Bloody on-foot racer Deathsprint 66 is getting singleplayer PvE modes with grisly challenges

The situation: Sumo Newcastle are making a dystopian on-foot multiplayer racing game called Deathsprint 66, in which you control one of eight Running Men hurtling through the spiked and bladed contours of a futuristic megacity. The complication: competing against other actual human beings isn't always pleasant or desirable, especially when hurtling through the spiked and bladed contours of a futuristic megacity. The solution: Deathsprint 66 is getting a set of PvE-focussed "Episodes" in which just one human player plus optional bots hurtle through the spiked and bladed contours of a futuristic megacity.

These Episodes consist of 3-5 stage tournaments, and they aren't just the same old neon pain gauntlets as in the core eight-player mode. They're custom challenges with "mechanical twists", sayeth the press release. Some of those "twists" take the form of additional spikes and blades.

One of the Episodes is Killing Time - this starts you off with just 15 seconds to reach the first checkpoint and top up your timer before your head explodes. In Five Lives, meanwhile, 'first or last' rules apply and you only have five "clone jockeys" (respawns) to burn through. And then there's Bloodbath Circuits and Bloodbath Sprints, in which maps feature extra hazards and all Tributes (power-ups) are offensive in nature. Catch some of that in action in this here audio-visual montage of people playing Dodge The Chainsaw, an Episode of my own devising which I generally suck at.

I caught a hands-off alpha build of Deathsprint 66 at GDC this year and swapped a few words with Sumo Newcastle - amongst other things we discussed the "suit of failure", a crashtest dummy outfit with no sponsor logos or other commercial bling, which you'll be contemptuously awarded if you kill your clone jockeys too often.

I'm on record as being a bit sick of satirical deathgames in video games, but I like this one because it reminds me of Blur and because they keep the wisecracks to a minimum. It sure looks... zippy. More WipEout than Blur, perhaps. The full game releases on 12th September.