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I make a lousy race horse trainer
I had the opportunity this weekend to play one of those games where you breed your race horse, train it, and then race it.
I lost, badly.
Here’s the thing, though: I finally understand why horse games don’t make any money. It’s because they just aren’t realistic for people who actually know anything about riding.
Take “my” little race horse, for example: poor guy was born wasp-waisted and with hind legs on steroids. When the program showed him walking off a trailer, it looked like his entire hind end was collapsing. Despite the fact that is was only computer graphics—and bad ones at that—it was still painful to watch. (Although it would explain why my horse ran so poorly; he probably needed some serious chiropractic adjustments).
So: ugly, unrealistic (even scary) graphics. At least I could handle the care and training part, right?
Nope. Feed the horse some hay, and he wants a carrot. Give him a carrot, and he wants some hay. Horse is sad? Try to cheer him up, and he walks off in a huff. Horse does a good job and you praise him? He walks off in a huff. Punish the horse? He walks off in a huff.
I know that once you sort out the algorithm, the game would be easy enough to win, but who wants to spend all day trying to figure out how to make a computer horse happy when you could be making a real horse happy?
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Comments
Fortunately, I don’t have a PSP, or I’d be tempted. I knew there was a reason I was sticking to computer games and avoiding the big systems.
On Sep 7, 2008, Jackie said:
If you want to try a good horse racing game, you need to try Gallop Racer 06 for PS2. Gamers don’t like it, but it plays well if you’re a horse person. You don’t do all the care stuff, but you have to plan racing schedules and try to win the Triple Crown and other sets. And the races are very realistic. It’s addicting; because the races only take a minute and a half I always end up saying “just one more” for another four hours. I’m with you though, I just got my own horse and I’m certainly not sitting at home playing video games!