Free Roam Cat and Mouse

New game mode to be added to PGR4

Wednesday, November 14 2007

Believe it or not, we do actually listen to our community at Bizarre. We've heard that many of you weren't happy with the PGR2 style of Cat and Mouse we included with PGR4, so we dug into the issue a little deeper. Unfortunately it wasn't as clear cut as "let's just change it back to the PGR3 method", as there are just as many advocates of the new style too. Eek!

Faced with this dilemma, the team decided to create a brand new Cat and Mouse mode to be included in the upcoming title update. The current Cat and Mouse mode will remain unchanged. This was due to conflicting feedback from both sides of the argument - and we figured that the easiest way to appease both sides was to leave the current mode as is, and let an entirely new game mode pushes the concept in a different direction. We think it'll address many of the concerns that both parties have had with the original mode. Oh, and did I mention that it's free roam?

Here's how it works:

  • Two teams, each with one mouse and multiple cats. The vehicle selection is not locked to a specific class... the only rule is that the mouse must be at least one class lower than the cats (so you can have classes A and B if you want).
  • Any city can be selected, and it will be opened up so any player can drive anywhere.
  • The mouse earns Kudos for his team by staying "alive", i.e. not being hit by the cats of the opposing team. The mouse also earns Kudos for performing style moves like slides and air.
  • The cats earn Kudos in two ways. Attacking the opposing teams mouse is the big scorer - the key to earning big points for your team is to ram into the slower cars as much as possible. The second way to earn points as a cat is to defend your mouse. Your Kudos meter ticks up the longer you spend within a certain radius of your mouse car.
  • The team with the most points at the end of the time limit wins.

Free Roam Cat and Mouse will be freely available (update) in the next few weeks. (update) For the time being though, let's have a look at some of the other questions from the community...

Of course we receive literally hundreds of community messages each week at Bizarre. Individually answering every single e-mail we receive is beyond the ability of my poor little typing fingers, but throwing them all into a web site update makes more sense (to me at least). So keep reading, and hopefully your question has already been answered. If not, send an angry e-mail to communitynews@bizarrecreations.com . The angrier the better. :)


  • Hi, I'm writing this to tell how disappointed we are about this situation: There's no Brazil Flag in PGR4, just the rest of the world flag. Sincerely, I want to know why the producers forget us. Xbox 360 is officially launched in Brazil and we have nice drivers around the world. So, in our point of view PGR4 must contain Brazil flag for online races. For sure it was a mistake and we hope this flag comes in a update. (Marcelo)

We made the decision early on to only support the territories where Xbox Live was officially launched. At the time that was 24 nations, plus one more "catch all" for Rest of the World. There were plenty of reasons for this, not least the technical ones. We're already pushing over 700 leaderboards in PGR4, and adding even more nations means even more of these (which isn't something we had trouble negotiating in the first place), and of course there are legal and geo political approvals to go through too.

So unfortunately you won't be seeing any more nations added to PGR4 in the future... all the Brazilians out there will have to settle for Rest of the World. Sorry. :(


  • The game is lovely however why is there no tachometer in the "in-car" view??? It's criminal! On a delorian it is impossible to work out when to change gear just by the sound of its small yet hilarious engine. Maybe there is a way with a controller however for the more enthralled drivers who own driving wheels there is no way of telling what gear one is in or how fast one is going. It is a dear shame. Please please please i beg you to bring an update out to give the opportunity to have a tachometer in the "in-car" view. (David)

This is something we'd love to fix for the upcoming title update, but it's been difficult to get approval for this so far. Of course it's a relatively trivial fix for us to make, but I believe the problems lie with getting enough test resources to get it through certification. However, the battle continues so hopefully we'll get this into a future title update. Cross your fingers. :)


  • I am currently top in the world in the photo's on PGR4. I've never actually got top in the world on anything before and wondered if you could find someway to congratulate me - maybe get a mention in your website or get any demo's etc? It is cheeky but I dont think I'll ever get top in anything in the world ever again! (Gareth)

How about a mention in this article? :) At least Stu is thinking about you...

Stuart Rutter

  • Who is the genius that decided to have the game cut out in the middle of a race every time the Xbox live connection drops? I could understand if I were playing online, but I am not. I can't tell you how many times I have been winning a championship race or an invitational when all of a sudden I'm back at the title screen. (Tom)

Unfortunately when the logged in profile changes (i.e. you sign out of Live) then the game has to react to this in a set way and return to the title screen. This is because continuing with the current game session will mess up the recording of results and potentially screw with the leaderboards. Easiest solution? Fix your network so that it doesn't drop you all the time. There's plenty of info on network setup at www.xbox.com/support/ to get you started.


  • Being a big fan of your PGR series I purchased the new PGR4 game. Is there any reason that the button configuration is not the same as all the other games? I.E D-pad to steer and A to accelerate and X to brake. There is every other conceivable setup accept that one. I don't wont to trade the game in for another one because PGR is so good. (Chris)

As we changed the face button layout in PGR4 slightly to accommodate bikes, we had to start again with our control schemes and work out which worked best in the new system. Unfortunately once the game was out we had a lot of feedback as to which schemes worked and which didn't. Internally we've added a bunch of new control schemes, but the latest story on this is that it won't make it into the title update as there isn't enough test resources for it to pass certification. Very frustrating for us at this end, but hopefully we'll see these changes make it into a future update in early 2008 (if not before).


  • Came out pgr 4 for psp? and if yes , when? (Janosch)

    The PGR series is owned by Microsoft, and I think the chances of them releasing a version of the game on a rival platform is pretty much zero. Sorry, but I think it would be a safe bet to imagine the PGR series remaining Xbox exclusive for the foreseeable future.


  • I have now had 2 copies of pgr4 on my xbox 360 and both of them crash I can never seem to complete a game but yet none of my other games do it so I know its not a problem with my Xbox. (Shane)

Eek, that doesn't sound good. Unfortunately I can't really provide much more help beyond "it is your Xbox". There are well documented faults with the first generation of Xbox 360 hardware, and occasional freezing is a symptom of this. It's possible that PGR4 is using the hardware in a different way to your other games, and that's why you haven't seen it before. Regardless, PGR4 has passed all of the hardware testing just like every other title, so if I were a gambling man I'd put money on the fault lying with your console. Sorry about that.


  • I have recently recognised a quite annoying bug in the game. If you choose the Audi RS4 and have manual transmission, once in the race, put it In 5th gear and it will accelerate VERY fast, faster than class A cars, also if you hold hand brake/E brake, build up the revs, let go of the Handbrake/ E brake it will wheelie. (Mat)

Yes, we know about this one and it has been fixed in the upcoming title update. We will also be removing all false RS4 leaderboard entries once the title update has been rolled out.


  • I really really really sincerely think that you should consider making more Formula 1 games; I don't think that I have ever come across over the recent years from 97' a decent Formula 1 game from other company's... Your formula 1 and formula 1 97' games were the best of its era, although they are old I think that if you created the new season many people would definitely buy them as I still from time to time play the games. Please please please consider it strike a deal with the sponsors!!!! You in game physics for racing games are amense especially the project gotham series..... (James)

I think there's definitely a great desire at Bizarre to work on another Formula 1 game at some point in the future. There's a bunch of us here who really enjoy F1, and this season was just so great that loads more people have got back into the sport recently. There are no immediate plans to work on another F1 game just yet - we've got some great ideas for another racing title first - but it's not something we'll ever rule out.


  • My name is Jon and I am 14. I was just wondering if it would be possible if you could put a Volkswagen split screen campervan for download on Xbox live on the 360 for Project Gotham 4 for us camper crazy people. (Jon)

That would be totally awesome. :) I think we've picked the majority of vehicles for the first DLC pack I'm afraid, but I'll put it to the car folks and see what they say.


  • What about the garages?!!? It was nearly masturbation in PGR3 walking through your garage, placing the cars you've collected in different surroundings and then marvelling the breath-taking graphics! So where is it gone now? PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, help me satisfy my collector-prurience in PGR5! Oh, obviously, you WILL make a PGR5. Otherwise I'll smack your bottoms. (Max)

We always intended the garages to be a different beast in PGR4. The idea wasn't so much for it to be car porn, but rather to be a working garage where a racing superstar might inspect his vehicles before a big race. So yeah, less masturbation and more racing please. :) As for PGR5, we're handing the baton over to another developer (although nobody knows who yet). Bizarre on the other hand have joined forces with Activision (the world's second largest video game publisher no less) to bring a brand new racing series to town. And we're totally pumped about it, smacked bottoms or otherwise.


  • Thank you for one of the best games I have ever played! I am 37 and have played a lot; everything in the game is spot on. You should get a pay rise for this, well done keep up the good work! (Pamela)

Thanks. I'll recommend that to my bosses. :)

(Sarah: "Isn't your Mum called Pamela, Ben?")


  • I logged on and immediately went to the career section where I commenced to buy the cars and place them kin the remaining spaces I had in Garage 9. This all went well, until all the spaces were filled, I assumed that when I went to purchase the final vehicle (Aston Martin V8 Vantage) that a new garage would be unlocked to me. I was mistaken. Instead of being able to buy the car I so dearly desired, I was met with the absence of the Buy Car button. So I ask you, as a user and lover of your game (and soon to be owner of your up and coming game PGR4) have any others experienced the same problems and how are you going to remedy this problem I have. (Philip)

Well actually that's how the PGR3 career mode was designed. You have a limited amount of spaces in your garage, and you must pick and choose the vehicles you want to have in them. So I'm afraid if you want that Vantage you must choose another vehicle to sell first.


  • I am a big fan of many of Bizarre's games, one of those games mainly being Boom Boom Rocket. I would be interested to know if the developers there at Bizarre are planning to do any updating to the game (new songs, new features, etc.), for I would love to see this game continue on to be a hit in the gaming community. (John)

Totally. We've just received word that the title update for BBR has just gone live (with guitar and dance mat support!!), and downloadable songs are still on the way. So just a little bit longer to wait I'm afraid...


  • Ladies and gentleman,

    I am unstable. Mentally. To further stress my irate instability, a good friend of mine showed me Geometry Wars: Waves via PGR4. I took it upon myself to pray forgiveness to God at my appalling previous babble that Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved was simply the best game ever. It is now clear to me that GW:W or "Gee-Waa-Waa" as I've been screaming in the streets, is of course the best game ever. God has forgiven me (we're good mates), however I could not forgive my good friend as he obviously worships the devil, having had the devil spawn words of pure lies from his dirty filthy mouth, to the effect that "gee-waa-waa isn't available for purchase via Xbox Live Arcade". Because of this blasphemous pallarous lie I beat him till his eyes exploded, chain-sawed his satan-infected cretinous sack of putrid dishonesty into several small packages which I plan on sending to various heads of state around the world. My Obsessive Compulsive Disorder means that all packages have to be weighed, stamped and stacked in batches of eight (which is lucky as my friends now-seperated biological system neatly split into 64 parcels of doom). As yet I have to find a Post Office with eight windows that have a real person behind the glass. One of them is always on lunch.

    This outrageous episode has left me fuming, as you can imagine. I spoke to God yesterday whilst I waited in the queue at the Post Office (he was sending his personalised Christmas Cards early, ones with a photo of him on the front) he recommended I start taking my medication again. He also suggested that I contact the Creators of the game (which is surely ironic, considering if He truly is the God of all things then technically He made the game and He is the one responsible for all of this. I'll have to have a think about that).

    So I have taken it upon myself during this extremely quiet nightshift to wash the dried body fluids off my hands and write you a small note to ask if gee-waa-waa will be available for purchase and download for Xbox.

    If not, why not, nag-shimeroo? Would it really be that hard to achieve such a thing? Think of the money! If it's poilitical or contractual reasons why you're not doing it immediately, I must remind you that poor Gordon stood no chance, and there will be many more instances of such violent outbreaks which technically you (and God, but lets forget about him for a while) are responsible for. I will be starting a petition, written in the blood of new-born babies, until this game is released for download.

    Yours ever-so-unstable,

    Alex - The True Lord of the Biscuit Tin

Errmm... okay. I'll let Sarah handle this one, as she's better at dealing with psychos... *ahem*, I mean "passionate gaming fans":

Dear Alex,

Thanks for your inspiring mail - it's certainly got a few people here considering turning to religion, and caused others to double their medication.

We can't make any comments on any release of gee-waa-waa as yet, but don't worry, I'm sure that with your say-so, God could well also contact us with a similar request. Maybe with a personal visit in the icing patterns on Friday's cake day or something equally impressive. We'll be sure to take Him seriously.

In the meantime, Dr Bennett from Sunny Shores Residential Home for the Gently Confused has also been in contact and asked us to pass on a message that he'll be glad to welcome you back as soon as you put the sword down calmly and put your clothes back on. Which I'm sure you'll be pleased to hear... :)

With best regards and two pounds of unripe bananas,

Sarah