0 to Z of Playstation 1 Games - Barbie Race & Ride

    

Barbie Race & Ride is a equestrian themed game developed by Runecraft using the Barbie licence and is the first Barbie game to appear on Playstation. Mattel Interactive published the game in North America, with it releasing on the 18^th of November 1999, The European release would come the following month on the 2^nd of December.

The game can either be played in single player mode or in 2 player mode, with the player choosing their outfit for their character once chose the game revolves around the player taking care of a stable of 4 horses, grooming them and feeding them, the player can feed them a variety of foods such as apples, carrots, strawberries, and sugar cubes 2 player mode does not allow you to take care of the horses, in 2 player mode the second player will play as Teresa

Once the horses in your stable are taken care of you can take them for a ride in one of four locations, the beach, forests, a meadow and in the mountains. Once you have selected your horse you will be able to name it from a selection of names provided, also if playing 2 player mode only the Beach and Meadow allow for a 2 player races. 

 

The player has the choice of only 4 horses a palomino, a paint, a white, and a dapple gray. Barbie will explain each of the horses personalities as the player moves to each one in the stable. Before the player takes their horses to one of the riding locations they must go through a riding lesson, once this has been carried out they are free to visit any of the locations

 

Controls are pretty basic with the D-pad used to steer your horse left or right, while the up and down directions control your horses speed. The X button is used to select highlighted objects and while riding it is used for jumping. Triangle will exit the current screen you are on while the square button will access areas while riding.

The also has mini games within each location for example the forest has a mini game where you will be collecting acorns for a squirrel, with the across slowly tumbling down the branches of a tree, while the player moves a basked left to right on the ground to catch them. In addition to in level puzzles there are also mini jigsaw puzzles to assemble see above screens for an example.

Only a handful of reviews for this game have survived the just over 19 years since the game released with the game receiving one pretty decent review, however the majority of reviews for this game were pretty abysmal with two review scores registering in single figures. 

As usual though we will start with the best which is a very respectable 79 from GameSpot UK, with the reviewer saying this game has a very specific type of player in mind but delivers the good in captivating quantity. They concluded with it’d be a rare small Barbie fan who would be disappointed with this neatly packaged game, they also praised the game for being one of the few that is specifically aimed at young girls.

From this point review scores for the game take a nose dive, the kind of nose dive that sees everything obliterated into a fine mist, Daily Radar were the next highest scoring review for the game with a lowly 25, with the review highly critical of the game ease, with the review commenting on any player over 4 years will not be challenged or stimulated by this game.

Another dive in review score for the next one with The Review Busters with a fairly recent review of the game coming in 2011, they found that Barbie Race & Ride to be one of the vilest games in creation. The review called into question who would possibly want to play as Barbie and ride a horse?

They concluded children maybe, but the hopes after a few minutes they would get bored and yell at their parents for buying this common used PSOne title. They rounded up by saying, with Race & Ride it is best kept on store shelves and in no way can I recommend this title, not even to the blind.

Amazingly the game get even lower review scores with a 6 and a 5 rated review from French publications Consoles Plus and Player One, starting with the former with the review harsh and to the point saying, the game boils down to pushing two buttons in an ugly and coarse 3D world devoid of any interest and literally debilitating.

Player One who scored the game at an abysmal 5 called the game rather ugly with little interactivity, while it may appeal to hardcore fans of the famous doll and maybe those parents who are eager to slowly learn video games alongside their offspring.

This is the part of 0 to Z where is visit four online retailers and see what the availability of the title is, and what price you would be looking at if you wanted to pick this title up, the sites that I will be using for this are Amazon.com, eStarland.com, retrogames.co.uk and Gamedude.com I know the last one is very location specific, but from a podcast I listen to, I’ve heard they have a huge stock of older games, Ebay has now been dropped unless the game is unavailable at other retailers.

So lets get down to business with Gamedude where this game seems pretty common, with Gamedude paying $3 if you are looking to trade in your copy of Barbie Race & Ride. On the other hand if you are in the market for a copy of the game, then one can be picked up pretty cheaply at $8.

 

Retrogames.co.uk sadly don’t stock or list this title so we will quickly move on to eStarland.com, who currently have two copies of the game available. The first of these copies is a disc only copy of the game and is priced up at $2.20, the second is a complete copy of the game which can be picked up for $4.68.

eStarland also offer a trade in for Barbie Race & Ride, with up to $2 paid for a complete copy of the game. Depending on the completeness of your copy this price will fluctuate, with a disc only copy worth just 42 cents at trade in, a missing manual copy is worth just 78 cents, while a missing case copy is worth just 84 cents at trade in.

Moving on to Amazon.com where we find the very cheapest available are mostly disc only copies, doesn't take long to find a good and very good complete copy though these are priced up at $6.98 for the good quality copy and $6.99 for the very good used copy, these prices are with the shipping costs added in.

Several more complete copies in very good condition are available on the second page of listings, with prices ranging from $8.53 up to $9.53. one of the very good condition copies that is available has a fully refurbished disc this copy is priced at $8.80.

If you are looking for a better quality used copy of the game, prices for a like new copy start at a minimum of $16.58 with prices for a like new copy currently peaking at $20.49. if however your are not interested in used copies and are looking for a new copy of the game there is a small selection on offer with prices starting from $18.32 with a small group priced up to around the $28.50 mark.

A couple more copies are priced beyond this point with one copy available for $44.98 once shipping has been added in. Prices for new copies continue to rise from here with one copy available for over $60, and another copy breaching the $90 mark.

Written by

P J Gibbon