Mark Plays… Ridge Racer 6 (Xbox 360)

This video shows a bit of Ridge Racer 6 running on the Xbox 360. Reiko Nagase – the series mascot – has even more loose strands of animated hair and is rendered in gorgeous detail in the full motion video opening sequence.

This game is the single outing on the Xbox of this series, the rest can be found on various Playstation consoles. The goal of the game is to place 1st in a series of races. Nitro is introduced which a lot of racers from around that era have – it temporarily boosts the performance of your car. To me it always feels a little like cheating. The cars themselves are the familiar fictional cars that the Ridge Racer series is famous for.

There’s a career mode called ‘World Explorer’ that allows you to ‘live through’ a career making choices on what races you want to race. There’s new cars on offer but also mirroring and reversing of known tracks.

Ridge Racer 7 for the Playstation 3 is a ‘sequel’ to this game but basically seems to be something of a ‘director’s cut’ adding more vehicles and tracks. The PSP and PSVita games are quite similar to this game.

If you are looking for another game in the Ridge Racer series that is often overlooked it’s R:Racing Evolution on the Playstation 2.

One of the best Arcade racers out there – love the entire series.
Ridge Racer (Arcade) (Playstation)
Ridge Racer 2 (Arcade)
Rave Racer (Arcade) (PlayStation and PC versions never materialized)
Ridge Racer Revolution (PlayStation) (similar to Ridge Racer 2: newer music and additional vehicles)
Rage Racer (PlayStation)(Reiko Nagase’s first appearance)
Pocket Racer (Arcade)(Japan Only, identical to Ridge Racer with different deformed Choro-Q-like vehicles)
R4: Ridge Racer Type 4 (PlayStation) (Gouraud shading makes this one of the best racers/games on the original PlayStation)
Ridge Racer V (PlayStation 2)(Launch title)
Ridge Racer 64 (Nintendo 64)(Not developed by Namco and it shows)
Ridge Racer V Arcade Battle (Arcade)(Came 1 year after the PlayStation 2 release)
R:Racing Evolution (Gamecube)(PlayStation 2)(Xbox) (33 Licensed vehicles on many different tracks: 24hours Le Mans is included)(Nice Backstory)
Ridge Racer DS (Nintendo DS)(Pretty much a remake of the Ridge Racer 64 game)
Ridge Racers (PSP)(Launch title)(Ridge Racer outside of Japan)(Inlcudes many of the tracks and tunes from previous ridge racer games)
Critical Velocity (PlayStation 2)(Spin off solely in Japan)(also called Rune Racer)
Ridge Racer 6 (Xbox 360)(Launch title)(130 vehicles, 30 tracks)(XBox Live enabled)
Ridge Racers 2 (PSP)(Sequel on the PSP)(Similar to the first game on the PSP, contains loads of tracks and tunes from previous games, the PSP games are quite similar to the Xbox and Playstation 3 games)
Ridge Racer 7 (PlayStation 3)(Launch title)
Ridge Racer Accellerated (iOS)
Ridge Racer 3D (Nintendo 3DS)(Launch title)
Ridge Racer Vita (Launch title for PlayStation Vita)
Ridge Racer Unbounded (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Microsoft Windows)(different from the series, more like Burnhout with combat)
Ridge Racer Slipstream (iOS)(Android)
Ridge Racer Draw & Drift (iOS)

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