Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds – The Animation – YouTube
Because earlier Sonic Racing titles were already available across multiple consoles, the absence of cross-platform multiplayer — notably in 2019’s Team Sonic Racing — stood out. To address that, the development team partnered with Sega’s arcade division to integrate the networking technology and backend infrastructure required for reliable cross-play.
Beyond expanding the player base for Sonic’s answer to Mario Kart, cross-play improves matchmaking by preventing new players from being routinely matched against highly experienced racers when player pools are small. CrossWorlds producer Ryuichi Taki said the benefits justified the extra effort, even though implementation demanded substantial time and resources.
Taki explained that removing platform silos made it easier to ensure a healthy pool of similarly skilled opponents: “Breaking down the barriers between platforms obviously helps secure enough players at comparable skill levels. That was one of the key advantages that led us to commit to cross-play,” he said, adding that the process was painstaking and lengthy.
All that work appears to have paid off. Justin Towell’s review for GamesRadar+ describes CrossWorlds as “a very playable, well-designed racer that should only get better with time.”
Source: gamesradar.com
