Riptide GP2

Year: 2013
Genre: Racing
Website: http://www.vectorunit.com/riptide-gp2/

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Lee:

• Platform: Android
• Hours logged: 1.0
• Playthroughs: 0
• Rating: --/10

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Notes and Discussions:

• Lee (5/22/2014): Historically, moving water has been a very difficult thing to render in computer graphics, but the design team at Vector Unit (or the makers of the physics engine that they used) did a pretty good job of it. (Side note: during a Nerdist podcast interview [I don’t remember with whom...Joss Whedon maybe], I learned that while making the first Toy Story movie, Pixar completely avoided all scenes involving liquids. In one scene, Woody dunks his head in a bowl of Fruit Loops, but no milk is seen dripping from his face.) The levels had a lot of extra scenery and interesting, non-gameplay-related stuff to look at. These things certainly added to the comfort that I felt while settling in and learning the controls and game objectives.
  
  As a jet skier (Google says that I can use the common noun here to refer to a rider of personal watercraft, and not the brand name from Kawasaki) aspiring to make it at the pro level, your goal is to win or place in jet ski races to unlock more race courses and earn money to spend on new tricks and upgrades for your watercraft.
  
  I remember more than a decade ago playing Mario Kart DS until my thumbs bled. I played every level over and over until I got Gold on all of them. I loved that game. I felt that Riptide GP2 could possibly tap into a bit of the nostalgia that I hold for early Mario Kart games, but unfortunately this didn't happen. I am certain that a large factor in this is the absence of that Nintendo character charm...and there were also no turtle shells to shoot at the other riders. I know that I could have grinded the races in this game to earn enough money to buy new tricks and jet ski upgrades, but I just didn't feel like doing that. Shane has commented in the past about the growing collection of games that he and I have said we may go back and play someday. I think that I will add this to that list, perhaps even somewhere near the top.