Here we have the new Tour de France game, a cycling strategy game for people who are passionate about cycling. There is very little/almost no story line for this game, the main focus of this game is to finish the Tour de France bicycle race, you get a few different races to do once you have finished the main tour such as the previous seasons and the others are pro tours that lead up to the main race.
You compete over 10 or 12 stages with the different teams that you want to race for, each team has different riders with different skill sets from people who are great sprinters to people who are great short or long hill climbers. Each stage is no less that 180kms and takes around 30 to 40 minutes to play each stage, the best comparison would be like Forza Motorsport mixed in with a football manager style game but for bicycles. The main bunch of riders is around 280 riders per race on average. The riders always try to make a break and form their own pelotons (A group of broken away riders trying to make a gap between others).
This is a very strategic game, you can’t just ride at full speed through the stage and hope to win, you need to plan when you are going to make a break or when you need to fall back and draft other riders. The stages are long and are mixed with all different types of hills and corners, your corners are unknown there’s only a map to show the different elevation changes, but this adds to the need to strategize on when to attack. There are also small challenges on short or long hills where you need to attack and make it to the top to score points for the different colour jerseys. Leading throughout the whole race doesn’t necessarily mean a win, it could make you blow out and become tired and drained and aren’t able to race.
The developers definitely thought about those who don’t want to sit through and pedal the whole stage constantly holding in the controller button so they added in a manager mode for the stages, it allows you to manage your team correctly, to tell them when to attack or fall back into the peloton to try and gain some energy back as well as get out of the wind, but the best part about it is that there is a speed up mode, where it speeds the race up to roughly X3 so a race only takes around 8 to 10 minutes. Allowing you to complete each stage without sitting through time.
The developers really have gone to town on the details, such as the crowds on the sides of the roads or on the climbs where they move aside as you climb the hill, they also shout the names of the some of the pro riders such as Alberta Contidoor and Mark Cavendish. The graphics are also relatively good; the scenery is detailed matching the French style roads and trees.
There are a few small downsides to this game such as when you go off the road your rider doesn’t fall over, he just slows down and gets bounced back to the middle of the road, secondly when you get stuck in a large slower peloton its so difficult to break away from the group as it doesn’t let you get passed other riders so easily, sometimes you have to push it to the very limits of the road to squeeze by, other than those few small things there is nothing else wrong, no bugs or frame drops.
The game also gives you a good sense of achievement when you manage to finish a stage, it’s a lot harder than it sounds, you need to think strategically and use your feeds to boost your energy back at the correct times, and when you cross that finish line it really puts a smile on your face.
This is a great game to play if you feel like playing a whole big bag of mixed genres, from managing to racing. This is a great game to play by yourself or with friends on the couch or other friends online.
I would give it a solid 7/10 for being different and fun!
Thanks to everyone involved for making it possible for us to review this game!