Once upon a time, there were shooting games and there were driving games. Two fine genres enjoyed by many gamers, young and old. Then, in the early 80s, in a move precedented only by the peanut butter-chocolate combination that was so delicious it kicked off the concept of democracy, the two ideas were finally brought together. It’s hard to nail down who did it first, with it largely depending on how broad you go, but by the time the theme from Peter Gunn was pounding in your local arcade, there was no going back. We were driving cars, we were shooting at other cars, and it was pretty great. As a genre, its certainly had its ups and downs, but I don’t think it’s ever going to disappear entirely.
Slightly more rare than a mere driving/shooting mash-up, however, is the racing/shooting mash-up. Most of the games that leave the racing part in fall into either the kart racing category spearheaded by Super Mario Kart, leaving just a scant few semi-realistic examples. It’s from this cloth that Battle Riders ($1.99) is cut, a behind-the-back racer that allows you to make gains from your opponent’s losses at the hands of your machine guns. Unlike some examples, Battle Riders does a nice job of blending the action and the racing so that neither truly overshadows the other. There are a number of different types of races, and depending on which one you’re tackling, you’re going to have to have a good handle on racing, shooting, or, more often, both.
Battle Riders offers up three single player-only modes. In career mode, you tackle set racing challenges grouped into three different difficulty tiers. In single race mode, you can set up and run a single race using options unlocked in the career mode. Finally, in challenge mode, you can take on one of three different special race types, each one unlocked by finishing one of the tiers in career. As you can see, you’re going to have to spend some time in career before you can open up much else in the game, but that’s alright, because career mode is really fun. Each tier offers up a bunch of different racing events focused around a particular track theme, including the city limits, the canyons, and a bustling metropolis. Each theme offers up three different course layouts, along with mirrored versions to increase the track variety. In total, you can look forward to more than 100 events to play through in the career mode.
The game will give your first car, but there are plenty more to unlock along the way. Interestingly, it’s not a matter of saving up the money you earn in races, but rather completing a set number of events. The money you earn can be used to upgrade your cars, but they top out pretty quickly. Since there’s no way to grind your way to victory past a certain point, and no IAP to allow you to cut the line, you’ll actually have to get good at the game if you want to unlock everything. It’s a crazy concept in mobile racing games these days, but it just might work. Upgrades for your car are priced such that you’ll be able to pick up something new every couple of races or so, and during the stretches between maxing out one car and getting a new one, you’ll likely bank a good chunk.
The races themselves come in several different flavors, with the most common of the bunch being the battle races, where your goal is to place first by any means necessary. In this mode, destroyed racers will respawn, but the time loss is of course painful. If you have spare cash, you can repair damage done to your vehicle at the push of a button, and that’s something you’ll certainly have to bite the bullet on as you play on. Slightly similar are survival races, where you’re again trying to place first, but this time, there are no repairs and no respawns, so if you get knocked out, you fail. On the other end of the spectrum, there are clean races, where you have to win without the use of any weapons. These events can actually be pretty tough, since you have no recourse but to outrace your opponents. Elimination races knock out the player in last place at the end of each lap until just one racer remains, time trials put you alone on the track to try to clear a lap within a set time, and duels put you in a one-on-one race to the finish. Finally, there are showdowns, where you have to win a race using a certain car or weapon type.
As you can see, there’s a lot here to chew on. Luckily, the gameplay backs the content admirably. Each car has its own handling style, but they all control as they ought to, only occasionally doing strange things during collisions. You can choose from a few different control setups, with tilt being the default for steering. You can choose to use a virtual stick or arrow keys instead if you like, however, which is what I opted for. I’ve seen some members in our forums express that the current layout isn’t optimal on iPads, but as I’ve only got access to an iPhone, I can only report that it’s fine on there. The developer seems to be working on an update to address the concerns of iPad users, at least. Regardless of your selected steering style, you’ll also have buttons for brakes and each weapon mounted on your car. I feel the tilt method has an advantage here, because it’s easier to fire both of your weapons at once with two free thumbs, but I suppose that’s obvious.
The way the weapons work is that you choose before the race which ones you want to bring with you. You then pick up yellow ammo icons along the track which replenish your stocks. You can also pick up money and hit speed boosts, though due to how they’re laid out on the track, you’ll often be forced to choose which of these three things you want. The tracks themselves are nicely designed, with lots of corners to lose your opponents around, but plenty of straightaways to lob weapons at each other on. The courses divide frequently, though rarely asymmetrically unless there are power-ups on the longer side. Occasionally, there will be a semi-random element like a crane lowering and raising a cargo container that briefly blocks one of the roads, but for the most part, you can count on each lap covering similar ground. There are also plenty of bottleneck opportunities so that you can enjoy the sheer anarchy of up to eight cars pelting each other with their shots.
Being restricted to single-player, the AI is pretty important in Battle Riders. I’m not going to say it puts on the best show, but it’s pretty good. It gets in your face a lot, makes occasional mistakes to reassure you that it’s being honest, and avoids ganging up on you just for being the only meatbag in the race. It’s satisfying and challenging enough to play against, though I really do wish there had been some type of multiplayer mode. The game does support Game Center leaderboards, but it’s just so much more satisfying to deliver a rocket up your friend’s exhaust personally, you know? Still, it’s hard to feel too upset given just how much is packed in here for the price. The game looks pretty good, the explosions and weapons sound suitably chunky, and the soundtrack is good old racing buttrock. It all runs pretty smoothly, too, which is very important in a racing game.
In terms of pure technical racing, Battle Riders probably isn’t the best game available on iOS, but it luckily doesn’t have to get by on its racing alone. The combat adds a welcome layer of complexity that helps cover for any shortcomings in the racing department. The sheer amount of content you get here for a very low price with no additional costs is very impressive, and most importantly, the game is just plain fun to play. If you’ve ever been stuck in traffic and wished you could go through the cars ahead of you instead of waiting for things to clear up, do me a favor and pick up Battle Riders instead, you psycho. It’s a much healthier and far more enjoyable way to work those anger issues out.
