FlatOut - First Look Preview

Dirty racing games, aka, Rally titles, come in batches and it certainly appears to be a productive period for this genre. The standard over the last few years has reached a zenith and it is now all about what extra extravagant ideas can be added that give the game a push. BugBear has already written a number of road sliding, vehicle crunching games, which have all been well received and their next title, FlatOut, continues the racing theme. In the words of the team, â??FlatOut is an adrenaline-filled racing game that brings cheap, rusty, banged-up cars to battle it out on intensive closed courses. First one to the finish line hogs not only the road but also most of the prize money, so it's every man for himself by all necessary means.â??

All cars start off side-by-side, making it possible for any contestant to come into (and, if lucky, out of) the critical first turn at the head of the pack. As the track then quickly narrows down the race can easily turn into a very busy wrecking site. This leaves the player with two options: either to give in to the road rage or to attempt surviving the clash without taking too much damage. Since many couch-motorists enjoy totalling cars into unidentifiable heaps of trash metal, they are granted the possibility of doing so - with style. Cutting edge damage modelling techniques and detailed visual car damage unleash the full potential of virtual racing. BugBear has developed totally new graphics and physics engines for FlatOut, bringing unrivalled detail in terrain and cars.

We spoke with Aki Järvilehto, Director at the company, about of the innovations that will excite and captivate gamers.

â??Our first thoughts were along the lines of, â??How can we do something really innovative in the racing genre and how can we do that exceptionally well?â?

â??With FlatOut we are certainly pushing the envelope on many different fronts, but the real difference to the gamers will be the cutting edge realism of the real time physics that FlatOut excels with. We wanted to create a racing game where the cars and the environment interact together in an explosive manner!â?

BugBear has already written titles such as Tough Trucks and Rally Trophy, along with Söldner. With some excellent technology in place and presentation of the aforementioned games excellent, their expertise not only in delivering good quality titles, along with their proficiency with vehicle physics, is imposing so it is more about their maturity and advancement in their techniques and tools that could really place FlatOut alongside other big titles.

â??The exceptional part about FlatOut is the moment when you make a mistake and crash through the fences or tyre walls on the trackside. When your hood violently tears away soaring over the windshield and youâ??re buried under the shower of tyres, which smash your roof in, thatâ??s when you know youâ??re really racing! What separates FlatOut from many other games is that we want to make the crashes visually very rewarding to the player. And we want the player to keep driving even when heâ??s lost the windshield or the driver side door and his engine is in flames!â?

â??As the tools go weâ??ve completely rewritten everything since our previous racing game Rally Trophy. The focus on the tools has been two fold: First, weâ??ve wanted to make sure that the technology is powerful enough to really dazzle everyone across all three platforms that weâ??re working on. The second objective that we had was to tailor all our development tools to support realistic environment and damage modelling. Itâ??s a tough challenge when youâ??re suddenly looking at situations where you need to be able to model physics in real time for literally thousands of simultaneous objects reacting to mid-air collisions with different kind of parameters.â?

The main goal for the player is to progress through ever increasing competitive racing classes in a career based mode. The aim is for the player to build his career as the toughest underground driver around. In addition to the career mode the player can also â??sidestepâ?? to different mini-games, but at this stage BugBear did not want to give away any details about this.

The general consensus is that there are too many games around or coming onto the market that rely on great looking cars but without any car deformation that truly create the full experience. FlatOut will have cutting-edge damage modelling techniques and it was interesting to hear how extensive it would be!

â??We believe we are taking damage modelling to a completely new level in FlatOut. Itâ??s been one of the focal points of the project since day one and itâ??s an integral part of the game. The damage is calculated to reflect the exact point of impact for each collision. Weâ??re morphing the cars on the fly so that youâ??ll be able to see all the dents in accurate detail. All cars are constructed from dozens of separate individual pieces which have their own parameters to include how hard impact will, for example, make your driver side door tear away in a crash.â?

â??To continue, weâ??re not just doing damage modelling because it looks cool! In fact the damage modelling is also one of the important gameplay elements. To illustrate this in detail letâ??s say that on lap one you have a major smash-up when the car hits the first curve of the track. Now, on the next lap this same curve will be way harder to drive as the track is cluttered with doors, windshields and other parts from the cars which collided here earlier. This is especially powerful in multiplayer mode, as youâ??ll never know what nasty surprises the next lap will hold. To sum it up this accurate damage modelling effectively makes the track change for each lap and that really keeps you on the edge of your seat, constantly focused on the next challenge.â?

FlatOut will offer 16 different cars and all will have unique handling characteristics. Play commences with a rather modest car (someone might be more blunt and just say a piece of junk â?“ Bugbears words) but then must build up his reputation and cash reserves to access the more powerful muscle cars. BugBear will ensure there are a plethroa of variations to make sure that tracks not only offer their own distinguished looks, but also have very different game play characteristics. Altogether there will be 45 different track variations that all have unique routes and shortcuts.

Flatout will harness a new physics engine but to the average gamer finding, when playing, how this manifests itself may be tougher than the actual racing so Aki explained what is on offer.

â??Thereâ??s a clear trend that physics is implemented to different game genres. Half Life 2 is considered as â??the physics showcaseâ?? for FPS genre. Weâ??re aiming to do exactly the same thing with FlatOut and racing games.â?

â??The difference to the player is very concrete. One thing that has been really bothering us with most of the racing titles is the fact that when you drive outside of the track the world simply ends! Or alternatively there are â??invisible wallsâ?? which kick in as soon as you leave the track. These kinds of artificial restrictions completely take away the illusion of reality from the player. We really donâ??t want to do that with FlatOut. We want to make sure that all trackside objects include realistic physics and when you hit a wall of tyres lining the track all these tyres will scatter or explode to different directions. Given that we also know the mass and velocity of all these objects we can then use the physics to our advantage and do real time damage modelling to your car. Itâ??s explosive and itâ??s fun, and itâ??s the way physics was meant to be used!â?

Interacting with the other cars is one of the key elements in the game. Gameplay we are promised will be hectic, along with â??destruction derbyâ?? elements included. A tip offered was that when youâ??re doing the laps itâ??s both important to make sure youâ??re racing as fast as possible, while also trying to use the interactive scenery as something to literally throw the competition off the track. When youâ??re leading you might want to make sure that you bump into obstacles, which will fall on the track to wreak havoc among your following opponents for example.

Tuning the car is also an important aspect of FlatOut. The player will need to make strategic decisions adjusting his car for more speed against handling and grip and so forth. This is crucial in order to keep up with the artificial intelligence, which will be tuning the competitive cars as the game proceeds. It also makes the game more fun as you can customize your car to your personal driving style.

â??Our background is in simulation type of racing games and weâ??re using techniques and past experience weâ??ve learned over the years to make sure that the vehicles will handle in a realistic manner. At the same time itâ??s good to point out that FlatOut clearly is not a simulation. Itâ??s more like driving a hyper realistic arcade game, i.e. the design is visually realistic, but the player will be able to keep driving even after a spectacular crash at insane speeds. In a way weâ??re trying to simulate real life as closely as possible, while consciously skipping all the boring parts and highlighting the most exiting and fun aspects of racing.â?

So, is FlatOut all about power, and the thrill of speed? Quick as a flash, Aki answered.

â??Absolutely. Racing is (and should be) a very masculine kind of sport. To add on that I have to admit that the damage modelling makes driving FlatOut very personal. When weâ??re game testing the multiplayer at the office thereâ??s a lot of testosterone in the air. I guess thereâ??s something about racing cars, and completely wrecking your opponents that really connects with the primal urges.â?

â??The most dynamic racer everâ?, were Akiâ??s parting words!