Ride 5 Review (doktor_f)
Ride 5 In Depth Review
New to the Ride games?
The developer has created a game changing type of game. Ride 5 has a Career mode that can provide many hours of enjoyment in itself. You have a chance to collect over 200 bikes which have been painstakingly modeled in amazing detail. On top of that you can ride them on realistic near perfect models of some of the best circuits in the world. There are a few circuits I have ridden and I can say they it gives me goosebumps of how accurate they are. If you have a decent gaming pc, some of the gameplay is easily mistaken for videos of real racing. My advice is try out the Career mode and collect some bikes while getting to the point where the AI is easy to beat and you can finish 3 laps without crashing. When you have reached this level, you will be comfortable diving into Multiplayer, which is another world inside this game. I have met a ton of great people through the Ride games who are helpful and fun to ride with. For the cost of this game, I can go out to eat and get a movie (once). Think about it, the justification is simple. If you race bikes or want to do trackdays, this game can even be a tool to familiarize yourself with a circuit you have to ride on in the near future. Hope to see you online.
Ride 4 players who are not sure if they want to switch
Look at the dates of the reviews. There have been a small number of patches and old reviews may not reflect the latest gameplay. It has gotten better IMO
New things in Ride 5
Bikes There are some really cool new bikes like the Superleggara V4, Aprilia RSV E5 (super smooth), many more BMW S1000RR and M1000RR.
Pro mode is a real Pro mode where turn indicators, auto-shift, off track aid + all the riding assists must be off. In Ride 4 you could be in realistic with all that stuff on. Look at the Time Trial leaderboards now and you see not everyone can do those times in Pro...
Dynamic Collisions Sometimes in Ride 4 it is a nightmare when collisions are on, if someone is intentionally crashing into others. In dynamic mode, they can bump you, but it won't instantly crash you. This can also be used in Career with the AI.
Endurance Races are 20 minutes for the most part. Rewind is available so you don't have to throw away your time if you are trying to get gold on every race in Career mode. If you made a bad choice on your pitstop, you can now restart from the pitstop. I am a busy person and for me rewind and restart from the pitstop keep me interested in doing the endurance races.
The way the rear tire spins is more dynamic now. You can do some fun sliding if you are into that. Also you can back it in waaay better than Ride 4. Very satisfying IMO.
Tire temperatures seem better now. In 4 if you don't have a perfect setup and riding style, you have to run H front on a lot of bikes/tracks. Now you can run soft on a lot of those same bikes/tracks.
Suspension settings like fork oil level, slipper clutch, swingarm length, chain tension.
Can have 20 in multiplayer.
AI in Multiplayer (adjustable to 120%).
Qualifying is better. There are no more invalid laptimes in career, only time deductions.
You can modify the liveries on BMWs now.
The editor allows twice as many layers and I found a new way of getting credits to buy bikes by sharing some bike liveries. Not new to Ride 5, but I never used it in Ride 4.
Electronics are better. ABS has 0-4 settings now. For me ABS 1 feels like Ride 4 with ABS toggled on in Rider Aids.
Bikes are cheaper when in the beginning of Career mode. No need to hack the game like some did in Ride 4 to get money.
Director Mode is a whole new venture, which I have not tried yet, but sounds interesting.
PHYSICS
My experience: 35 years riding 2 stroke/4 stroke. Ride R6 and Duc twin regularly. Have been a licenced racer in the last 15 years. Still do some trackdays. One championship on 250 MX.
There are no games currently available which are just like the real thing. Unless you are in a very small group who own an actual road racing sim, you are playing from a controller. These games do challenge you by making you put your body position in the right vicinity, use the gas and brakes correctly and hitting the ideal trajectory of the turns. When I go back and play Ride 4, I immediately go off the track because I slowly got used to the arcade abilities. I see people do 1:44 on Mugello on old R6 bikes in Ride 4. That isn't very realistic, unless you are telling me you are faster than Marc Marquez on his factory Honda... The real non-MotoGP record on Mugello is more like 1:54 on a V4 Panigale. For me it feels like Ride 5 is more like how it should be and for us jaded Ride 4 players, it is hard to accept slower lap times. With that said, I see some of the guys laying down some fast laps still. Those super fast guys you see on YouTube seem to be finding ways to do the super fast laps. We just have to work harder, but in the end you will be a better player. Hurry up so we can do some racing online.
CONS
Missing weekly challenges - I enjoyed a new challenge each week and seeing which of your friends could get the top spot
I Like adjusting electronics on the starting line, for doing starts in TC0 and then turning it up if needed. It is possible in Ride 5, but you have to remember to do it in setup, then toggle Y as soon as the race starts.
No tuck. Not really a bad thing. Not having tuck in Ride 5 allowed me to move to manual shifting, so it was a bonus in that aspect. But I keep pressing the tuck button and it upshifts the bike at bad times.