The upcoming Rocket League DLC "Chaos Run" will add a post-apocalyptic twist to the game with "thematically inspired" paint, wheels, rocket trailers, toppers, and antennas, plus a pair of brand-new cars, one of which sports a rather familiar haircut.
The release of Chaos Run will also see the launch of a free new arena called Wasteland, that's based on a similar map in Psyonix's 2008 game Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars. As the first "non-standard" stadium added to the game, it will be wider than other fields and have different Boost placements. But the biggest difference is that the ground around the entire perimeter will be sloped, which developer Psyonix said will result in a much different "feel" in matches.
Also on the way is new music from Kevin Riepl, whose previous videogame credits include Gears of War, Crackdown 2, Aliens: Colonial Marines, and Hawken. The new tunes will be free as well, as will a number of new Garage items that have yet to be announced.
Rocket League—Chaos Run is slated to come out in early December, and will set you back $4. Details are up on Steam.
Rocket League [official site] is, of course, set in the brightest of utopias, when we have all transcended flesh to gambol and frolic as sentient cars. But what if it were a bad future, what if everything were all rusty and had sand and all that bad future stuff? You’ll see soon, as developers Psyonix today announced Chaos Run, a new DLC pack with grim, grimy new cards, decals, wheels, and other customisation bits. It’ll arrive this December alongside a free update adding a new footie arena for everyone, the dusty Wasteland – the game’s first ‘non-standard’ pitch. Have a look:
Football with rocketcars, sure, that makes sense to me – it’s the natural evolution of ballsports, to come in our own future following an intermediate step of sports combining rollerskaters and motorbikers. But making the ball cubic? Making cars murder each other on contact? Now that is unlikely! But you can virtually indulge in this wild dream, as Rocket League [official site] developers Psyonix have added those and more as optional oddities through ‘mutators’ in an update last night.
These are small options that can change the game in silly ways, from low-gravity Moonball (which, again, seems inevitable) to carhockey (preposterous!).
You've probably heard about today's big Rocket League update incorporating mutators that enable the game to be played in all sorts of weird and different ways. But you may not have known that it includes a sweet little piece of free Fallout 4 swag too.
The unlockable Vault Boy antenna is undeniably swanky, and yes, it's legit: Developer Psyonix offered Bethesda "a huge thanks" for allowing it to be added. Several other game-related antennae are included with the update as well, for Drive Club, Oddworld, and Unreal Tournament.
But the best of the bunch—and I say this as an entirely unbiased third-party observer, naturally—is the official PC Gamer antenna flag that's also included in the update. There are other "community flags" to choose from—Reddit, Something Awful, Day[9]TV among others—but really, between Fallout 4 and us, what more could you possibly want?
So, to recap: Rocket League mutators are out today, Fallout 4 will be here tomorrow, and you can read our Fallout 4 review right now—right here.
If you have Rocket League in your Steam library, good news! It got a free update today adding mutators and a new playlist that randomly cycles them. I played a few mutated matches just now, and it's exactly what I expected when it was announced: a way to play Rocket League where I can stop caring so much about the score, and focus on doing stupid mid-air tricks and aimless somersaults.
My favorite mutators are the low-gravity Moonball mode, which lets you fly across the map with a few taps of the boost, and any mode with a giant ball. The giant ball is great, because it gives everyone a chance to do aerials and make epic saves, often all at once in a mid-air pushing contest.
They're not all fun—I don't love Time Warp, which makes everything go slow-mo whenever someone hits the ball, and just feels disorienting—but they all have the effect of taking the pressure off for some low-stakes matches in between the competitive stuff. And maybe certain settings will be taken more seriously in time, the way I only play Unreal Tournament 2K4 with Instagib. In custom matches, there's lots to experiment with. You could play a match, for instance, with low gravity, a gigantic ball, friendly fire (teammates can demolish each other), unlimited boost, and no reset after goals. I've dropped a screenshot of the options in below.
There's a bit more, too: Next month, we'll get the hockey mutator, which turns the grass to ice and the ball into a puck, and I look forward to seeing how that works out. No one is saying my nickname is going to be 'The Dominik Hasek of Rocket League,' but I mean, they could start saying that now and we'll just see if it sticks.