But strategic combination of colors according to real life biology is not what you should come to this game for.
This joy of this all is somewhat dampened by the fact that stud fees are not available as a source of income, and that breeding a high grade foal costs a lot of money even when coupling two of your own horses.īreeding horses is satisfying and cute, but anyone going into Rival Stars expecting an accurate genetics simulation will be disappointed: your foals will inherit markings and track preferences from parents as well as a rough idea of coat color. You can pay for studs or select your own stallions to sire your next champions. Apart from the homestead income, all wait times can be skipped with ingame money, which I’ve often found not to be worth the trouble.īreeding new foals from your winners is not only incredibly cute, it’s also your best bet to get into position of higher grade horses, because buying them will likely be out of budget. I personally didn’t find the timing balance egregious enough to be bothered. Foals can be fed every 2-3 minutes for stat bonuses. Homestead income is generated every 5 minutes. Foaling time increases by Grade, my latest was 10 minutes. In a 40$ premium title, they stand out as a remnant of the game’s mobile origins.
Rival stars horse racing new update free#
These real time waiting mechanics are a common characteristic of free to play games where the waiting can be skipped with in-app purchases. The loop of racing - spending - levelling that so ensues is perhaps not particularly deep, but you always know what to do next, and you always have something to do while waiting for a foal to be born or for your next homestead payout to be available. This random opening-and-closing that you see in Rival Stars actually detracts from realism rather than adding to it.
Apart from eating, biting or yawning, they sometimes open their jaws to evade bit pressure, but the mouth does not just stay open unless there is a concrete reason for it. To a layman, any picture of a horse with its mouth open may give the impression that horses just let their jaws drop sometimes, or even that they breathe through their mouth while running.īoth of that is false: horses cannot breathe through their mouths. While the racing focus and lack of three dimensional interaction „at home“ means you‘ll rarely see your horses at a walk or trot, their movements are fluid and pretty throughout.Ī weird detail remains that the horses‘ mouths are constantly open while running. I am very happy to see that Rival Stars does not fit into that pattern: The horses look absolutely solid, in their stables, on the racetrack and in the pasture that makes up the main menu. Time and time again on this website, I have reviewed games with horse models and animation anywhere between awful and mediocre, games that lack polish all around because they‘re made as cheaply as possible. This will not come as a surprise to anyone familiar with Rival Stars‘ mobile origins, but may not be self explanatory from the Steam page alone. The racing aside, this game is very much UI and click based. While the horse racing is a fully three dimensional experience with its own controls and challenges, everything else happens via the User Interface and clicking, the actual upgrades and level ups happening fast and with satisfying audiovisual feedback, but without any additional mechanics or challenges. With some introductory quests and brightly marked buttons to press, you quickly click your way through the game‘s basic mechanics: racing, training, breeding, expanding. My first persistent impression of said gameplay was how fast paced it is. You meet your mentor Francis Kwan, horse trainer Trenton James, and stable manager Sophie Martin, the characters who will function as your guides and questgivers throughout.Īfter the voiced and animated cutscene, the story falls into the shape of text boxes and character images, with the narrative quickly taking a back seat compared to the gameplay itself. The game begins with a very pretty opening cutscene that introduces you to your family‘s nameless farm and horse racing business, fallen into disrepair after a deadly accident on the track.
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