Sonic Free Riders

Note: The review contains spoilers for Sonic Free Riders.

While the first two games in the Sonic Riders trilogy were both multiplatform releases, an Xbox port was noticeably absent from the second game, Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity (Zero Gravity). Perhaps to make up for this, the third game in the series, Sonic Free Riders (Free Riders), released in 2010 exclusively on the Xbox 360, as a launch title for the Kinect peripheral. While not having an Xbox or Kinect at the time had something to do with it, this was a game I had actively avoided for the longest time because I had only heard negative things about it at launch, especially the mandatory motion controls, with said reception being what killed any chances of a fourth game and made the Babylon Rogues dormant in most Sonic media for over a decade. I eventually went back on this decision when the 360 store was shutting down and bought a physical copy along with an old Kinect, deciding I may as well complete the experience while revisiting the games. Because I still had the negative perception in the back of my head, I wasn’t looking forward to this entry when I got around to it, but persisted anyway.

As it turns out, it’s actually not nearly as bad as everyone had made it out to be, but much like the original Sonic Riders, I ended up having to cut my experience with Free Riders short.

Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity (Wii)

Despite the gameplay difficulty of the original Sonic Riders, it was enough of a hit to warrant a sequel in 2008, Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity (Zero Gravity). Like the first game, it received a multiplatform release, but skipped the Xbox platform entirely. Since I had previously sold the PS2 version I had as a kid, I eventually re-bought the game through the Wii version due to price and availability, as part of a desire to play though the Riders trilogy for the first time. On finally being able to see it through, I found this game to be an improvement over the original in many ways, creating what I thought was a more fun experience overall.

Sonic Riders (PS2)

Since speed is a core part of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, it was only natural that at some point it would enter the world of racing games. While not the first, one of the better-known attempts at this is Sonic Riders, which also features the first appearances of a trio of characters named Jet the Hawk, Wave the Swallow and Storm the Albatross, collectively known as the Babylon Rogues. This was also one of a few Sonic games I engaged with as a kid, and the Babylon Rogues’ reintroduction to the franchise through the IDW comics and the more recent Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds led me to revisit their roots. For the purpose of this review, I mainly engaged with the Story Mode, though the game’s controls and difficulty unfortunately led me to not finish it, as much as I really wanted to.

Smashing Drive (GameCube)

While I have played some more obscure games before, it’s not very often I play a game because I heard about it through a YouTube video, and yet here we are. Developed by Gaelco, Smashing Drive was released into North American arcades in the year 2000 and later ported to home consoles (Xbox, GameCube) in 2002. After learning about the game, I managed to find a GameCube copy online since I didn’t know about the Xbox port at the time, however the newfound attention drawn to it caused prices to go up by the time I got around to buying it. After getting to play through it once, I can say it was worth playing once, though not at inflated prices.

Crazy Taxi (PS2)

The year 1999 saw the release of an arcade game from Sega known as Crazy Taxi, with its popularity and success leading to a port for the Sega Dreamcast in 2000. Not long after the Dreamcast was discontinued in 2001, ports of Crazy Taxi for PS2 and GameCube were released later that same year and has since been ported to other systems over the years. Of these ports, I happen to own the PS2 version that I found at a GameStop when they still sold PS2 games. I picked up this port since I had some experience with the arcade game, and only learned later that it retains all of the music and product placement found in both the original arcade version and the Dreamcast port. After deciding to give the game a closer look, I would agree with the idea that it encapsulates the time in which it was made, though found the port a little rough around the edges.

Star Wars Racer Revenge (PS4)

Three years after the release of Star Wars Episode I: Racer, a sequel known as Star Wars Racer Revenge was released for the PS2 in 2002, in time for the release of Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones later that year. I will admit that I never really knew Racer Revenge existed at the time, in part because I lacked the system to play it on, only hearing about it when Limited Run offered a physical copy of the PS4 port of the game and bought it out of interest. After getting to experience Episode I: Racer again, I decided to check out Racer Revenge for the first time to see how much it changed from the first game, finding a number of these changes to be for the better.

Star Wars Episode I: Racer (PS4)

Around the release of Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace came a cavalcade of licensed games to cash in on the hype, many of them aimed at children, with varying levels of quality. Arguably the one that best stands the test of time is Star Wars Episode I: Racer, a racing game inspired by the Podracing sequence seen in the film proper. Though this game originally released on the Nintendo 64 system, I have fond memories of playing the PC port as a kid, for which I still have my original copy, and so I was excited when a modern re-release of the game was announced, later picking up a physical copy of the PC reissue and the PS4 port from Limited Run games along with the PS4 port of its sequel, Star Wars Racer Revenge. After finally receiving my copy of Episode I: Racer in the mail, I decided to revisit the game through the PS4 version and found myself having a blast with it despite some technical hiccups with the port.

Pocketbike Racer

Alongside Big Bumpin’ and Sneak King, Pocketbike Racer is one of three advergames for Xbox and Xbox 360 that were once offered as an extra with the purchase of a Burger King Value Meal, though I would not actually play any of them until I found them for cheap secondhand. When I first played Pocketbike Racer, I didn’t spend very much time on it due to what seemed like a lack of content, though I recently decided to take a look back on it to see if I had missed anything. Upon closer inspection, there is a little more to it than I remembered, however it didn’t change the fact that it was a mildly ambitious racing game on paper, though a bit unpolished in practice.