AllStars Destruction is a game about how to destroy cars. It’s right there, the first word of the title. It is also an important milestone for the PS5 – a great exclusive that is exclusively on the next generation console that is not a remake or that spans generations.
It is a title that, out of necessity, will be used to show what kind of games developers can make when given the reins of PS5’s new features and firepower. But crushing is still the heart of AllStars Destruction: so much so that the seed of the game was a simple idea. “Imagine how incredible we can damage the PS5,” says John McLaughlin, senior producer at Sony XDev The Verge.
It was a small leap from there to the partnership with Lucid Games for development, given the studio’s heritage. Game director Colin Berry had previously worked on the Destroy series, while other members of Lucid came from other classic car games, like Metropolis Street Racer, Project Gotham Racingand MotorStorm. “One thing was for sure, these guys knew cars,” says McLaughlin. “And then we basically looked for those guys with that seed and said, ‘We want to do something on PS5, with a lot of destruction and cool stuff – what’s your idea, what’s your selling point?’”
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The Lucid team came back with a different type of battle car game. As McLaughlin explains, “They came to us, not so much with AllStars Destruction – the name came later – but they came with the tone of a game that featured cars, a lot of destruction, [and] encouraged destruction. It wasn’t about hiding from destruction, it was all about breaking and breaking as fast as possible and so on. “
The other objective was to raise the bar for a derby-style game of destruction. While older games would cheat by showing damage or debris, hiding behind changes in texture or low-resolution polygons, AllStars Destruction tries to offer a better experience, according to Berry. “Regarding PlayStation 5 and what we were told about the specs at the beginning, that we could look at making deformation and damage and physics in a way that we haven’t done before, and at a level that we haven’t done before. So, kneading the cars, the number of parts of each car is composed, all this debris, we can really tighten the bolt on this type of thing. “
That level of detail in title destruction is a big part of why AllStars Destruction it is limited to PS5 only – even when a PS4 port would open the game for more players, a fundamental thing in a game strongly focused on multiplayer modes. A PS4 version simply “wouldn’t have the same performance in terms of damage, defamation and physics, in fact in the game,” says Berry.
The flip side of this exclusivity, of course, is what happens to AllStars Destruction Next. As a free PS5 exclusive title on offer via PlayStation Plus for the next two months, a large opening audience will be virtually guaranteed, just like previous PS Plus hits, such as Rocket League or Autumn staff reached. Rocket League went on to become a sensation on the internet, with huge electronic sports tournaments that are still popular even years after the launch. Autumn staff, on the other hand, largely disappeared in the background, hampered by new content that appeared very slowly to maintain the interest of most players after the first few weeks.
“We have a plan, we have a script, not just for the … game launch window, but for the first three, four weeks later, a few months later, for the next year,” says McLaughlin, with new characters, new game modes and more, all planned for free in the future. “We have a plan with a content schedule for next year that I think will keep people entertained and engaged and keep them coming back and wondering what they are going to launch this week and what they are going to launch next week.”
AllStars Destruction is available as a free download for PlayStation Plus PlayStation 5 subscribers in February and March.