FLIP RIDERS Review
PROS
- Cheery, cartoonish atmosphere; vibrant style brought to life by its whacky environments.
- Multiple characters, each with their own unique 'feel'.
- Simple to master controls; flip or touch/slide options available.
- Unlockable content; 5 'hidden' riders to try out.
CONS
- Hellish difficulty curve; not above throwing multiple traps at you early on.
- View distance too short; hurtling blindly in to traps is a lazy way to increase the challenge.
VERDICT
Flip Riders presents itself as a cheery, friendly and most importantly, simple and fun stunt-racer, but buried just beneath the surface is a brutal challenge designed to make grown adults weep.
- Full Review
- App Store Info
Editor Note (Nov 9, 2011): For some, Flip Riders was everything they wanted in a time-trial, hardcore moto-x style stunt game, but for us at AppSpy it presented a lot of frustrations that managed to pile upon themselves, resulting in a less than stellar first outing. However, in what is certainly a praiseworthy effort of retooling, Agimat has updated their game to not only separate the weaklings from the heroes (thanks to a new difficulty selection), the levels themselves have also changed to emphasize its aerial fun. Instead of deadly blind traps players will have to skillfully manipulate their speed, flips and jumps to maximize their score, while all new checkpoints mean you're not cheated at the last moment. What was fun to try has turned in to a game fans of the genre should definitely try their hands at. (Final Score: 3.4 -> 4.0)
Some gamers would like to think that separating people in to groups like 'casual' and 'hardcore' can be relatively easy and provide at least some way of defining what game suits what player. The truth is it's so much deeper than that, though there is a subset of gamer who enjoys a game that's uncompromisingly challenging and Flip Riders by Agimat and POWapp will be like a cool, refreshing breeze in a dry desert to these players.
After selecting from one of five different riders, each with their own balance of speed and agility, the player is thrown in to a world dominated by ramps and traps designed to kill said rider at every turn. Thankfully a few tools are at the user's disposal, with the basic acceleration and brake also being joined by the ability to jump (even mid-air) and tilting to flip the bike (hence the rather simple title).
Unfortunately for those used to a game being at least half-way fair, the game isn't beyond building the traps in such a way that you require foresight to pass them, which given the limited amount of vision you're given in a side-scrolling environment, is very little. A 'panic' mode can slow down time, giving you a chance to avoid some traps, but when some are based around your momentum, adjusting your angle at the last moment or jumping are not going to help you to survive. The end result is a need to brutally replay each level until you've mastered the timing for your particular racer as any fall/explosion/death-by-shark requires a full reset of the level.
To offset this immensely frustrating style of racing, the game itself is amazingly charming with vibrantly colorful 3D characters, cartoon-inspired backgrounds and whacky touches like pipes from Super Mario firing sharks at the rider as they cross a bridge... it's mayhem and it's easy to crack a smile or two despite previous annoyances.
This does, however, place Flip Riders in to the camp of 'hardcore' in the sense that it will require a lot of dedication and forgiveness based on enjoying its brutal nature to keep coming back for more. If you find games hold your hand too much, this might be for you.
Screenshots
