Group Grapple: Just Cause 2 Multiplayer Hits Steam Today

Graham mentioned this a couple of weeks ago, but since the release is today and it's unlikely to be particularly visible for long on Steam, I though it best to draw attention to it again. Just Cause 2's multiplayer mod is one of the crazier alterations to a game I've ever seen, turning the enjoyably daft open world game into a massive landscape of impossible stunts and unlikely vehicle bonding. Supporting hundreds of players, most with the single objective of causing as much hilarity and carnage as possible, it's akin to a drunken superhero flashmob invading Far Cry 3 and turning the island into the world's most expensive and ludicrous circus. The video below tells you everything you need to know.

The second scene, with the red vehicle that becomes a skittering supersonic metal dervish, is precisely the sort of thing that open games need more of in my opinion. Just Cause 2 is an enormous box of toys along with the tools needed to break them into gloriously glitchy component parts. And all of the parts are on fire.

It's extremely unlikely to be as significant as the Day Z boom for Arma II, but it'll be interesting to see if Just Cause 2 enjoys a sales spike on Steam when people who were previously unaware of the mod notice its existence. Like Day Z, it's an astonishing alteration, changing the experience of the core game dramatically. Unlike Day Z, this is an expansion rather than a conversion and it seems bizarre, after playing it, that the game ever existed without such scope for group mayhem.

The mod team have been updating for the last couple of weeks and their most recent post summarises progress so far:

We're well into the 0.1.0 beta test, and it's a good time to go over what we've done for these first few days.

We had a rocky start at first; we're not going to deny it. Plagued by frequent server crashes and lag spikes, day one of the test was completely unplayable.

Through concentrated efforts, we managed to track down many of the issues involved and massively increased stability, reliability and performance in time for the official release of the server this coming Monday.

Just Cause 2 is currently £9.99 and the mod will be available as free DLC.