Milestone is back on the track with ambitious licensed motorbike games in MXGP3 and MotoGP17 for PC, Playstation 4 and Xbox One. Visiting the Square Enix offices last week, Senior Product Manager Andrea Giolito walked us through some of the new features that would excite any racing enthusiast.
At first glance, MXGP3 hopes to set a new bar for graphics innovation by being the first Milestone studio release to utilize Unreal Engine 4. For the dirty and rough-rugged sport that motocross glamorizes, it could not be a better example to showcase terrain deformation, weather effects, and how it all impacts the rider’s physics throughout the race. “The more that you race in the very same point, the deeper the skids in the terrain and the deformation,” says Giolito. “This physically affects the way you play, the way you race.”
Customization is another pillar for MXGP3 as you can customize not only your rider but the bike down to the color of the foot pedals. This is not only cosmetic as you can also switch and swap mechanical parts that will enhance a bike’s speed or handling, like an RPG. At the same time, the development team appeared to hear the vociferous calls from its audience resulting in the inclusion of the two-strokes bikes. “The community asked very, very loudly because the two-strokes are some kind of legend,” said Giolito.
Milestone is certainly playing up the rags to riches tale in its Career mode, which is focused on building reputation to attract more sponsorships and credits. This results in key objectives that will appear while you race, such as placing ahead of a rival sponsor on the track.
For those looking to scratch their circuit itch, MotoGP 17 looks to appease with realistic sounding bikes, managerial element, and the series first foray into e-sports. With the Milestone development team moving future projects to Unreal Engine 4, MotoGP 17 marks the final game of its current tech engine and the perfect opportunity to showcase its attention to detail and refined simulated realism. “We decided to re-record the entire sound of everything single bike for MotoGP,” says Giolito. “We have new tools which granted us the ability to replicate exactly as in reality.”
In contrast to MXGP3, the managerial suite appears more robust in MotoGP 17, allowing you to select the crew and the office staff in charge of building your reputation through social media and marketing. You can also customize your rider to suit a specific stance like Ground, Shoulder Out, and Body Out. More aligned with Milestone’s simulated racing counterpart, Ride 2, there are now unlimited rewinds to ease the burden of making mistakes while on the track.
The biggest addition to MotoGP 17 is its e-sports competition starting in June, only for PS4. The premise here runs parallel to real life events, where players can race the same circuits happening in cadence during June to October. When the seventh race rolls around, the top 16 players will be invited to Valencia to compete in the final event at the close of the championship circuit, with a BMW M240i as the grand prize. While there is much to look forward to, Milestone hopes to appeal to a broad base of motorbike racing enthusiasts. “If you are a fanatic, or supporter of MotoGP, and you watch MotoGP on TV and network, you also are more keen to watch also the e-sport events because it’s replicated in the same format,” Giolito concluded.
Both games don’t have long to go till arrival as you can expect MXGP3 on June 20 and MotoGP 17 on July 11 for PC, Playstation 4, and Xbox One platforms.
