Shaun Munro reviews Trials Rising…
Trials Rising has been a long time coming for fans of the physics-based racing franchise, with the divisively-received Trials Fusion landing way back in the spring of 2014. And though the latest instalment makes a few peculiar design calls, it is for the most part the addictive, infuriatingly challenging blast fans will be hoping for.
The core gameplay is as crack-like as ever, mastering the “just one more” appeal of bite-sized trial-and-error puzzlers. Hell, the game itself even notes this in an amusing loading screen gag, that you might easily find yourself playing until 2am and wondering where all the time went.
If you’re new to the series, Trials is a deceptively challenging racer in which players are tasked with riding a motorcycle around a map peppered with vertiginous environmental challenges. It might sound simple enough, but in order to make headway through the more complex tracks, you’ll need to master leaning, weight-shifting, bunny-hopping and other tricky techniques.
And much like the previous games in the series, Trials Rising acutely understands how players will try to read tracks, and often seeks to subvert this with some clever rug-pulls intended to trip them up. In other games this would seem cheap and mean, but given the generous checkpointing and fast restart times on offer, it’s not often you’ll feel like the game is being unnecessarily harsh (though later levels certainly do test the patience).
There are almost 120 levels strewn across Trials Rising‘s somewhat confusing world map – where it’s often tough to tell whether a track has been completed or not – and though many are relatively samey, there are some easy standouts. A film-themed track, for instance, features some visually stunning dynamic events in the background as you speed around – namely a Starship Troopers-esque giant bug – and in other levels, you’ll find yourself riding along speeding trains and airplanes.
That’s not to forget the peripheral Skill Games, which include propelling yourself into a series of explosive barrels or riding as far as possible while on fire. It’ll take a while before seasoned players reach the truly mettle-testing levels, but they’re definitely there in decent abundance.
Mercifully the game also includes a new University of Trials sidebar with smartly laid-out – if painfully low-res – videos detailing some of the game’s more complex manoeuvres, presented by Trials expert Professor FatShady (a YouTuber hired by RedLynx for the game). Even as a veteran of the series, the videos and subsequent playable tutorials were a welcome refresher, especially for when the late-game levels arrive. Meanwhile, if this is your first Trials game, it’s the most newbie-friendly the series has ever been, and gently assures players that there’s no need to be too intimidated.
Trials Rising has one big problem, though; after you reach level 50-ish, you’ll find yourself forced to relentlessly grind Contract challenges in order to unlock more stages. Contracts are re-purposed levels where XP is awarded for completing tasks such as performing x number of backflips or frontflips during a level, completing a track with an invisible rider or beating a CPU rival.
Despite never devolving into outright boredom, it does feel like an ungenerous slog, especially later on. Furthermore, with the post-race summary screens lasting at least a few seconds too long, getting into the next race takes longer than it probably should, and it proves a tad grating during longer play sessions.
Also, the amount of XP doled out is wildly inconsistent between contracts, with some easy-peasy ones giving you a wealth, while you can conversely spend half-an-hour on another that gives you basically zip. Why make players toil to get to the good stuff, especially when Fusion‘s gold medal requirement seemed far more sensible? One suspects this might be a corporate missive from Ubisoft higher-ups to heighten “player engagement” – that is, hours logged as opposed to fun logged – but fingers are crossed that the already vocal fan outcry might prompt RedLynx to patch this soon enough.
Thankfully there is some peripheral content to check out when ennui inevitably sets in, namely a multiplayer suite. Online play is bafflingly limited to just a dispassionate series of races through a strict number of tracks, and the pitiful amount of XP doled out per race makes it an untenable alternative to rinsing Contracts. Given that this could’ve been a fun way to offset the single-player grind, it’s another bizarre, regressive design choice. Local options are also there for those who crave it, namely a goofy tandem bikes mode, where two players must combine their finesse to dual-control a bike.
Elsewhere there’s Track Central, where you can tackle tracks created by others, though it sadly doesn’t reward players with XP (presumably to prevent players boosting to the level cap). The track creator itself meanwhile continues to be a credit to the series, though for many – this critic included – it’s a touch too nebulous, and I’d much rather invest my time just playing the tracks that others have slaved over.
Visually Trials Rising is hardly a barn-burner but it’s certainly a decent-looking game, especially when played in 4K, and if you’ve played the Nintendo Switch version, the gulf in visual acuity and background detail speaks for itself. Generally speaking the game’s environments are far more diverse than with Fusion‘s controversial sci-fi aesthetic, while character detail is defined by heaps of customisation (at the behest of, yes, loot crates).
Playing on PC, however, there was a good deal of texture pop-in when loading races – especially if performing a quick-restart – not to mention some not-insignificant frame drops. Given that my GPU didn’t even get warm playing the game at 4K, that’s a touch disappointing. Also, the game’s smoking skull post-race menu transition desperately needs to go; it’s been stuttering horribly across platforms ever since the game’s closed beta and just looks hideous.
Sound-wise Rising mostly opts for licensed music in favour of Fusion‘s divisive techno – though I’ll not entertain a single bad word against “Welcome to the Future” – yet despite diverse offerings from the likes of Motorhead and Stone Temple Pilots, it mostly just fades into the periphery. Environmental sounds aren’t particularly remarkable either, but the hilariously exaggerated screams of your racer as they get brutally mangled after crossing the finish line are undeniably hilarious.
Above all else, this feels like a game struggling with the modern gaming moment, as evidenced by its enforced grinding and wildly unnecessary loot box nonsense (which, for the standards of shoehorned micro-transactions, is at least rather benign and can be almost completely ignored). But if you can withstand Trials Rising‘s needless XP grind, it finds the series in classic “video-game-as-cocaine” form.
Pros:
+ Core gameplay is as good as ever.
+ 4K visuals add a lot of character.
+ A wealth of content.
Cons:
– The XP grind is painful.
– Some rough technical edges.
– Multiplayer is incredibly lacking.
Rating: 7.5/10
Reviewed on PC (also available for PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch).
Shaun Munro – Follow me on Twitter for more video game rambling.
