Review
Played on: Xbox Series X
Released: 2005
Released: 2005
Yes, you can now play a Ridge Racer game on a modern console again.
A quick history recap. Released in arcades in ‘94, Ridge Racer battled it up against the early polygon racers, going head-to-head against Daytona USA. While not beating Sega’s massive hit in the arcades, Namco took its own throne in the home console market with massive success on the first PlayStation. Fast forward through sequels like RR Revolution, Rage Racer, Ridge Racer Type 4 and the PS2 debut Ridge Racer V, with arcade exclusives like Ridge Racer 2 and Rave Racer along the way too. Plus, the spin-off Ridge Racer 64 on the N64 which inturn was ported to the 3DS later on as Ridge Racer DS.
All these titles share a common nominator, although they are varied in their own respect; the drifting is based on the angle, cutting of the corner apex and finding a way through increasingly tighter corners in a smooth manner without losing too much speed. After RRV the franchise lay dead, the world had moved to realism. This marks end of the first era of RR games.
Enter Ridge Racer, or Ridge Racers if you will, on the PlayStation Portable for a reintroduction and a fresh start to the franchise. Marking the beginning of the second era of RR games. An era that added an unnecessary boost mechanic and far simplified drifting. No longer was your angle of approach, curve or gradient of the corner anything to worry about. The cars drifted on a predetermined curve after the drift was initiated. A massive let down for RR veterans, with the skill set required being heavily reduced.
This reboot of the series leads us to four titles: RR on the PSP, RR6 on the Xbox 360, RR7 on the PS3 and then RR2 on the PSP again. Further mobile phone spin-offs all base themselves on this same type of simplified drifting.
But let's get to the point here. Ridge Racer 6.
Xbox 360’s early jump to the new seventh generation of consoles and aggressive marketing in Japan led to Bandai-Namco releasing a handful of exclusives titles for the console. Ridge Racer 6 was such a release and Ace Combat 6 being a later one. The launch of the Xbox 360 saw an RR title race to the podium as a launch title, restoring its former role from earlier PlayStation console launches.
I never played RR6 at launch, but I did buy it later in the Xbox 360s lifespan. However, after digging deep into two PSP titles of the same style I quickly put it back on the shelf. Now, in 2021, and with massive RR cravings for a basically dead franchise, I was pleased to see the game added to backwards compatibility. A perfect opportunity to replay it!
And what a reunion it has been. Indirectly, the game has time travelled my memories back to simpler days of gaming. It even brings me back to the joy buying a PSP and playing RR on it for the first time. This time period is an interesting insight into how Japanese games kept themselves alike in a gaming era rapidly moving towards western styled games. This is just before the brink where large Japanese developers hired western studios and shifted towards a new style to keep up with the changes.
And what a reunion it has been. Indirectly, the game has time travelled my memories back to simpler days of gaming. It even brings me back to the joy buying a PSP and playing RR on it for the first time. This time period is an interesting insight into how Japanese games kept themselves alike in a gaming era rapidly moving towards western styled games. This is just before the brink where large Japanese developers hired western studios and shifted towards a new style to keep up with the changes.
RR6 is from 2005, but transports me back even further to the 90s and early 2000s through its music, arcade based gameplay and stylish menu design and presentation. It’s been a pleasant walk down memory lane, in a way I hadn't anticipated. Sometimes distance grows the heart fonder.
The game kicks off with a short but sweet intro showcasing RR’s wonderful mascot lady, Reiko Nagase. Her design lends itself from this second generation of RR games and spins around her in minimalist white room, dreaming about fast sports cars. It’s a neat nod all the way back to R4’s famous CGI intro. Thereafter we are presented to the meat of the game. “World Xplorer”, the X and green colour scheme being an intentional Xbox nod, is the main singleplayer mode.
A massive hexagonal based grid where races unlock new nodes of hexagons that surround segments containing new cars. When all races surrounding such a segment are completed, the car unlocks. The more races completed, the more of the grid is revealed, and segment blocks are marked as completed. As you progress into higher classes of cars, the speed increases. It’s a visually striking design to come back to, even years later.
Like many RR games previously, the first races are bordering on the slow side. The fault of the second generation of RRs is they linger far too long in these slower classes. Shining a light on how the simple drifting mechanics make early races to easy and tedious. However, it had been so long since I last played this kind of RR, I burnt through the first two classes quickly just before boredom kicked in. This is where the game starts to become interesting!
The game kicks off with a short but sweet intro showcasing RR’s wonderful mascot lady, Reiko Nagase. Her design lends itself from this second generation of RR games and spins around her in minimalist white room, dreaming about fast sports cars. It’s a neat nod all the way back to R4’s famous CGI intro. Thereafter we are presented to the meat of the game. “World Xplorer”, the X and green colour scheme being an intentional Xbox nod, is the main singleplayer mode.
A massive hexagonal based grid where races unlock new nodes of hexagons that surround segments containing new cars. When all races surrounding such a segment are completed, the car unlocks. The more races completed, the more of the grid is revealed, and segment blocks are marked as completed. As you progress into higher classes of cars, the speed increases. It’s a visually striking design to come back to, even years later.
Like many RR games previously, the first races are bordering on the slow side. The fault of the second generation of RRs is they linger far too long in these slower classes. Shining a light on how the simple drifting mechanics make early races to easy and tedious. However, it had been so long since I last played this kind of RR, I burnt through the first two classes quickly just before boredom kicked in. This is where the game starts to become interesting!
Suddenly the roomy and wide tracks with easy corners feel smaller due to the increased speed in higher car classes. Cornering requires fast manoeuvring and holding the right amount of drift without losing speed against your increasingly faster opponents. The pure fun of RR really comes back to me, albeit in a far simpler manner than the first era of RR games.
What holds up so well, even today, is the silky smooth 60fps gameplay, that is so key to tackling the faster races where response time and precise controls are vital. The art style, while very minimalist with sparse environments, actually helps an old title like this stay healthy visually. It looks clean and sharp. In classic RR fashion the race tracks detail is simple, yet cleverly designed environments with a vast variety of sunlight colouring, giving it this classic arcade aura. The contrast level and muted colour style from this era of gaming however, I could have done without, but there's enough variety to forget about that.
The city night races look the most incredible and remind me of those glorious days sitting in front of a CRT TV speeding faster and faster through the cities of R4. Large highway bridges hang above you, coloured tunnels blur away and massive skyscrapers with lit up windows bring this urban visual treat to speed past that very few titles nail as well as the RR series.
Once you turn off the annoying as hell DJ voice in the audio settings and crank your sound system up loud you notice the music in RR6. It’s very good. Sure, there are annoying tracks here and there, but it brings me back to how on point the music selection always was in RR games. Unique, music tracks of pumping electronica, that really keep the pace of the race going. Coupled often with melancholic and beautiful melodic parts that bring this overflow of nostalgia to me, throwing me far, far back to the 90s playing Rage and R4.
Maybe I’m growing soft in my older days or just the longing of playing Ridge Racer is too strong, but the annoyances of the second generation of RR kind of faded a bit away. I just sat down and really enjoyed this throwback to simpler times of arcade racers.
If you’ve never played any RR game before I still recommend the older ones over this, for more depth to the gameplay. R4 being the easiest entry point for beginners. But if you want something more current and on a new Xbox console, look no further. Preservation through backwards compatibility shines again and Ridge Racer 6 is a unique racer with an early 2000s vibe that has long since passed in modern times.
What holds up so well, even today, is the silky smooth 60fps gameplay, that is so key to tackling the faster races where response time and precise controls are vital. The art style, while very minimalist with sparse environments, actually helps an old title like this stay healthy visually. It looks clean and sharp. In classic RR fashion the race tracks detail is simple, yet cleverly designed environments with a vast variety of sunlight colouring, giving it this classic arcade aura. The contrast level and muted colour style from this era of gaming however, I could have done without, but there's enough variety to forget about that.
The city night races look the most incredible and remind me of those glorious days sitting in front of a CRT TV speeding faster and faster through the cities of R4. Large highway bridges hang above you, coloured tunnels blur away and massive skyscrapers with lit up windows bring this urban visual treat to speed past that very few titles nail as well as the RR series.
Once you turn off the annoying as hell DJ voice in the audio settings and crank your sound system up loud you notice the music in RR6. It’s very good. Sure, there are annoying tracks here and there, but it brings me back to how on point the music selection always was in RR games. Unique, music tracks of pumping electronica, that really keep the pace of the race going. Coupled often with melancholic and beautiful melodic parts that bring this overflow of nostalgia to me, throwing me far, far back to the 90s playing Rage and R4.
Maybe I’m growing soft in my older days or just the longing of playing Ridge Racer is too strong, but the annoyances of the second generation of RR kind of faded a bit away. I just sat down and really enjoyed this throwback to simpler times of arcade racers.
If you’ve never played any RR game before I still recommend the older ones over this, for more depth to the gameplay. R4 being the easiest entry point for beginners. But if you want something more current and on a new Xbox console, look no further. Preservation through backwards compatibility shines again and Ridge Racer 6 is a unique racer with an early 2000s vibe that has long since passed in modern times.
Leaving my opinions on how they simplified the unique RR drifting, and understanding that this very title might be a perfect entry point for newcomers to get a glimpse of what the whole RR love was back in the 90s. Slick, fast, drifty, arcade racing goodness with great accompanying soundtrack of unlicensed music and cars. Those were the days, and still are as it's again available for younger generations!
