Lightning McQueen is coming to Rocket League, marking the game's first alive car
Knight Rider's KITT takes the honour of first sentient car in the game.
.jpg?width=70&height=70&fit=crop&quality=60&format=png&auto=webp)
In what might be Rocket League's most concerning crossover yet, the one and only Lightning McQueen from Pixar's Cars is coming to the game.
Rocket League, for the uninitiated, is a game where you drive around as a car playing football. It's ridiculous, wacky, and when you get the hang of it pretty dang fun too! But up until now, there haven't been any crossovers where the car itself is alive. Sure, there was a Knight Rider crossover featuring KITT, a sentient car, but it's just a robot. Yet yesterday, developer Psyonix announced the Lightning McQueen bundle, which is adding in the iconic car portrayed by Owen Wilson in the original film (though no Wilson to be found in this particular bit of DLC).
The bundle includes the Lightning McQueen car, of course, which is the first car in the game to "feature dynamic expressions! Lightning will look around the pitch while you cruise the Arena, then narrow his eyes in focus as you approach supersonic speeds." This raises several concerns. Has Lightning McQueen been transported from another universe to take part in these games? Is he a particularly good footballer? And more pressingly, what does this say about the rest of the cars in Rocket League?
If he isn't from another universe, then that means cars can exist as living beings, but with only Lightning available as an example of a car that is alive, there's an implication that he lives an incredibly solitary life. There's also the potential issue that consciousness has been ripped from all of the other cars in Rocket League, and thinking about all of this as hard as I am is stressful, yes, thank you for asking.
Anyway, existentialism aside, the bundle also comes with a couple of extra decals, including a Dinoco Decal which has Lightning sporting a nice sky blue, and the Cruisin' Decal, which offers a more casual look for the number one racer around. On top of that, there is of course a Ka-chow goal explosion, and even a "Life is a Highway" player anthem by Rascal Flatts.
You can pick up the bundle from today, November 7, just try not to think about it as hard as I have.