Wait, Ride 6? SIX?
Seems like only yesterday this motorcycling rookie was getting a harsh lesson in going very fast on two wheels by the original game.
The Ride series is one of the great labours of love — and almost an outlier — in a modern gaming landscape littered with sequels, short-termism and fancy nonsense.
It is a stripped-back, simulation-focused and often massively challenging gaming that offers rewards for those prepared to be patient.
There remain any number of games for four wheels — from the big guns like Gran Turismo and Forza Horizon to official games for Formula 1 and World Rally Championship racing, to more arcade-style series like Need For Speed — but Ride all but stands alone as the game for motorcycle freaks.
You can really feel the passion the Italian developers have for the machines as they waste no time in Ride 6 in getting you on the track.
Speed, of course, is the ultimate measure of any driving game, and the series keeps doing an impressive job of making you feel like you are going umpteen hundred kilometres an hour without feeling you are in mortal danger.
The difficulty curve is reasonable, and there is enough variety to the events in the feature career mode — including off-road action for the first time — to keep you coming back for more.
My only concern is that, in a bid to maintain as realistic an approach as possible, the game does not hold massively long-term appeal for the casual fan.
Some of the visuals also do not appear to have progressed all that far since the original games.
Good fun, though, and bound to satisfy the passionate motorcycling folk.
