Game Reviews

Keri Racing

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| Keri Racing
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Keri Racing
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| Keri Racing

Ever since the days of the arcade classic Joust in the early '80s, video game characters have rode upon ostrich-like birds to the delight of players everywhere.

Final Fantasy popularised the bird-as-a-horse conceit with its iconic chocobos, and introduced the world to the concept of chocobo racing with Final Fantasy VII.

Since then, the art of horse-sized bird racing has declined. Keri Racing aims to bring it back to the pockets of gamers across the world with a combination of city-building and RPG-inspired pet raising.

Whip it good

Keri Racing isn't so much a game of two halves as it is two mini-games bundled together under the same title.

When the game begins, it's very much a standard social city-builder. You build farms to raise crops and you then convert these into food at bakeries or mills. All the while your actions are limited by energy. It's about as typical a freemium game as you could imagine. Then it asks you to build a nest.

The introduction of the giant bird (Keri) at this point should not be a surprise: it's in the icon for the game itself and stars in the opening movie. But its presence in a social city-builder is still a bit jarring at first.

When you hop onto the Keri, the social trappings fall away and you suddenly find yourself playing a racing game.

Go forward

With the Keri under rein, you amble about the racing area (which looks rather like a frontier mining town mixed with Final Fantasy VII's Golden Saucer). Here you can explore the basics of the racing mini-game.

If playing solo, you can engage in races against wanted criminals (computer AI) for rewards. Further south is the grand prix, which allows you to engage in real-time PvP racing against friends or strangers.

The racing mechanic itself is fairly straightforward: your Keri runs automatically and you can whip it to coax it into a brief sprint. Occasionally, obstacles like walls or large toads will appear, and you tap the screen to jump over them.

What really helps the racing mechanic shine is the degree of control that you have over your Keri's performance. Different accessories like hats and leggings are available to augment specific stats.

You can also feed the Keri to increase its stats, but this comes at the cost of food and energy back in the city-building half of the game.

Move ahead

The end result is a satisfying pet raising experience that really lets you bond with your mount.

Unfortunately, Keri Racing is not without its flaws. Several menu options still have bugs that allow you to click on them when you don't have enough energy to make use of their features, and the translation is awkward at best.

But if you feel that traditional social city-builders need an end goal to make them worth playing, Keri Racing is worth checking out for its well-integrated racing component.

Keri Racing

Racing breaks up the harvest, build, repeat cycle of town building in this cute title
Score
Matthew Diener
Matthew Diener
Representing the former colonies, Matt keeps the Pocket Gamer news feed updated when sleepy Europeans are sleeping. As a frustrated journalist, diehard gamer and recovering MMO addict, this is pretty much his dream job.