‘Disney Infinity’ Cars Play Set Officially Announced (Screenshots, Trailer, Figures)

Although it had already been announced (and confirmed our initial reports), Disney Interactive today noted that at launch, ‘Disney Infinity’ will have a Cars play set available to purchase. This makes Cars the fourth officially announced play set (along with Monsters University, Pirates of the Caribbean and The Incredibles) and the first add-on pack.

As we reported (and confirmed) yesterday, the Cars play set allows gamers to take on the role of Lightning McQueen, Mater, Holley Shiftwell and Francesco Bernoulli and enter the virtual world of Radiator Springs, where they will prepare the town for a big international racing event.

Key highlights of the play set add-on include:

• Racing and Customization: players will be able to race through town on full sized tracks and pull off amazing, gravity defying feats in a no-holds-barred stunt park. Additionally, players can customize the town, exploring the outskirts of the city and towing all types of vehicles to make way for tourists.
• Play Set: The Cars play set adds driving/racing play mechanics and track pieces to the Toy Box allowing players to create all-new racing challenges, build and customize tracks and much more.
• Toy Box mode: Lightning, Mater, Holley and Francesco are able to interact with all of the previously revealed characters from The Incredibles, Monsters University and Pirates of the Caribbean.

Courtesy of Disney Interactive, we have added the new assets for ‘Disney Infinity’ Cars including character art, figures and screenshots to our galleries below (we will begin backfilling the galleries shortly).

[View with PicLens]

[View with PicLens]

[View with PicLens]

‘Disney Infinity’ Online Listings Unearth New Details, Confirm Reports

With just a few months to go until ‘Disney Infinity’ hits the shelves, etailers around the world have begun listing the game and its various components and accessories, offering us a glimpse of what we can expect on its launch date in June.

Amazon.com as well as several others have already begun listing the starter pack for consoles which includes Nintendo Wii and Wii U, Microsoft Xbox 360 and the Sony PlayStation 3. Curiously enough, they (and several other etailers) also list the same starter pack for the same price for the Nintendo 3DS. This is somewhat telling since the 3DS version is expected to be essentially a completely scaled down experience due to hardware constraints, so selling an entire starter pack for it at full retail seems a bit ambitious to say the least. Just to expand on that, we have been told by Disney Interactive that there will not be any software-only version of the product, so if you wish to play it on both your Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo Wii (or any other console), you will be required to purchase the full starter pack for each, despite the fact that the hardware is fairly independent of the software.

Also listed for pre-order are some of the 17 or so additional figures that will be available at launch including Mike Wazowski, Davy Jones, Syndrome, Violet, Captain Barbossa, Dash and Mrs. Incredible.

Our report that a Cars play set would be available at launch was also confirmed, but it appears the only etailer currently listing it that we could find is Entertainment Earth (we presume the price is incorrectly posted and have notified them as such). Their description goes on to confirm our original reports that the play set will include Lightning McQueen and Holly Shiftwell while Tow Mater and Franceso Bernoulli figures will be available separately. Interestingly enough, Entertainment Earth’s description also confirms our report of The Lone Ranger being supported in the future.

Lastly, while we anticipate more characters being announced for launch as well as a full line of accessories for display and power disc keeping, one other item of note we found was a book titled Disney Infinity: Infinite Possibilities. According to the description, this 80-page companion book to the highly anticipated Disney Infinity video game will introduce players to the beloved Disney and Pixar characters and worlds featured in the game. Players will learn all about their favorite characters, including Captain Jack Sparrow, Sulley, Lightning McQueen and The Incredibles. In addition, this first companion book will explore all six initial Play Sets, such as the worlds of Monsters University, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Cars as well as provide tips on building entire worlds in the Toy Box mode straight from the game’s creators.

The book is the only item we found domestically with a specific release date of June 18, which coincidentally when we have been reporting ‘Disney Infinity’ to be released. In the UK, June 28 is being listed as the release date for ‘Disney Infinity’ while in France, it appears to be July 15.