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Mad Riders Review

A frustrating and entirely uninspired addition to the ATV racing genre

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Multiplayer in Mad Riders is a bit unusual, although it works on a basic level. While playing single player, a notification will appear at certain moments on the side of the screen letting the player know that multiplayer is available. Hitting the prompt will warn you that you will lose your current progress in the race you are currently in and will be dumped into the multiplayer menu. It is an odd system, especially considering it doesn’t save the state of your single player race or tell you specifically when users on your friends list are playing multiplayer. It honestly feels as if the developers understand that there may not be very many people playing this game online at any given time and it will be helpful to prompt players when someone else is looking to play online.
 
That unusual system aside, once I was able to find an online match it worked well enough. I raced against other humans over an internet connection. The problems arose when I noticed that I had joined other racers who had already been racing each other for a number of tracks. This led to their scores carried over between tracks to be in the high 80s while my score was in the 10s or 20s. I would never be able to catch up. This continued seemingly as long as we all wanted to play, with a new track and game mode popping up soon after one track concluded.
 
Mad Riders
 
I was never prompted with a choice to vote on a game type or select my preferred track or any of that. New races came up, we raced, points were awarded to players based on rank, the next track started and so on and so for until I forcibly quit out of the multiplayer. A system similar to Trials Evolution in which a number of tracks are selected and played through then awarding an overall winner at the end is able to be set up if you host your own custom match, but it is my understanding that individuals could still join halfway through the competition, encountering the same problem I did.
 
The game features two separate leveling systems, one for single player and one for multiplayer. In singleplayer, rising in level unlocks new ATVS, new paint jobs, new rider skins and even new tricks. While the unlockable ATVs are fairly straightforward with better stats than the previous ATVs, the rider skins come in a wide variety including things like skeletons, mummies, ninjas and more. These costumes were one of the few things that helped give the game some flavor while also reminding me of past extreme sports titles like Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater that used to embrace the wacky. From what I could tell the multiplayer leveling system seemed to be tied mostly to achievements and online rankings but due to the fact that I was not able to play a massive amount of the multiplayer prior to the game’s launch, there could be more to it.
 
Mad Riders
 
Mad Riders is an entirely uninspired title. While it cribs a feature or two from more modern titles, it ultimately feels like a game that came out of the era of the original Xbox in terms of music, overall presentation and game play. Lackluster controls lacking any real weight coupled with troublesome level design which consistently places a wide array of impassable objects and vision-obscuring foliage make for an extremely frustrating experience. Just a few races in and I had already had enough but forced myself to keep playing for the sake of this review. Your time and money would be better spent running to the local game store and picking up a copy of Pure or even Nail’d, another ATV racer from Techland. In the trailer for Mad Riders, it promised an “awesome arcade game for the price of a pizza.” Honestly, I think you’d be better off going with the pizza.
 

Our ratings for Mad Riders on Xbox 360 out of 100 (Ratings FAQ)
Presentation
62
Graphics are reasonable for a downloadable title but lack of environmental variety keeps things stale.
Gameplay
36
Extremely frustrating controls, map design and forced respawns make for a playable, but bad experience.
Single Player
48
A reasonable amount of events and ATVs to unlock is coupled with difficulty spikes and repetitive tracks.
Multiplayer
40
Awkward game joining and track selection makes it difficult to have any real completion beyond a single race.
Performance
90
The games seems to perform as intended, sadly that still isn’t good.
Overall
46
Mad Riders is an entirely uninspired and poorly-controlled addition to the ATV racing genre.
Comments
Mad Riders
Mad Riders box art Platform:
Xbox 360
Our Review of Mad Riders
46%
Poor
The Verdict:
Game Ranking
Mad Riders is ranked #1875 out of 1957 total reviewed games. It is ranked #139 out of 145 games reviewed in 2012.
1875. Mad Riders
1876. Flashback
Xbox 360
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Screenshots

Mad Riders
7 images added May 30, 2012 01:35
Videos
Mad Riders - Gameplay trailer
Posted: May 24, 2012 12:22
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