Team Sonic Racing is Sega's soon-to-be-released racing game, featuring a bunch of characters from the beloved
Sonic the Hedgehog series; expected to release in a couple of days from today for the PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Steam.
One of the things that threw a lot of people off about
Team Sonic Racing is the fact that the game will be introducing a new team mechanic that will reward how players race in teams, instead of rewarding the player that first crosses the finish line.
A recent interview with Takashi Iizuka,
Sonic the Hedgehog series Producer, has revealed the reason behind the developer wanting to focus on team races instead of the more traditional 1-vs-everyone type of gameplay; and it actually makes a lot of sense.
According to Iizuka, the reason behind
Team Sonic Racing being a team-based racing game has to do with multiplayer gameplay in general, as this would make races more enjoyable by having players working together to reach the finish line.
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This game uses rules where the overall placement of members decides the winners, a ruleset that’s not used much in racing games. Despite it being popular in shooters and action games, there are surprisingly few titles in the racing genre where can share the joy of working together."
The other reason for the developers deciding to go with team gameplay in
Team Sonic Racing is to give less-experienced players their time to shine instead of always having the most-experienced player mostly always winning the races; they'll have to work together in order tho win the race, no matter who crosses the finish line first.
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Actually, my son plays racing games with his friends, but if there is even one kid who’s better than the others, they’ll end up winning all the time. The mood of the group slowly gets worse, and people stop having fun. I would see that sort of thing happen and think, “If only there was a game where you could work together and high-five and share in the joy of winning together."
Team Sonic Racing is coming out in a couple of days, but reviews for the game have already started rolling out, which praise the inclusion of the team gameplay mechanic and stating how fun it is; further proving that the developers made the right decision.
Team Sonic Racing arrives this Winter! Race in a team with your friends (or against them) both offline and online, and choose from a variety of characters and tracks in the Sonic universe!
Team Sonic Racing will be available for the PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Steam on the 21st of May in 2019.