Rocket League skills into a career, JZR's love for soccer proved to be the gateway to the video game. Before JZR was showing his viewers how to be one of the best players in a Rocket League lobby, he started by learning the basics of Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket Powered Battle Cars (SARPBC). This turned out to be the first game JZR started taking seriously.
"I started playing SARPBC seriously pretty much from the beginning," JZR said. "I loved the game because it was really similar to real-life sports. You're in total control of the car. SARPBC gave players the car, boost, and the ball. From there, it’s all about what you can do with them. It's the best feeling when you realize how you struggled with something last time you played and now you are more comfortable with it. You feel proud and want to improve on the next thing."
That improvement would eventually lead to the creation of content including some of the most insane Rocket League goals on YouTube. Before his YouTube channel got fully off the ground, JZR wasn't sure if YouTube would be his career path, despite it being his dream. Even though soccer was his first YouTube upload and the beginning of his love for competition, he decided to hang up the cleats after playing for 9 years to focus on his college. At that time, the goal was to go from college to university to study nanoscience (university comes after college in Finland). Even while juggling higher education, college brought free time, and free time began to fill with SARPBC. But, he wasn't able to drop everything and embrace SARPBC just yet.
After college, it was time to complete his military service—a government mandate for all men over 18 years old in Finland. JZR, who served as a Navy Scout, describes it as one of the toughest times of his life, but credits his service for teaching him discipline and respect.
Following military service, JZR found himself at a crossroads. He was back at university, but his passion for SARPBC still lingered. Creating videos on a regular basis for a YouTube channel is no easy task by itself. JZR taught himself to edit his videos, and had to learn new techniques as he went along. Throw in a university course load studying nanoscience in chemistry, and you have a recipe to get stretched pretty thin. That's when he had to make the decision between the traditional path versus the unconventional.
"I'm still in university, but I've taken time off for a year now to focus on content creating. That's where my real dreams are," he said. Having the support of loved ones always helps, and JZR says he has that too. "My family is super supportive and always encourages me to do what I really want to do in life. They knew how much I enjoyed gaming already and that I did videos before this for a long time. So, they were just proud and happy for the success of the channel."
Now, being laser-focused on Rocket League and content creation, JZR is all about elevating his game, both on the pitch and on his channel. He came on the scene with crazy mechanics known as "freestyling." Freestyling is when players go for goals in the flashiest way possible. He and his partner on the pitch, MK, are practically Rocket League magicians, setting up ridiculous passing plays to one another all while spinning multiple times in midair with ease. JZR and MK's partnership goes way back to three years ago when they were part of a freestyling team called Nixus.
"From the first game we played together I saw how good he was at passing. We had amazing chemistry. We've been playing ever since and haven't stopped. Nowadays, he is one of my best friends. I've met him several times in real life and I'm truly happy that he's part of my life." JZR admits that while his channel, and his playstyle with MK, started out with a focus on freestyling, he's been trying to distance himself from being labeled a "freestyler."
"I started freestyling on SARPBC in 2011. I thought it would be cool to score goals while spinning like crazy in air for montages, because people really didn’t do them back then. My viewers liked the goals, so coming up with different tricks became my thing. Nowadays in Rocket League, my passion is more in competitive, so I haven’t been a freestyler in a long time. I don’t come up with new tricks anymore on purpose. It’s more like crazy stuff just happens when I’m trying my best but also improvising on the go." JZR still likes to follow the freestyling scene and particularly enjoys the goals of other content creators like MuiricleS.
When not producing videos, JZR has dabbled in Rocket League's competitive landscape. He was part of the now defunct FlipSid3 Tactics in 2017, and is looking to refuel that competitive fire. He recently competed in the EU Play-In stage of the Rival Series this season. "After a long time not competing I have started to focus on that again, and I'm improving myself as a player," JZR said. "I’m doing competitive highlights more than freestyling, so making those highlight videos and competing is easier."
Whether it's competing, practicing, or creating content for a YouTube channel, playing that much Rocket League can lead to burnout. JZR's got that covered, too. He tries to take time to himself away from screens when he can, or play something other than Rocket League to give himself a break. "In my spare time, I try to take care of myself as well as I can," he said. "Workout out at the gym and running are my favorite ways to do that, and I'm still playing soccer for fun." He enjoys playing other games with his teammate MK like Dead by Daylight, Tekken, CounterStrike: Global Offensive, Call of Duty, and Overwatch, just to name a few.
Even with all the games he plays for fun, Rocket League is still JZR's mainstay. He always goes back to it to improve his skills, pushing the boundaries of what's possible, and helping others elevate their game with tutorial videos on how to get to those top competitive ranks. "I still get super hyped about good goals even though I've been playing Rocket League and SARPBC for almost 10 years. That just shows that goals just keep getting better, and that thought makes me happy."