Rocket League

Genre: Racing / Sports (Soccer / Basketball / Hockey / Misc.)

Players: 1-4 Team-Based Competitive (Local Split-Screen), 2-8 Team-Based Competitive (Local Wireless, Online)

The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference

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Review:

WARNING: THIS GAME HEAVILY PUSHES MICROTRANSACTIONS

In the time since my original review of Rocket League, there have been some significant changes. The game ditched its lootboxes (though it still has microtransactions for clearly-outlined aesthetic-only items). However, even bigger than that is that the game went completely free-to-play, without even adding any new monetization. For a short while, this briefly caused problems on the Nintendo Switch that made local multiplayer inaccessible, but a patch fixed this problem and now everything seems to work swimmingly.

Given that these are pretty major changes, I have opted to re-review this game, though the majority of the original review remains intact, as the core gameplay hasn’t changed since the original review. As such, what follows will mostly be the original review with a few minor alterations to reflect these changes to the game’s monetization.

Rocket League, originally released on multiple platforms in 2015 and ported to the Nintendo Switch in 2017, is a game that is most easily described by saying that it’s playing a game of Soccer, but with cars. Or alternately, depending on the game mode, hockey with cars, or basketball with cars, or the unique “drop shot” sport with a focus on slamming the ball down onto the opposing team’s turf. Basically, it’s a Racing / Sports title that combines various sports with cars.

It’s a formula that works surprisingly well, and adds a new element to sports games. Aiming the ball (or puck) is a simple, straightforward process of bumping it in the right direction, yet it is nevertheless difficult because your movement is limited to the way that a vehicle can move around. Players are given a few moves to assist with this, including a useful double-jump, brief speed boosts, and the ability to drive along walls and ceilings, although it takes some practice judging these moves when you’re using them for the purpose of precision aiming instead of winning a race.

If you can get past that initial awkwardness, the game plays like a dream. It is immensely satisfying to line up a successful shot at the goal, or to steal the ball away from an opponent and pass it to a teammate for the win. And the jumping acrobatics are tricky, but that just makes it all the more thrilling when you can manage to jump up and thwack the ball juuuust right. And for those who have the inclination and aptitude, combining boosts and jumps to literally rocket around the arena makes for all sorts of tantalizing opportunities.

The game has a wealth of modes and options, as well as tons of customization options to deck out your car. Many of these options are behind paid DLC but it’s easy enough to earn these bonuses on your own, and thankfully none of them affect gameplay performance – all cars in the game run the same.

Visually, the game looks great, sticking to a solid 60fps, although the resolution has dropped from the 1080p of other versions to 720p on the Switch in docked mode (and even less in handheld mode, and of course things look even worse in split-screen as well). The loss of resolution here is noticeable, but not enough to really hinder the gameplay, and even with the lower resolution the game still looks great. Honestly, I think that visually this is the best that fans of the game could hope for in a Switch port.

Here in my original review, I bemoaned that the game’s excellent ability to play with a friend in couch co-op while also online at the same time was hindered by the need for each player to have a Nintendo Switch Online account, but the switch to free-to-play removes that requirement, and now it’s extremely easy to get multiple people on your couch playing against opponents around the world. Players are required to sign up for a free Epic Games account, but this is a pretty fast and painless process, and once you’ve done it you needn’t worry about it again.

At this point, Rocket League is getting extremely close to the perfect version of what it aims to be. It’s free to play, the monetization is actually much more relaxed than it used to be as a paid game, it looks great, it plays great, it has plenty of game modes and options, it has excellent online play and superb couch co-op and couch competitive play. While I’m still frustrated at how tough it is to line up a good shot, that doesn’t stop this game from being an absolute blast, and the fact that it’s now free means that the only reason you shouldn’t have this game on your Switch is if you already play it on another platform instead. In short, Rocket League is a must-have game, and it has only gotten better as time goes on.

tl;dr – Rocket League has players using cars to play soccer, hockey, and basketball, and it is an absolute blast to play. It still runs smoothly on the Switch, albeit with reduced resolution, and it’s loaded with options and a wealth of multiplayer features. What’s more, the change to free-to-play has made it even easier to take the plunge, as it not only removes the entry fee and the need to subscribe to Nintendo Switch Online for online play, but it actually has less monetization now than when I first reviewed it. Unless you have this game on another platform, you absolutely should have it on your Nintendo Switch.

Grade: A

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The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference

Rocket League

Genre: Racing / Sports (Soccer / Basketball / Hockey / Misc.)

Players: 1-4 Team-Based Competitive (Local Split-Screen), 2-8 Team-Based Competitive (Local Wireless, Online)

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Review:

WARNING: THIS GAME HEAVILY PUSHES MICROTRANSACTIONS

I’ll try to make this short and sweet. I thought Rocket League looked pretty good on Nintendo Switch when I first reviewed it, and I still do. The resolution is fairly low, but the framerate is smooth and rock-solid. The Nintendo Switch 2 doesn’t really do anything to change this.

What Nintendo Switch 2 does change are the loading times – just to get to the title screen took 42 seconds on Nintendo Switch, but only 18 on Nintendo Switch 2, and I suspect it could have gone even faster if it let me skip the logos at the start. Loading into matches is also faster.

So there you go – it’s not a massive change, but it’s definitely a nice improvement that will save you time. And if you’ve gotten a Nintendo Switch 2 and are looking for a great free-to-play game to add to your collection, this one may have a low resolution but it is otherwise an absolutely superb choice.

tl;dr – Rocket League has players using cars to play soccer, hockey, and basketball, and it is an absolute blast to play. It still runs smoothly on the Nintendo Switch, albeit with reduced resolution (still the case on Nintendo Switch 2, but with reduced loading times), and it’s loaded with options and a wealth of multiplayer features. What’s more, the change to free-to-play has made it even easier to take the plunge, as it not only removes the entry fee and the need to subscribe to Nintendo Switch Online for online play, but it actually has less monetization now than when I first reviewed it. It might not have the higher resolution of other versions, but this game still looks and plays great on Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2.

Grade: A

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