Riders Republic from Ubisoft is a game that I’ve been eyeballing since it was announced last year. Ubisoft originally showed off a video with a lot of mountain biking gameplay that seemed incredibly fun. Thankfully, the full game delivers above and beyond what the trailer showcased. Riders Republic is a ridiculously satisfying open-world extreme sports game for multiple reasons which I’ll get into shortly.



In Riders Republic, players will take on the role of a newbie rider that’s roped into taking on increasingly difficult extreme sports challenges all in the name of obtaining new gear and equipment. The character creator in Riders Republic is rather lacklustre with the playable character model looking average by today’s gaming standards. You’ll be able to select from a mediocre range of presets and that’s about it. Thankfully, players will have access to a lot of cosmetic items which they can unlock and adorn their character with. These are far superior to the base character model itself.

The character creator in Riders Republic is rather lacklustre...

Once you’ve created your character, players will be introduced to Suki and Brett. Suki gets you up to speed with a bike and introduces you to Brett, a seasoned veteran of extreme sports. Things really take off after this with both Suki and Brett guiding you through some early challenges which teach you the game’s mechanics.



Players will be taught how to accelerate, brake, pull off tricks, control the camera, change the direction of their playable character and more. The onboarding process is fairly linear and straightforward but once this is done, the game world begins to open itself up to you. The control scheme in Riders Republic offers some variation with regards to camera control as well as trick control with an auto and manual mode available for the latter. Sticking with Auto makes landing tricks far easier but for those who want more control, manual is the way forward.



Speaking of tricks, for some perplexing reason, Ubisoft opted to make the accelerate button, a trick button too. So if you’re accelerating at high speed and launch yourself off a ramp while holding down the right trigger (Accelerate) you’ll start performing a grab trick while moving unless you let go of the trigger immediately. This might annoy some gamers but you do get used to it quite quickly. You can perform a range of tricks by pressing the controller face buttons and it’s extremely satisfying being able to string together a combination of tricks and stick a perfect landing. You’ll be racking up extremely high scores in no time.



Riders Republic doesn’t only feature bicycles though. There’s a range of other extreme sports equipment available to you as the player and these really elevate the game to the next level. Players can ski, snowboard, snowmobile, wingsuit and rocket wingsuit (It’s clearly a Jetpack and this is the best part of the game!) their way across the open-world map while taking on various challenges.

Players can ski, snowboard, snowmobile, wingsuit and rocket wingsuit (It’s clearly a Jetpack and this is the best part of the game!)

The challenges you as a player will face include standard races, trick orientated courses and slaloms as well as online “Mass Races” with 50+ players competing against each other. The world of Riders Republic is a mashup of 7 national parks from the United States with some creative license being applied to their composition. What players essentially have in Riders Republic is an enormously massive map that will take your breath away.



What Ubisoft have created here is legitimately mind-blowing and the fact that the game runs so smoothly is flat-out insane. The in-game world is not only amazingly gorgeous but borders into photorealism at times with the lighting and effects being a visual feast for the eyes. Thankfully, Ubisoft have included a photo mode into the game so players can experiment with changing the time of day, weather effects and more. You can also apply filters and share your photos. This can be done instantly whenever you want to by simply opening the photo mode. I’m fairly certain that there will be a lot of gamers out there who will spend a significant period of time just taking screenshots in this game just because it’s so beautiful.

The in-game world is not only amazingly gorgeous but borders into photorealism at times with the lighting and effects being a visual feast for the eyes.

Riders Republic also features a “Zen Mode” which is entirely separate to the busy Career Mode (which is populated with hordes of online player ghost data zipping around). Zen Mode allows you to appreciate the entire map in all its glory by letting you explore the national parks and just have fun without any distractions. The actual map in Riders Republic needs a specific mention too since players can use either a 2D or 3D representation of the world map when fast-travelling around. This is a technical marvel and it will amaze you the first time you try it out in-game.



The pure, unadulterated enjoyment you get from Riders Republic lies in the fact that you can literally take a bike, snowboard or set of skis and launch yourself off the sheer cliff face of a mountain and pull off a tonne of tricks whenever you want to. It’s an open-world sandbox that allows you to just have fun whenever and wherever in both the Career and Zen modes.

The rocket wingsuit rounds off the package since it’s absolutely amazing zipping through trees, under rock arches and down rivers with a jetpack at breakneck speeds. This is what video games should be about: pure, distilled, joy. The game leans into this quite a bit too with “Shackdaddy Challenges” which feature some crazy equipment for you to race or complete challenges with such as plain wooden skis or an ice cream bike.



Where Riders Republic does falter lies with the fact that there is quite a lot of “Hipster” dialogue. The way Brett speaks is quite plain and simply, atrocious with a distinct “How do you do fellow kids?” meme vibe coming off of him (Editor's Note: lol). If this is what Ubisoft wanted though, I guess that worked out quite well since his dialogue is often so laughably bad you may want to mute the sound whenever he starts talking. Some gamers may also find the repetitive nature of some of the challenges to be a bit lacklustre but you aren’t really forced to replay challenges much since the game is quite generous with awarding progression stars and new gear.

The way Brett speaks is quite plain and simply, atrocious with a distinct “How do you do fellow kids?” meme vibe coming off of him...

Completionists will need to dedicate a lot of time to the game since there’s plenty of collectibles scattered throughout the game world. Ubisoft have opted to include “Landmarks” which are quite a nice touch in that they teach you some real world history about specific locations in the national parks. Discovering the “Sherman Tree” in the Sequoia Forest for example was quite fascinating since this is by volume, the largest known living single-stem tree on our planet and the game tells you this fact.



The soundtrack of Riders Republic features quite a lot of licensed music tracks ranging from rock to classic music. The selection is varied enough to keep players satisfied. However, the actual real star of the OST is the music created for the game itself. There’s a lot of synth heavy tracks as well as some extremely chill electro and drum and bass. It suits the game perfectly and the main menu theme is rather catchy too.



Riders Republic features a lot of in-game mentions of real world sponsors such as Red Bull and there’s a daily cosmetics shop as well as numerous paid cosmetic DLC. When playing against other players online, there weren’t any noticeable hiccups and the game has an extensive “Year 1” season pass worth of content still to come. This includes paid and thankfully, free DLC for those who don’t want to shell out even more money.



Overall, Riders Republic is a game that is highly reminiscent of both Steep and The Crew 2 in that you have a massive open-world playground at your disposal. Ubisoft have done a great job here and the game is ridiculously enjoyable to play. If you’re a fan of extreme sports and games that give you a lot of freedom to explore a sandbox, Riders Republic will appeal to you.

Review code provided by Ubisoft | Reviewed on PS5