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Ridge Racer (Vita) |OT| The Death of a Once Great Franchise

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
No. It's terrible, and there's only like 4 songs not including the menu music.

The game desperately needed Nobuyoshi Sano and Asuka Sakai - the dirty techno/electrobeats we've been getting since RR7 are unbefitting.

There is more music than that in the US launch w/ the free DLC. Including a pair of megamixes that are different styles than the rest.
 

DenogginizerOS

BenjaminBirdie's Thomas Jefferson
The reviewers are missing the key aspect of this: online lag free racing against people all over the world who are competing for one of four factions. The upgrade tree for your car looks to be pretty stout. Also, the racing is lag free. Pretty damn stunning.

If you want to race online in a Chromehounds like global environment, definitely look into this.
 

Gen X

Trust no one. Eat steaks.
Ah so it sounds like they're staggering the gold pass tracks.

Lost Ruins must not be out yet.

I had a look after I posted on the previous page and there was a new car, but no tracks yet. On the Gold Pass page on the Vita it says the content will be available by March 31st.

3.0 from IGN


thread title is perfect

So 1.0 per 10fps? Imagine what the score would be with 60fps gameplay! =D
 

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
LOL I'm still not sure I grasp the progression in this game or what you are "supposed" to do to be efficient. The criteria for how much you play or win to increase your level isn't explained that I can see. Not sure how to filter or select ghosts of human players so the match-up is close to my own car ability and gear. Even picking people marked the same level as me, their cars seem much faster.

Can't say if this works or not yet, it's not clicking. Yet it seems like it should be working well for the portable format.
 

Jeff-DSA

Member
It's a real shame when those of us who are long-term fans of the series can't muster up much enthusiasm for this :(

It looks like it plays almost identically to RR7, which I loved, so I want to buy it, just can't justify it, no matter how cheap.

When it was announced, I didn't think anything would hold me back from getting it. Now, I can't see myself buying it until it can be had for $5 in the clearance bin.
 

Gen X

Trust no one. Eat steaks.
No. It's terrible, and there's only like 4 songs not including the menu music.

The game desperately needed Nobuyoshi Sano and Asuka Sakai - the dirty techno/electrobeats we've been getting since RR7 are unbefitting.

Have you seen how many free audio tracks there are on the Vita store? Didn't think so.

Thank you, please come again.
 
Have you seen how many free audio tracks there are on the Vita store? Didn't think so.

Thank you, please come again.
My bad, 8 original tracks, and only one decent song among them.

Compare this to Ridge Racer PSP's 18 majestic tracks, not including the 12 additional classic tracks. That's 30 songs in 2004, so am I to find this marginal DLC impressive in 2012?
 
All this "RR sucked after Type 4" is overblown... Ridge Racer 7 IMO is a superb game and my favorite in the series. It's basically "RR6: finished edition". Has the content, machine customization, and modes that RR6 lacked even if it's built out of RR6.

Couldn't agree more. RR7 felt like an evolution of RR4 to me, albeit without the story and with boosting. I looks great, plays great and has the best soundtrack since 4.
 

thirty

Banned
Nothing...NOTHING has touched 4. Blasphemers. 6 and 7 and onward are just bastard childs of the psp version. 5 was the last thing remotely resembling old ridge racer. The only thing the psp games have going for them are the huge collections of tracks and music from past games. Ridge 2 better make vita/psp download or namco will be a complete failure in my eyes. The series is dead. The only thing that could save it is a return to ridge city proper in hd. Not these embarrassing versions of 765 that have been in 6 and onward. Not this ultra colorful world. I want the overcast and grit and grey of the old games. I want park city. I want day/night cycles again. Damn they've strayed so far.
 

Gen X

Trust no one. Eat steaks.
I never understood the love for RR4. I bought it the week it came out with the JogCon, finished it in the same day. Was there more to it than I realised?
 

thirty

Banned
It was a relaxing departure from the norm. From the music to the dreamlike yet cold colorscape it was amazing. And the stories. OMG so simple yet added so much to ridge racer. It was exactly what the series needed imo. Namco at it's finest. I mean the entire production was just something special. For me it still felt like ridge city too. Nothing past 5 has really felt like the ridge universe at all even tho namco keeps calling it that now.
 
As a huge fan of R4's presentation (so very 90s chill), I was excited when Teramoto boasted around TGS that Ridge Racer would bring a "new visual style" and "impactful sound" - I was actually expecting something daring and fresh from Cellius. How foolish of me.

4rkjS.jpg


R.I.P.

It was a relaxing departure from the norm. From the music to the dreamlike yet cold colorscape it was amazing. And the stories. OMG so simple yet added so much to ridge racer. It was exactly what the series needed imo. Namco at it's finest. I mean the entire production was just something special. For me it still felt like ridge city too. Nothing past 5 has really felt like the ridge universe at all even tho namco keeps calling it that now.
90s Namco was everything. All their games had a unique atmosphere and a soul.

NOSTALGIA

OVERLOAD.

PURE

CLASS.

God-like.
 

Veins

Unconfirmed Member
As a huge fan of R4's presentation (so very 90s chill), I was excited when Teramoto boasted around TGS that Ridge Racer would bring a "new visual style" and "impactful sound" - I was actually expecting something daring and fresh from Cellius. How foolish of me.

4rkjS.jpg


R.I.P.


90s Namco was everything. All their games had a unique atmosphere and a soul.

NOSTALGIA

OVERLOAD.

PURE

CLASS.

God-like.

Wow this really summed it up for me. Something happened to Namco after these glory days. Did everyone leave? This gen Namco is a lifeless shell compared to back then.
 

Gravijah

Member
No. It's terrible, and there's only like 4 songs not including the menu music.

The game desperately needed Nobuyoshi Sano and Asuka Sakai - the dirty techno/electrobeats we've been getting since RR7 are unbefitting.

i dunno, i thought rr3d had a pretty nice soundtrack. but whatever, we'll never reach the heights of the first few games ever again. ;(
 

thirty

Banned
As a huge fan of R4's presentation (so very 90s chill), I was excited when Teramoto boasted around TGS that Ridge Racer would bring a "new visual style" and "impactful sound" - I was actually expecting something daring and fresh from Cellius. How foolish of me.

4rkjS.jpg


R.I.P.


90s Namco was everything. All their games had a unique atmosphere and a soul.

NOSTALGIA

OVERLOAD.

PURE

CLASS.

God-like.
Holy shit what the hell happened namco? Wow. So much in this post. Did they die when sega died? Think about it... THINK ABOUT IT.
 

plasmasd

Member
R4 is one my most treasured games. The style and graphics at the time blew me away. I used my sisters MD player to record the intro music and have always kept it on one of my hard drives listening to it every once in awhile. From the bonus 60fps R1, to the slick presentation, R4 is still a very special game.
 

Choc

Banned
I am not going to defend this game but IGN giving RR 3/10 for having 3 tracks and 5 cars

and then giving Daytona USA (which has 3 tracks ....)

7/10

is stupid

my point is that you can't judge a game purely on its content. Yes RR Vita is shit because it has less stuff, but you know, there are other games like it!
 
So what's going on with the Vita PSN store saying RR is one price but a little ad at the top saying it's half that? 30 and 15 respectively in Australia.
 

Wonko_C

Member
I am not going to defend this game but IGN giving RR 3/10 for having 3 tracks and 5 cars

and then giving Daytona USA (which has 3 tracks ....)

7/10

is stupid

my point is that you can't judge a game purely on its content. Yes RR Vita is shit because it has less stuff, but you know, there are other games like it!
Daytona is $10, Ridge Racer is $30.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
You know, if it wasn't for the framerate, this could have been the best looking Ridge Racer game yet. It feels as if the visuals they started in RR6 are finally complete. I always thought that game looked unfinished (lighting wise) while RR7 got closer, it was still missing something. The use of depth of field and improved light placement really makes a difference here and it just looks beautiful.

The 30 fps aspect is still disappointing, but the game is still excellent. Still, compared to something like Wipeout (which is a very complete package), this is definitely lacking.

Daytona is $10, Ridge Racer is $30.
Ridge Racer has more content than Daytona, though. It has double the number of tracks, actual progression, and more event variety. There's simply more to do within Ridge Racer. They're both great, though.
 

BigDug13

Member
The pricing model can work if the price of admission of the base game isn't too extreme. $30 for this barebones release is ridiculous. $10 for a barebones rease...even $20 might be forgivable. But it's too expensive for what it is.
 

gkryhewy

Member
You know, if it wasn't for the framerate, this could have been the best looking Ridge Racer game yet. It feels as if the visuals they started in RR6 are finally complete. I always thought that game looked unfinished (lighting wise) while RR7 got closer, it was still missing something. The use of depth of field and improved light placement really makes a difference here and it just looks beautiful.
Great to hear.
 

DenogginizerOS

BenjaminBirdie's Thomas Jefferson
The "near" implementation is great. If a core group of people play this together, this can be a very entertaining package.
 

gtmax

Member
The minute i saw the first screens i knew what we were in for. It seemed like the same, unfinished, rushed, launch game that works with a new system when there's absolutely nothing else on the Horizon. But you can't fool all of the people all of the time.

I don't get Namco. It's like they decided to slow let the company self destruct. Granted, they used to get all of their game 'ideas' from what Sega was doing - but it worked and they were doing great. Tekken vs VF, Ace Combat to (after Burner?), etc. Time Crisis, Soul calibur, you'd actually look forward to their stuff.
 
Ridge 4/5 are the pinnacle for me. No question about that. Both the PSP games were nice compilations as well.

Ridge 6/7 were hollow imitations IMO. They had lost their soul at that point. From then on I feel like they've nearly let the franchise die. The 3DS game seemed to be a mess, with it's weak graphics and framerate problems. Unbounded isn't even Ridge Racer.

But, IMO this Vita game represents their best work in a while now. Menus are slick, upgrade tree and tuning options are neat, and game looks quite nice. I really hope they keep patching the game, because I think they could really put together something nice with an additional 5-10 tracks, and maybe adding something of a classic career mode would be cool.
 

Wazzim

Banned
I have had this since EU launch and it's pretty good actually. The lack of content is really evident but the base of the game Is extremely well made for a ridge racer game.
 

sajj316

Member
Ridge Racer is a victim of a publishers new philosophy of getting the most revenue out of a dwindling development budget.
 

Kerub

Banned
When are the rest of the gold pass tracks coming out?

There's only Old Central on the store right now. :( Don't care about the cars since I always use the same one.
 

DenogginizerOS

BenjaminBirdie's Thomas Jefferson
If anyone is interested, send me a friend request and we can at the very least race against each other's ghosts.

This system is a bit like autolog/SSX's online system. Pretty addictive

PM me if you want to exchange IDs
 
Dunno if it's been talked about too much in this thread yet, but how is Ridge Racer PSP on the Vita? Does it look good upscaled? I have RR Vita and it's just... I don't like it at all.
 

Parallax

best seen in the classic "Shadow of the Beast"
As a huge fan of R4's presentation (so very 90s chill), I was excited when Teramoto boasted around TGS that Ridge Racer would bring a "new visual style" and "impactful sound" - I was actually expecting something daring and fresh from Cellius. How foolish of me.

4rkjS.jpg


R.I.P.


90s Namco was everything. All their games had a unique atmosphere and a soul.

NOSTALGIA

OVERLOAD.

PURE

CLASS.

God-like.

the intros are nice, but soul edge(blade)'s content doenst hold up at all anymore. and theres no more soul in any of those games than their decendants.
 

BasilZero

Member
Such a shame , was such a wonderful series and the PSP version I enjoyed alot, but damn, Namco's been acting lazy lately.
 

G_Berry

Banned
Does the DD version include the latest update with the extra tracks or do you have to download the update after?

Plus, how big is the initial download?
 

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
I hate to admit it because it looks so good, and drives so good, but I don't think I can take it.

It's not the arcade nature. I don't care about having a campaign if there's a proper arcade score attack progression system in place. But... I think they blew it here. Progressing is just too boring. It is a missed opportunity to not auto-fill a race with seven ghosts selected to match your level. That car performance is tied directly to the 16 experience levels stratifies the player base too much. You can't really select a ghost that's anything other than your exact level or the machine power will be too different. Skill makes no difference.

Grinding to get cash to buy stuff from the tech tree takes too long, and it is an insult that half (?) of the slots you buy on the tree to progress are empty or have a dumb hint about playing the game. That is authentic padding, to try and stretch out the lack of content here.

I feel tragic right now because it's SO close to being an incredible portable, quickfire Ridge Racer. It's not rocket science these days how you engineer an addictive drip-feed experience and unlock system. This could have been Call of Duty with cars.

So yeah, it's not the content, number of cars, or number of tracks. It's that the game they DID try to make isn't made correctly.

Shit. On paper, it does work. Execution is too screwed up.
 
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