Moto Racer DS Review

What annoys you the most about racing games for the DS? The graphics? The short missions? Or the fact that even though it's for the DS, the game isn't especially designed for the touch screen? Well, you'll be pleased to hear that this game was made to make the DS shine again.

The game is based on driving motorbikes. To be good at this game you need adrenaline and skill. There are plenty of ways this game can entertain you, whether it's the racing, doing the stunts, or doing the missions. I think that adding the stunts in it spices up the game a lot, and makes it a lot more fun, because the stunts range from being hard or easy to remember, although usually I just press random buttons and see what happens.

There are four different modes that you can play around with, which are:

• Moto GP: here you can race on traditional style racing tracks.
• Super Cross: like traditional dirt tracks with the hills which you can make jumps from.
• Freestyle: here you can use the Super Cross tracks to show off your skills by doing stunts off the jumps.
• Traffic: like the title says this is racing in the streets with traffic.

All of these game types have two or three other modes within them. Moto GP and Super Cross have the same modes, which are: Championship, which is where you compete with other opponents, and you try and win the race; there is Single Race which is where you can choose from a range of tracks that you have already unlocked, and race your opponents and Time Trial which is where you can race on tracks you have already unlocked and try to get your fastest time on that race.

Freestyle only has two modes which are: a mode in which you have eight tracks and on each of those tracks you have a score goal, and you have to get that many points or more to win and clear that stage; and there is a mode on there where you can drive on a track you have already cleared, and you can do stunts to earn some extra points.

The traffic mode also has only two modes which are: Missions, where you are given goals to compete on a certain road, and once you have completed the goal given to you, you go on to the next stage; and the other one is a mode where you race the streets with an opponent. To unlock new levels, stages, and new bikes to continue with the game you have to go through the game, racing and doing various other events.

Like most games, Moto Racer DS handles multiplayer mode and it also supports the magnificent DS Download Play, which is where you can play a game on multiplayer, and you only need one cartridge for two or more of you to play the game. Not all of the modes support multiplayer but it's enough to keep you entertained

When choosing a bike you have a choice of using three different types of bikes: you have a light weight bike; a medium weight bike; and a heavy weight bike. Obviously, there are pros and cons to each one. For example, if you choose a heavy weight bike, it has high speeds, but poor accelerations and poor turbos. I think that is quite cool because I hate it when you come to the usual selection of cars or bikes and you obviously go for the fastest car because you don't really have to think about how it affects your bike/car. It just makes you think and experiment.

The game has a really nice feature where if you clip a corner or car, or just loose control of your motorbike, you start to wobble fiercely, and you can fall. When this happens a small icon will appear to indicate that you are going to fall off of your bike. However, you can recover from this by braking, which of course slows you down, giving the other opponents an opportunity to overtake you.

A problem is that I find that when you crash, the game tends to show a scene of your bike somewhere totally different from where you originally crashed. This is disorientating, and furthermore when you do crash, it doesn't show your character falling off of their bike; it just shows your bike spinning off into nowhere, which is a bit puzzling. As I said it is disorientating, however at this stage, you have already fallen off or crashed, so it doesn't affect the gameplay.

Another feature is that when you are coming up towards a corner, on the upper screen it displays a colour coded directional arrow, showing how to take the corner. There is green, which means that you can take the corner at full speed; there is amber, which advises you to maybe slow down a little or take it wide; and there is red, which signifies that it is a tight bend (usually a hair-pin) which will result in you crashing if you don't brake. I know most racing games already do this, but still, I thought it was a nice feature and the visualisation of the colour code, gives you a quicker heads-up on what's coming up.

I tried the game first of all without using the stylus, to get the feel of it, and then I experimented with the touch screen. When I switched from using the control pad to the stylus, at first I struggled quite a bit with it. But then I started to improve and soon I was doing better than I was when I first started using the control pad. When I went onto Freestyle mode and started to try and do the stunts, I was failing abysmally so then I tried using the control pad, and to my pride, I noticed the difference. The ultimate question is; is it better with, or without the Nintendo DS stylus? Well, the answer to that question is that it IS better with the stylus, on the races, however I found, that when doing the stunts, the control pad was much easier. To sum everything up, Moto Racer DS is an eventful, lightening game, which keeps you wanting more and more.