New Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed Trailer

The original Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing was about the only example of a recent racing game that rivalled Mario Kart's supremacy, with it's cast of colourful characters, game-themed tracks and weapons to pelt each other with proving something of a blast - especially in four-player split-screen. Taking another leaf out of long-term rival Mario's book, the next instalment in the franchise has had more than a little influence from Nintendo's latest 3DS racer, Mario Kart 7, as Sonic and co. now get transformable vehicles that can turn into planes to fly through the air, or bounce along the water as a boat.

With last week being E3, the biggest event of the games industry's calender, we were kind of expecting some more information on Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, but all we got was a new trailer, showing off a number of the new characters from SEGA's past, and the cool new transforming vehicles:

And now comes the weird part – in their infinite wisdom, Sega have decided to include Danica Patrick as a playable character, alongside the likes of Sonic, AiAi and co. Never heard of her? Neither had we, but she's apparently a famous REAL LIFE racing driver, although a quick google search seems to turn up far more pictures of her scantily clad than anything else. If we didn't already have a few reservations about the direction the Sonic And Sega Racing series was taking with it changing how the All-Star moves are awarded, we have now...

The partnership seems a bit of an odd one – while Sega will get advertising from the races Danica Patrick takes part in in her Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed decorated car, are the sort of people who like watching car racing really going to be interested in a game that prides itself on being nowhere even approaching realistic? Surely they'd be better served by the likes of the more serious Forza, Dirt and F1? And will the fans of the game series even know or care who she is, let alone decide to tune into a race just because they've played as her once on a game?

Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed is releasing across the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Playstation Vita, Nintendo 3DS and Wii U later this year, just in time for Christmas. Until then, keep checking back, as we're sure to have more on Sega's strange marketing ideas before launch.