Paul Jeffrey
Premium
Bugbear Entertainment have done a little more teasing of the next big build update - showcasing the inclusion of mini maps to the title!
Ok I will admit, this isn't the most exciting piece of news in the whole world, and probably won't significantly change the gaming experience for existing players of the title, but the inclusion of the often requested track mini maps within the game is a very welcome step in the right direction for Bugbear Entertainment - another very welcome step forward as the studio look to push on to a full version release on PC and console later this year.
Bugbear have already confirmed significant performance improvements are coming to the title as part of the next build, and alongside this and the inclusion of track map functionality, Wreckfest continues to go from strength to strength..
Full blog post release:
Howdy all,
Here's a quick question for you (and it's not a trick one): What's that one obvious thing that Wreckfest has been missing compared to other racing games? That's right, a minimap! And by that, we mean the little overhead presentation of the track, complete with cute little dots showing your car as well as the other cars, all neatly tucked away in one of the corners of the screen on your HUD.
A minimap is something that's long been our to-do list, not only because it's pretty awesome but also because it has quite a few benefits. For starters, it makes it much easier for newcomers to get up to speed and start racing properly, obviously so because it removes the need to keep guessing where the next turn is and which way the track is going. Also, and this is a big one, for Wreckfest in particular it's extremely useful during demolition events because you can use it to quickly glance where your opponents are, removing the need to drive in circles especially during the latter stages of the match, looking for the remaining cars, all while possibly risking triggering the dreaded contact timer.
This being the case, we thought it would be a high time we added one so that' what we did!
Here's our minimap in all its glory:
Here's a quick question for you (and it's not a trick one): What's that one obvious thing that Wreckfest has been missing compared to other racing games? That's right, a minimap! And by that, we mean the little overhead presentation of the track, complete with cute little dots showing your car as well as the other cars, all neatly tucked away in one of the corners of the screen on your HUD.
A minimap is something that's long been our to-do list, not only because it's pretty awesome but also because it has quite a few benefits. For starters, it makes it much easier for newcomers to get up to speed and start racing properly, obviously so because it removes the need to keep guessing where the next turn is and which way the track is going. Also, and this is a big one, for Wreckfest in particular it's extremely useful during demolition events because you can use it to quickly glance where your opponents are, removing the need to drive in circles especially during the latter stages of the match, looking for the remaining cars, all while possibly risking triggering the dreaded contact timer.
This being the case, we thought it would be a high time we added one so that' what we did!
Here's our minimap in all its glory:
We're still working with the some bits like finalizing the HUD layout, minimap size as well as figuring out how much further ahead to show the track but we wanted to already give you a sneak peek since for the most part, the minimap already functioning like a proper one should, doing a fab job at showing the next stretches of the track and the other cars. It also rotates according to your direction of travel, so up is always forward, and zooms according to your speed, meaning that the faster you're going the further away the view is. This works well especially in larger demolition arenas, in so that when you're rolling ahead slowly you can clearly see the cars in the immediate vicinity and when increasing speed, the whole arena comes into the view. Like alluded to earlier, the distant sections of the track are faded away.
Here's another sneak peek, this time in demo derby:
Here's another sneak peek, this time in demo derby:
As you probably already guessed, those gray dots are poor souls that have been already wrecked.
We also found out that having a minimap definitely makes playing a more exciting experience. For one thing, it obviously makes it easier to target your rivals and evade their hits during demolition events, or dodge those clever whippersnappers going the wrong way with a school bus. Besides, when playing catch-up during racing events it's fun to glance at the minimap to see whether you're catching up or whether you need to step up. What's even more fun is seeing the leader go off the track or even come to a completely halt, meaning that they crashed! Good times.
Oh, and one final note to our content creators: The minimap is being generated run-time from the track data, so as long as your sector data is more or less legit the minimap should work straight out of the box even for your custom tracks.
The minimap will be part of the next update of the game, and we can't wait until you folks get to try it out. That's all for now but see you the next time for more exciting progress reports on what we have in store for you!
Wreckfest is available now for PC, with console versions to follow later in the year.
Check out our Wreckfest sub forum here at RaceDepartment for the news and chat around this awesome game, and also our newly refreshed and restarted Wreckfest Racing Club! Join in the online shenanigans and have yourself some fun!
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