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Awesome Game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: July 04, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Other people have said that this game sucks. It sure doesn't. They are wrong. First of all i think that you have to be a horse lover to enjoy it. Some people said that they are horse racing fans but you have to love horses all together. The racing part is the best part of the whole game. The horses look real. You get to choose your horses training and you get to breed other horses. Another good thing about this game is that when you breed horses the horse just appears in your stable. I have a computer horse racing game that is similiar to this game except in that game you have to wait a year for foal to be born and then you have to wait until it is old enough to race (2 years old). I reccomend this game to horse fans and if you happen to love horse racing too like me then you will definetly love this game.

Horse lover's buy this game.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: July 05, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game is awesome. But i warn you only buy it if you are a horse lover and also love horse racing.

An okay game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: February 24, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I liked this game a lot, I liked Gallop Racer too but it was too hard for me, I really stink at a lot of video games. Well this game is easier than Gallop Racer, but your horse can get injured really easily, and you don't even get to choose any of your horse's names. I liked racing against champions like Funny Cide and Seabiscuit but they were pretty easy to beat. If Gallop racer is too hard for you but you love horse racing games, this is a good game for you.

Ok game, I like it

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: August 15, 2007
Author: Amazon User

this is a good game for people who get frustrated all the time when they loose, this game can get booring but it is easy to win, I think gallop racer is way too hard so, this is better. I dont like how you dont have to do anything when you race, accept when you go through the starting gate. the rest of the time you just have to do NOTHING! untill the end when you whip and hold the analog stick up. I hope you found my review usefull!

Just bought this game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: May 07, 2008
Author: Amazon User

O.K. people need to figure something out, why would you buy a horse racing game and expect something else, this game is intended for the person who loves horse racing and simulated horse gambling so what if you can't name your own horse when breeding you still get to pick the sire and dame.

three positives:
1. The graphics quality is actually surprisingly good
2. The racing aspect is quite challenging but if you know what your doing you are set
3. The # of actual racing venues is pretty vast

three negatives
1. It is too easy to win
2. like i said you can't name your own horse
3. The AI horse names are repetitive

Not that bad

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 11 / 14
Date: January 01, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game is okay. I mean, Gallop racer is a million times better. But this gam is kinda cool. But when you breed horses , they are either 2 or 3 years old.And you can't breed YOUR horses. You breed someone elses. Plus, your horse injures itself AL OF THE TIME!!! It drives me crazy.

"Impressive" NOT

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 6 / 8
Date: February 18, 2006
Author: Amazon User

My dad got me this game for Valentine's day. I was SOOO excided, But when I started to play, it was boring. The races were too easy, and the stable part is comfusing. You have to claim your horse and you can't even groom it!! I didn't want to hurt my dad's feelings, so I said the racing part was fun.

No Where Near As Good As Gallop Racer With A Few Glaring Flaws

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: October 05, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I'm not much of a gamer but I'm a big horse racing fan and about 90% of my game play has been Gallop Racer games. I like the Gallop Racer's gameplay in the races. Asking horses to accelerate or decellerate seems somewhat realistic as do horses running better when they're in their preferred running position (lead, pressing, closing).

The new game fails horribly in race play. Closers appear to suffer no problems racing on the lead. Horses all accelerate like Arazi did at the quarter pole in the 91 BC Juvenile. The whipping is a joke. Pace is perhaps the most relevant variable in real horse racing (if you figure that natural abilities of horses can't be controlled), and pace seems to mean nothing in this new game except that you can't run off without tiring. Any closer with any ability can win if they take the lead and then just make a series of as many as 12 moves within a race.

Gallop Racer is much better as far as horse ability, as well, in the sense that if you pay more for a horse, that horse will be a better horse. The randomness of breeding in Gallop Racer seems realistic for a video game.

Notwithstanding my criticisms above on the issues that are probably most important, here is the thing that discredited this game for me the most:

ALL THE TRACKS SEEM TO BE 6 FURLONGS IN CIRCUMFERENCE!!! I thought I'd watch a race from Belmont at 1 1/8 miles, just to see a long one-turn race on a video game. The horses made THREE turns.

A close second for biggest thing that bothered me was that the grandstand at Saratoga looks nothing like Saratoga, while the Florida make believe track has Saratoga's grandstand. Didn't they have a consultant on these things? I will say that Del Mar is a good depiction. I live in San Diego and it was fun to show Del Mar to a few people.

But the game is a disappointment.

If you love horse racing, buy the game. There's a reason it's only $20, though. If nothing more, this game will have you thanking yourself for the creation of Gallop Racer and its progeny.

A Disappointment - Mildly Engaging at Best

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: July 18, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Gallop Racer is the accepted leader for horse racing games, but being a Japanese franchise, it lacks some of the authentic feel of American thoroughbred racing (e.g. the whole "amusement park" setting, a lackluster wagering system, etc.). I had hopes that this game would make up for those shortcomings since it was sponsored by the NTRA. And while the atmosphere may be much more familiar to North American racing fans, the game unfortunately falls woefully short in gameplay and lasting appeal.

The two primary downfalls are the game's simplicity and redundancy. Simplicity in that there is no challenge at all, either in single races where any mudder can beat an all-time great or in the stable mode where within only a few weeks you'll be flush with winnings and able to breed the finest horses available. Simplicity also in the races themselves - there is very little player interaction beyond some timed button mashing. What should be the centerpiece of the experience feels more like a mini-game added at the last minute. There are other frustrations with the races as well, such as no variety in the camera angles, no ability to look back at your competitors during the race, and no replays at all after the fact.

The redundancy is showcased in the stable mode. What should have been the key driver for replayability instead feels like a treadmill of tasks. You simply cycle through breed, train, enter, wager, race over and over again. It feels very repetitive by the third cycle.

On the plus side, wagering is realistic and robust, complete with tutorials. The fact that it's the most complete aspect of the game leads my cynical side to believe that the entire title is simply an advertisement to get people to the track. This suspicion is further bolstered by the fact that you can't opt out of races that your stable isn't competing in - the game wants you to handicap, wager, and watch each go-round.

All in all, this title feels like a PDA or PSP game - something decent for killing time at the airport while on a layover. But as a console game, it lacks enough that anyone would hard-pressed to spend much time in front of it given the other options.

what a shame

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 16 / 17
Date: October 09, 2005
Author: Amazon User

As far as I know I have played every horseracing videogame to come to an American console, I even bought a Saturn just so I could play Winning Post, and this game is the worst. I had high hopes upon hearing about this game and bought it right after it came out. I was hoping it would have the race and breeding mechanics of gallop racer but with American tracks and races, boy was I disappointed. The other two reviewers have pretty much nailed down the game's faults; it is far to easy, I probably won 75-80% of my races the first year I have played, the racing part of the game is pathetic, you basically just have to gun your horse to the lead rather he prefers to be there or not and you will win most of the time. Even pinballing between horses does not seem to hurt you, if you are blocked in just knock the horses out of the way and go right through. The breeding is also bad, the first horse that I bred with my initial 50k won the Breeder's Cup Mile the first year. I also thought that having some real tracks meant that there would be some other real races such as the Travers at Saratoga or Pacific Classic at Del Mar, but no, only the actual Breeder's Cup races are real. The betting is also ridiculous, I won at 50-1 or more a couple of times and 20-1 shots seem to win as often as favorites. Hopefully they will make another game with improvements but right now this game is really bad, I had alot more fun with the original Gallop Racer on PS1, and Gallop Racer 2004 is an infinitely better product, NTRA license or no.

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