Ridge Racer Vita – Impressions

DING DING DING – that’s the sound of Nintendo being knocked out of the hardware business. All-Star development team Cellius™ have released their first game after 5 years of development, Ridge Racer Vita. Sony’s new handheld features amazing graphics and a home console experience in your hands. It’s more than a controller with a screen.

The graphics in Ridge Racer Vita are the best i’ve ever seen, better than LittleBigPlanet and Uncharted; Vita goes beyond “HD”. There’s no stupid 3D effect gimmick, so you can actually see the screen and race properly. The graphics are so good that it successfully produces a 3D image on a 2D screen, this is called “4D” and is very apparent in Ridge Racer Vita. It really does feel like a home console game – sometimes it feels like i’m holding a TV!

Wow. Yes, that’s real, and it looks even better on the screen of my Vita. The grass is very realistic and has multiple shades of green; if you look closely you can even see individual shadows on each blade of grass. They look a lot like pixel outlines, it’s refreshing to see Cellius™ have a sense of humor after all their hard work! Haha. Ken Kuturagi™, you never fail to exceed our expectations.

Ridge Racer Vita is bursting with content, with an entire handful of tracks and cars to play with. How much is a handful? Well that depends. A handful of peanuts would be quite a lot, but you wouldn’t have much trouble holding all of 3DS’s quality games. The important part of Ridge Racer is the gameplay, and on Vita it’s the best it’s ever been. There’s no point having more than one track when you think about it, all tracks are the same anyway, just corners and straights. Thankfully Ridge Racer Vita goes above our expectations again (crafty Ken!) and has more than one playable track. I’ve been enjoying mastering my times on the first track so i’ve had no need to try the others yet. It’s a different experience each time depending on how much i’m drooling over the graphics during the lap – the drool adds some realism as if it’s raining. It’s amazing how many layers the game has, much more convincing than a 3D screen.

After the huge disappointment of the 3DS game, Ridge Racer Vita has brought back online racing, proper controls, and the series’ trademark good graphics. Fans of videogames, it doesn’t get much better than this. I understand that PlayStation Vita is sold out in many stores, but don’t let that discourage you, Sony will have enough units for everyone. Drop by your local store and ask for the “gamechanger”, they’ll know what you’re talking about. There’s only one, and it’s Ridge Racer Vita.