Bloodborne Kart completes its six-year journey from meme to full-blown fan game with a full release in January

Bloodborne reimagined as a kart racer
(Image credit: FromSoftware / Lilith Walther)

Bloodborne's unofficial, wonderfully low-poly kart racing spin-off has got a release date, and it isn't far off. 

Developer Bunlith reveals on Twitter that Bloodborne Kart releases on January 31, 2024. Upon launch, you're getting 12 racers, 16 maps, a full single-player campaign mode, multiplayer, and oh so much more. 

If you've been out of the loop, where have you been? Bloodborne Kart is an unofficial fan game stitched together by a community of developers over the past six years. You race through the streets of Yharnam and beyond, using heaps of vehicles – the karts and motorcycles will appear familiar to Mario Kart fans, though the wheelchairs? Not so much. 

As the developer explains on its website, Bloodborne Kart began life as a meme posted randomly back in 2017 that then spun out of control. You had fanart, mods, and, of course, this full-blown fan game that's releasing as the culmination of a six-year communal art project. If you have ever wondered why anyone hasn't made the Dark Souls of kart racers, this one might be for you.

While we doubt the studio has its own kart racer on the way, it looks like the actual Bloodborne developer, FromSoftware, is plenty busy, too. As IGN Japan reports, the studio is staffing up for "multiple new projects" following the success of Elden Ring and Armored Core 6. Whatever those projects end up being remains to be seen, though a low-poly kart racer likely isn't one. It's simply been done.

Bloodborne Kart releases on January 31, 2024, on Itch.io.

"The Elden Ring of Metroidvania in terms of map size" is blatantly threatening me with a good time.

Deputy News Editor

Iain joins the GamesRadar team as Deputy News Editor following stints at PCGamesN and PocketGamer.Biz, with some freelance for Kotaku UK, RockPaperShotgun, and VG24/7 thrown in for good measure. When not helping Ali run the news team, he can be found digging into communities for stories – the sillier the better. When he isn’t pillaging the depths of Final Fantasy 14 for a swanky new hat, you’ll find him amassing an army of Pokemon plushies.