Sony‘s Mod Nation Racers game for its new portable game system, code-named NGP, has an interesting connection to the PlayStation 3. When the Mod Nation Racers game for the NGP launches, it will have more than 2 million user-generated race tracks.
Sony is making that announcement at its E3 press conference today in Los Angeles, but we saw a version of Mod Nation Racers for the NGP at the company’s pre-E3 press briefing. This kind of product integration is a stellar example of how to design products that work well together, so that in this case the home console version of the game makes the handheld version a lot more playable. It is also a good example of crowdsourcing, where Sony relies on users to create the tracks that make the game fun to play.
Essentially, the game allows the user to take all of the content created for the PS 3 version of the game and run it on the NGP (which debuts sometime in the future), or take content created for the NGP version and run that on the PS 3. That’s a pretty cool innovation that allows players to play the game while they’re at home or on the run.
The game is designed for the NGP from scratch and is meant to take care of the portable game system’s touchscreen and a touch-sensitive touchpad on the back of the device, which has a beautiful five-inch organic light-emitting diode screen.
In the PS 3 version of the Mod Nation Racers racing game, players can create their own race tracks, or “mods.” Those mods can be created quickly and easily with intuitive tools on the PS 3. Sony has also made it possible to create mod tracks in the NGP version of the game. You can put your finger on the touchscreen of the NGP, for instance, and then point in the direction you want to lay down your track. The user can also use the rear touchpad of the NGP to help create features on the track. You can basically use your fingers to sculpt the terrain of the game.
You can then add background landscapes such as trees or hills and then upload the tracks. You can also play the tracks designed for one game on the other one. Once you design a track, you can race your carts on the track as soon as you’ve saved it.
That allows for some pretty cool exchange of user-generated content from the NGP to the PS 3 and vice versa. Shu Yoshida, head of Sony’s worldwide game studios, said the games for the NGP have been in the works for a couple of years and are all aimed at taking advantage of the NGP’s unique features.
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