Rocket League is officially streamlining the Play Menu by grouping a variety of modes into broader “cards”, which will be introduced next season.
These cards include Casual, Competitive, Play Offline, and other intuitive changes for easier navigation. Notably, there will also be two new Arcade Playlists, which will have weekly rotations of Extra Modes.
There will also be quality of life improvements. Players will be able to start simultaneous queues, see your rank in a party anytime, and more.
This overhauled play menu will mark its first update since the free-to-play launch.
The announced changes will surely improve Rocket League’s UI, which has been overdue for a while as the game continued to expand over the years.
However, the freshly announced Arcade Playlists are the real surprise. Today’s official blog update mentions that the devs plan to “give you even more influence over the modes that appear in the Arcade Playlist”.
It’s a solid way to continue building a sense of community and keep engagement high. Presumably, there will be a simple community vote, but it’s unclear which modes will be available.
Only Heatseeker, Spike Rush, and Rocket Labs were mentioned by name. New modes altogether might even be introduced later on. It would be an effective way to gauge interest before committing to a full event.
Fans are left to speculate, as the Arcade Playlists won’t be addressed further until early 2024.
The devs will also update fans on broader quality-of-life issues next year, including both smurfing and skill placement in particular.
Smurfing is an industry-wide problem, and it frequently requires updates as players discover new ways to break the rules. However, Rocket League also has a large eSports scene, and could especially use more effective smurfing defenses.
For more on Rocket League, you can also read about the recent addition of Lightning McQueen.
