Downhill Bikers

"Mountain Biking without the medical risk plus it gives me enough exercise."

OK. You've ate a hamburger, hot dog, several pieces of French Fries, a Cheese Pizza, a few Milky Way Candy Bars, and other junk food that you can name it. You realize that you are getting fat and you need to go bicycle riding in order to burn up those calories. You want to do some mountain biking at times but keep in mind that mountain biking may be dangerous as it holds LOTS OF MEDICAL RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH THIS SPORT. Downhill Bikers is as close to downhill biking without any risks of getting hurt while biking on a downhill mountain.

Graphics: Running on the same board that empowers Crisis Zone, Time Crisis II, Motorcross GO, and Namco 500CC GP, this game features a lot of fluid movement and a lot of detail within the texture-mapped polygons. Even the ''human'' polygons are faithfully detailed in this game. The animation is extremely smooth and there is virtually no slowdown associated with the game.

Controls: Imagine eating a 1/3 Pound Hamburger and not gaining a pound!!! The controls replicate the bike riding experience really well and the amount of speed is determined on how light and/or hard you pedal. You also have to nudge the handles left and right in order to change the travelling direction of your bicycle as well. You are also equipped with bicycle brakes that enable you to slow down in places which requires more control than speed. The controls in this game gave me a lot of exercise, ever since Prop Cycle came out. This is the game's best feature because now YOU MAKE THE RULES. Control the bike as you please and the controls will respond differently to your style of bicycling.

Learning Curve: It's kind of short because it only takes minimal effort to learn the game. You just have to learn a few theories or two in order to master the game. Sometimes you can make better use of the few theories in the game and while the bicycle concept looks cool, the game doesn't offer as many strategy-based theories as opposed to some of Namco's hotter deluxe machine hits.

Variety: While there are only 2 tracks (High Speed and Technical) available in the game, you are given a selection of four bicyclers, each have their own strengths and weaknesses. For example, one bicyclist can corner better but has poor speed.

Overall: While this game is kind of easy to learn, this game is a worthwhile title and is quite a kick to play not because of the amount of exercise that you get from playing this game, but the theme of downhill biking seems to be a great interest as well. Give it a try if you can. Need I mention this is also a safe alternative to real-life Downhill Biking?

Reviewer's Score: 9/10 | Originally Posted: 07/05/00, Updated 04/07/02

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