Nice post rapaleeman. I agree with the whole thing. In Asphalt you really can buy a bad car which isn't competitive enough. In RRS the different cars are more like different character classes in an RPG. They're all viable, but they require different playing techniques. It gives the game a lot more replayability, since going through events again with a different type of car requires very different techniques. Fun fun!
@rapaleeman - I hope u didn't think I was attacking this game and saying it's bad. "End rant" tends to make me think u did. Let me clarify...in response to the prev post I had quoted, a mention of the iPhone 5s specifically having issues with this game crashing were brought up. It's the A7, and the point being made was simply that it sucks this game still won't work for us on the A7...yet. Regarding controls, thx for the heads up. Sounds like the "lower maintenance" drift controls do better suit virtual controls, which is promising. I am hoping (if it doesn't already) the game supports iOS 7 gamepads. Since I have a Moga, I'm excited at the possibility of playing this using the controller. That's all....just hoping that namco bandai add support (it's not referenced in the app description on the store). And I agree with Asphalt having pay walls and requiring you to take a path that could lead to an expensive and time consuming dead end. I'm really glad to hear that's not the case here.
Cool to hear you solved the game without inapps repaleeman, that is really good to hear. Really loving this game so far.
I installed it the game to my iPad 3 and it's runs really badly. It is actually smoother on my iPod touch 5g. Sigh... Still love the game though.
Yeah, would imagine so. Even the ipad 4 version is slightly laggy at times. Wonder how the ipad air version runs.
Its funny how your last paragraph where you defend the game and its iap system could be applied in the exact same way to A8. And funnily enough I can still manage to win just about any class specific career race with just about any car in that class. And that I have all the cars. Earned in game with ease. They are not all upgraded because it was clear that applying upgrades to all cars was wasteful. Who really wants to race a fully upgraded Dart against an S4 anyway? Comparing the cars in these two games is somewhat pointless anyway as A8 has actual real world cars where it should be pretty clear which cars to aim for and upgrade. A8 may not be as easy to earn in as it was in A7 but that doesn't mean its any harder than this one. And yeah, I did manage to complete more than season 2 (season 8 fully). I'll grant that I bought an iap car pack but that still only made it the same outlay as this one. And while I can't say just yet whether or not I'll get, or need, any iap in this, I do know that it was originally intended as a F2P release that was changed pretty late to the current model and that criticism of the structure of A8 (in its F2P iteration) are the exact same criticisms you'll see of this one once it switches back. Probably unjustified criticism in the end, but no more unjustified and unbalanced than your own statements on A8. And in reality A8 easily deserves game of the year nominations. It's not an outright winner but its definitely top 5 for the year, much more so than this, even though this is still a top quality title. Ultimately though, criticising the pay model of one over the other is pointless and somewhat misguided considering they use an almost identical structure. A structure I had zero problem with in A8 so I foresee no problem with it in this either.
I don't agree with your reasoning here. The fact that the two games use a similar pay and progression structure doesn't in any way prove that one game doesn't require a lot more grinding than the other. The problem with your reasoning is that even though the structure might be similar, the parameters of the structure, such as the rate at which you earn currency, and the rate at which you need to spend currency to progress, can be different enough to make all the difference between a premium game experience and one which feels like it's pushing you to spend money on IAPs. Also the structure isn't quite the same. Ridge Racer only requires you to buy one car per class, so you only need to buy four cars to complete the whole career. Buying additional cars is strictly optional. Asphalt 8 not only has more car classes, but it also has lots of events which require a specific car, so you can't just buy one of each car class. I don't see any point to having events which require a specific car other than to force the player to use up their currency and put more pressure on them to make in-app-purchases. I will grant you that Asphalt's pay structure is a much less annoying one than Real Racing 3's. I got enough enjoyment out of it that I even bought a car pack, the mixed pack which gave me one car of each class, so I could keep playing without grinding so much. Also, while I might seem critical of Asphalt when I compared it to Ridge Racer, really I don't begrudge them their pay model at all. If they're giving the game away for free, or even their initial price of $0.99 which might as well be free IMO, then they have every right to try to make money somehow. Justified or not though, I think it's accurate to consider Asphalt a freemium game, because in my experience it requires either a lot of grinding, i.e. repeating events to earn currency, or IAPs, in order to complete the campaign. I wonder if our difference of opinion has to do with having different definitions of grinding, or what freemium means. I've seen a lot of people object to criticism of freemium games by pointing out that it's possible to go through the whole game without paying anything. I don't think that's a valid argument though. Most freemium games these days don't have a hard paywall, so they can honestly make the claim that you don't need to spend money to play. Instead they just make sure that many people will find it sufficiently annoying to complete the game without spending money that they'll be tempted to make in-app-purchases. As far as what defines grinding, I consider it grinding any time I have to repeat content in a game, not because I'm trying to improve my skill or get better result, but just because the game requires me to in order to proceed. For example in a racing game, if I repeat a race because I feel like I haven't learned the track or the car's handling as well as I could, that isn't grinding, it's just the kind of practice that racing games require. On the other hand, if I have to repeat events that I can already win reliably just because I need to earn currency to buy upgrades or a new car in order to be able to win the next event, then that's grinding. When I played Asphalt, I felt like I had to do a lot of grinding by the third season. As for why you don't think of it that way, maybe you find it more fun than I do to repeat events, so it doesn't feel like grinding to you. Or maybe you're just better at the game and don't need to upgrade your cars as much as I do.
@Rip73 bilboa pretty much hit the nail on the head and honestly I see no reason repeating much of that though I sure I will hit on some of the same topics as your opinion on freemium and grinding is essentially the same as mine. Asphalt to me by season 4 just annoyed me to tears. The requirements for cars and their upgrades just didn't justify the consistent repeat of races to get more cash just to afford an upgrade that is required in order to beat the AI that flies past you and leaves zero chance of you even catching up. Even getting 5 stars on most races up until that point didn't provide me with enough cash to get the Maserati as I was trying to level up some of my other cars. Not all the way but just enough to win. Some of those upgrades are super expensive and again, when comparing the payouts really makes me question who thought it was balanced. Your ideas on cars and their class is solid as sure a Dart can't keep up with an Audi R8. The implementation of it is so flawed in A8 though, that I wonder who in their right mind thought an R8 should be anywhere near the same class as a Dart. That is just silly and makes A8 a game that is so dependent on the "right" choice. If the player makes the wrong choice and say buys or upgrades the wrong car then they are essentially screwed out of a ton of time and money that is not easy to come by without kicking in some IAP. As for Slipstream being originally F2P, I am aware of that. It was originally supposed to run on a scaled version of the Driftopia model. Here's the thing though, the game never requires you to grind. If you get first in every race you will have more than enough cash to get a new car or upgrade by the next series. The payouts are balanced and the need to replay an event comes from a place of wanting to enjoy a track again because you want to, not because you have to. The RR bucks exclusive cars don't even outclass the basic cars which to me is how balance should work. Granted A8 was only a dollar but if I am paying out of pocket initially, that should be enough to complete the game. If they wanted more money from me then they should have charged me more cash for the game. Had A8 released freemium then I may have been a little more tolerant. The $3 bucks that Slipstream asked of me seems fair to me as there is a constant stream of progression, no repeating races unless I want to, and no feeling that if I spend a little more cash I will win. A8 is the exact opposite and is constantly telling me to give them more money. The little payouts after each race are like a slap in the face. Sure, with enough time and constantly redoing races I'm sure I could eventually save up and get more cash to get a different car or upgrade to progress but I shouldn't have to. The payouts should be fair and should give me a better path to take on the career. As it stands that career progression is all over the place, much like RR3 although that game is freemium, requiring purchases of other cars that you will more than likely only use once or twice unless you consistently drop money into it to upgrade it. Look, agree to disagree or like one game, the other, or both. It doesn't matter to me. What matters to me is that a game that I paid for has made the wall so high for me to climb to progress that I don't even want to play it anymore and that sucks. I actually love the racing in A8 and maybe the reason I don't have enough cash is because I don't play online races (I typically play games on my phone in teleconferences at work or when I need a quick break from reality). Maybe it's because I'm not using the ghost system to get some extra coin but I shouldn't have to. I should be able to progress, get all the stars (really I should only have to get most of them) and then have enough cash to move on up. Ridge Racer walks you through the seasons and gives you more than enough cash to win and upgrade. You only need one car per class and that is it since all the cars in a given class are competitive just with different handling models. You pick the one that works for you (mild, dynamic, or standard which the game really should do a better job of explaining) and hit the pavement. You will only pay more cash out of pocket if you want to skip ahead which I really advise against as you need to learn the mechanics. A8 constantly wants more cash and it has zero issues telling me that which really rubs me the wrong way. Coupling that with the seemingly halt in progression it made a game that I had legitimate fun with, a chore to play. Bottomline is that you should want to replay races or do things repeatedly in a game because it is fun not because you have to in order to progress. Constantly having to repeat races and having little to nothing to show for is not my idea of fun no matter how great the actual racing is. Monotony starts to set in almost immediately with A8 and while I will be the first to admit that Slipstream is not for everyone, it is at least a complete game that requires zero grinding. There will always be fans of a popular or even remotely competent game but it doesn't mean it isn't without flaws. I've been plenty critical about Slipstream but for all its flaws, A8 seems to take those flaws and amplify them 10 fold which to me is a shame as a great game lies underneath the money troubles in the later seasons of A8. It doesn't stop you from playing like RR3, but it stops you from moving forward. A8 just gets to a point of not being fun which is its ultimate downfall. If you like the Ridge Racer style of driving then Slipstream is for you. Side-note: While I don't Slipstream is game of the year either due to the issues a lot of folks are having on certain devices, Asphalt 8 certainly doesn't qualify to me either. You can't/shouldn't be able to charge for something and then down the road in the game require either a lot of time repeating the same events over and over or throwing more cash at the game. That is just wrong. This is before it went freemium and made the situation worse. That to me is false advertising. Much like the recent Fightback which to me is one of the best fighter mechanically on the iPhone. I don't care how great your game is. Wrap it up in a terrible pay model and it instantly destroys what good the game brings to the table.
Well, I don't necessarily think either of you guys, Bilboa or rapaleeman, are necessarily wrong. I have a different perspective in that I'm simply enjoying the repeating of races in A8 and in no way focused on the earnings. It is perhaps a lucky coincidence that I've managed to get all the cars without what I would consider grinding. I just played a lot and enjoyed it and never even considered earnings as I always seemed to have enough to get whatever car I wanted at the time. It just never became a grind and was always a pretty easy win and earn for me. I never planned on all the cars anyway, it just turned out that way. Maybe a lucky coincidence or maybe I just never looked to the next car beyond what I had. I chose carefully also but once I had all I needed to get career to 100%, it became very easy to get the ones I hadn't early on. I agree grinding is annoying, but from my perspective, if one enjoys the race, it's not really grinding and that's why I never have a problem there and earned plenty with plenty still being earned through the daily events and rewards for them and then just simply racing. So I suppose that's where our perspectives differ. If I had the same perspective as yourselves, that it is grinding, I just give up on a game and move on. That's not to invalidate your points, as obviously they are perfectly valid, I just don't share them and haven't really figured out where I stand on this one yet, I'll have to wait and see. It's obviously still fun if I'm still playing so I'm happy to keep going and see where I get with it. And obviously comparing Slipstream and A8 is perfectly valid, I just seem to have enjoyed A8 that bit more, the in game currency never bothered or affected me and considered it a more stand out title than this, even though if you like one, I think both will appeal. Of course others will disagree but I'm still not sure if I'll earn as easily in this one but I will definitely give it the ole college try when I find the time. Of course I'll always be happy to get iap if I have to if I get value out of it and if its reflective of the level of enjoyment the game gives me. On the side note, A8 did give iap equal to the value of the initial purchase when it switched for free and more so the switch shouldn't have caused a problem because the ingame prices and earnings did not change in the process. So the switch being wrong is something I totally disagree with as Gameloft more than balanced it out, substantially better than any other (TTR being the other exception) developer. The coin doubler alone if used effectively could get all the cars one needed. It got most of the top 10 most expensive ones so I fail to see a problem with that. Either way, I accept your points, I don't necessarily agree with them but I understand them from a different perspective. They are not reflective of my position but if I understand your perspectives correctly, they are perfectly valid. I think we will move on now though and see what others think as they progress with it. Cheers though, it has been interesting.
One thing that I also liked about Asphalt 8 is that alot of races are always unlocked, Ridge Racer, you can kind of get stuck cause you have to pass one race before getting to the next. A8 was nice cause one could jump around, with so many different options. But, I like both, and now sonic transformed is a good addition to the arcade racing genre. Cool to have so many cool arcade racers lately.
@Rip73 A very reasonable post. I agree that what constitutes grinding is subjective. If just playing the game the way it was most fun for you resulted in you always having enough currency, then it wasn't grinding for you. Also, I didn't realize there was a coin doubler for A8. I may have to go buy that and play it some more, since I found it a very fun game other than the earning rate being too slow for me.
Good posting. I agree (with the later ones as well). Thanks. In A8 I always buy European cars (only exception: to accomplish races where I have to buy American cars). Can't go wrong with that strategy. Go for stars in the first place and not for cars. It's easy like that. Believe it or not: I'm almost through with career mode (no IAPs, no grinding) and still have to buy a second car for Class A.
You missed the point entirely though if you aren't grinding then why would you "still have to buy a second car for Class A"? Anyway, All Class D cars should be competitive with each other. Sure some may require a few extra upgrades or a different way of driving but they they should be competitive. Same with Class C, Class B, and so on and so forth. In A8 you can legitimately waste time and money by buying a bad car in a given class which is not how a game developer should balance their game. The advertisements for then buying more credits or a car pack to help me win is like salt in the wound. The classes also really make no sense to me except for the higher classes where the super cars live. That's where they belong but an Audi R8 belongs nowhere near Class D especially when a garbage ride like the Ford Focus RS is in Class C. Same goes for a Shelby Mustang is in Class B (I think) while the Camaro is in Class C. That is poor balance as well as mislabels and therein lies the problem. It seems you and a few others got lucky buying or upgrading cars that can take you to the finish line. Great but if I fully upgrade the R8 for instance it should be competitive in every class D event and it isn't. I get dusted off the starting line and never see the first place racer again. Look, I like Asphalt 8. The racing is fun but it boils down to who has the better car and who has memorized the shortcuts on the track. I'm ok with the second part of that but in the career, when I can buy my way to victory that just shows how shallow of an experience it is even if said experience is fun. The game is actually not hard at all as most cars really handle the same which is kind of odd. They just have different acceleration and top speeds. Handling seems to be almost identical. As I've said before, kickflips are dope so I like Asphalt for that and the easy pick up and go attitude is great but the need to make the "right" decision or your career will come to a screeching halt is really disheartening. The reason I appreciate what Slipstream is throwing down is that it is up to the player to get better. Even the person who throws all the money in the world at the game still won't stand a chance unless they learn to drive in accordance with the game's physics or lack thereof. The AI is tough but in my experience fair as they can and will abuse the same mechanics that the player does. Some of the crazy crap I've seen the AI pull off to fly past me in Asphalt 8 is pretty baffling and screams of rubber banding. It exists to a point in Slipstream too as you can't lap racers but if you race cleanly and use nitrous accordingly you will win every time. Bounce around the track or try to Gran Turismo yourself off opponents in turns and you will lose. In any event this is the Slipstream board so I won't mention A8 again outside of this post. I've read some of the fandom and absolute massive praise in A8's forum and as I definitely don't share that much blind love for the game, I won't post there and will avoid that topic. It's not a bad game but it is seriously flawed for as many great things it brings to the table it ruins the fun with other things. Like whatever you want but at least acknowledge the flaws is all I'm saying. Even I, for as much love as I have for Ridge Racer and in turn Slipstream, even admit to how broken some of the things this game throws out, especially to new players to the series, are. Side-note: You can't tell me that A8 uses real cars and as such I should know which one to upgrade by using real world knowledge when the game itself doesn't seem to understand or know about cars and their stats to begin with unless it is on a brochure. A Camaro SS competes with a Shelby Mustang GT500 in real life. It needs a few parts (which is why there are upgrades) but in comparison with off the shelf cars, the ZL1 is essentially an upgraded SS and the GS variant in this game is a ZL1 minus a few body kit and street legal parts. I would expect an upgrade or two off a base SS or even the GS to be as fast as the GT500 off the line (I know the later to be true as I have raced my 2011 SS against a Shelby and our tracks times were disturbingly close) but the game seems to ignore that all together and throws them in different categories. All the stats in this game essentially seem to come from stereotypes in car handling and brochure listed 0-60 times. There isn't anything wrong with that as this is an arcade racer but you can't have it both ways in comparing RR's fake cars which are actually based on real life variants and A8's "real" cars.
And this is exactly why I'm disappointed with the game. It just feels you can't really screw things up, like the game is playing itself and no skill is required to drift properly. Much different from console versions. Not to mention the meager number of tracks. Also slipstream is such a dumb mechanic. It doesn't feel good to perform perfect corners just to see your opponent flying pass you because it was taking advantage of slipstream. Sure, you can use it too, but it's just not fun to play cat and mouse all the time using a mechanic that gives an unbalanced advantage to the racer behind. So in the end it's just one racer changing position with other until the race ends. It comes off cheap because it's an artificial way to provide challenge when the challenge should be in the driving and tracks, but since the driving is so automatic and it's practically impossible to screw up a clean run, they had to create this mechanic. Pretty much the only skill needed is a little in the way of tactics, like saving your nitro for the right time. I wish they would just take Accelerated's engine and create the game around that.
As Habukak posted above, its on sale now. Was worth it at the original price so really a no brainer at the sale price. Like all games, it has both flaws and benefits that I won't waste space and go to in to and just say it will certainly entertain and is a lot of fun. It does what its supposed to so if you enjoy racers at all, you will enjoy this.
