PREVIEW – When I was asked to write about this game, I remembered 2014. Three and a half years ago, I was beta testing a PC game called Quantum Rush. Anti-gravitation racing with powerups. Then I read the press release, and I got pretty much the same thing as a few years ago… but now, on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

The game is developed by an indie team called Cybernetic Walrus, and they will show with the publisher (Iceberg Interactive) how a Belgian-Dutch collaboration is possible without any issues. They tried their best to create a fast-and-furious, futuristic, anti-gravitation racing game built on the Unity engine.

2210

The game is set in 2210, and the pilots drive the anti-gravitation vehicles (of course!) called Gravs. There will be three game modes, four game worlds, and three levels per each world. On paper, that sounds like a low amount, but the fact that the multiplayer could be split screen, and that it could be played by up to four people, could be massively turning things around! Online, you can expect leaderboards to show you’re the best (like no one ever was…). Cybernetic Walrus also promises to make destructible environments: activating hover mines, destroying a tunnel, make a rockslide fall on the other drivers, or even getting rid of them with the help of a rocket launcher. Natural traps multiplied by a thousand.

Of course, you will also be capable of upgrading your Grav, and you’ll unlock the tools and better equipment via the single-player campaign, and, apparently, one update could be affecting another one negatively. That quickly reminded me of Test Drive 5’s setup system: improving the acceleration hurt the top speed and the handling, boosting the top speed took a hit on the acceleration and the handling, and the handling’s fix ruined the acceleration and the top speed.

Why would it be good?

WipEout. With it, Sony threw a massive nostalgia pie at us in June, as they brought back an old franchise exclusively for the PlayStation 4 players. However, this game is going to be available on Xbox One and PC as well with a tentative release window of Q2 2018 (between April and June), but I think there will be one delay. There’s not a lot of worlds (and maps), but if we indeed receive destructible environments, it could be improving the replayability until the online pro players learn all the tricks, which means the first person to pull the punches will win. I’m also curious to know how many vehicles and customization options we will get, and then, we didn’t even get into the technicalities. Oh, the good old technical aspects!

There’s the PlayStation 4 Pro and the Xbox One X – will Antigraviator support them? If the answer is yes, what frame rate will it have? It’s an important aspect, especially for a racing game! How choppy will it run on the old PlayStation 4 and Xbox One? What about the resolution? How much of a performance hit will we get when we destroy a tunnel, for example? I’m curious to see how the developers utilized the Unity engine.

I like the sci-fi environment, and the base idea is also intriguing (there’s a campaign, so it’s not just an online-only loot box bull… hopefully), too. Antigraviator, in Q2 2018. Will it be an indie WipEout, or will it run off the track how F-Zero did? (Dear Nintendo, Metroid Prime had a return announced… why not go back to F-Zero?)

-V-

Publisher: Iceberg Interactive

Developer: Cybernetic Walrus

Genre: sci-fi racing

Relase date: Q2 2018