French developer Nadeo finally took the wraps off Trackmania 2 this past weekend at the Paris Game Festival.
Not much is known about the upcoming new addition to the popular family of arcade racers for the PC aside from the fact that it’s in development. The game will apparently include three new environments, support for split-screen racing and an enhanced track editor; as you’d expect, the graphics will also be given a significant boost.
Despite being called Trackmania 2, several other Trackmania titles have come before it, including Trackmania Sunrise, Trackmania Original, Trackmania Nations, Trackmania United, Trackmania Forever and a version for the Nintendo DS creatively entitled Trackmania DS. Nadeo’s support of the series through free expansions and upgrades (and in the case of Trackmania Nations, an entirely free game) has helped maintain its popularity over the years, as has the stream of fresh content provided by a strong and well-supported community of track creators.
The game looks fantastic even through crappy shakycam footage but it shouldn’t be confused with any kind of serious racing simulator. Trackmania comes directly from the Stunts school of driving, where realism goes out the window in favor of looped tracks, mile-long jumps and epic crashes in indestructible cars. If that sounds like your bag, you’d be well advised to give it a look.
No official release date was announced, although a Twitter post by French website Kazan claims the game is expected to come out in 2010 and will be available only for the PC.
Source: Joystiq
