The 1.4GB download of Mad Riders provides a little something for everybody.  Certainly there is a racing challenge even for single players, the AI of the computer controlled opponents may not be the cleverest in picking a racing line through the mud, but it certainly moves at speeds requiring human players to ensure no mistakes are made in order to garner a podium finish. The game also puts an emphasis on big-air, stunts such as flips, whips and precise landing of extreme jumps.

Mad Riders
	Developer	TechLand
	Publisher	Ubisoft
	Rating	G
PC, PS3, Reviewed on Xbox 360

At least each of the multi-event eight environments available provide ample opportunity to boost experience points allowing for level upgrades of new, more powerful or agile bikes.  Thankfully reload times are short as are the majority of events, so trying again is not so,, errrm, trying.

New bikes are rated on horsepower and boost as well as traction, stunt agility and air steering.  Yep! Air steering.  Mad riders does not profess to be physics accurate, we are talking about a pure arcade racer here through extreme environments impossible in real life.  

Track design is for the most-part well designed with crazy non-symmetry the order of the day.  There are frustrating moments were some paths lead to automatic re-spawning kicking in, but with a bit of practice the best racing-line for each challenge can be found.  This includes opening secret short-cuts or calling on extra boost tokens to grab the advantage on rivals.

Mad Riders however, is no Motorstorm.  Graphically the game (running on the Chrome Engine 4) is adequate with no real modern day visual bells or whistles, the audio is pretty good with not only the roar of a variety of small engines captured in a satisfactory way, but even little things such as the whump of a tropical plant being hit at full speed incorporated into the mix.

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There is a smattering of different events apart from pure race events against nine opponents there is also arena based checkpoint racing and solo race the clock and race a pro ghost rider modes during  a single player tournament.

Multiplayer on the other hand, does not involve a delineated race as such.  Instead each event is able to be dropped into at the flick of a button, where players will have a fixed time period to record the fastest lap possible. Ghost bikes of competitors accompany the player around the track and when the countdown clock.  Thankfully the game ramps up the hardware available to Competition Class Quads during multiplayer.

All up Mad Riders lives up to its name, it is a frantic challenge of speed and craziness in a wild setting, it suffers from some of the issues that plague similar titles, for example the detection that you are off-track and require auto –spawning is not too lenient, and it does not profess to be any kind of simulation, rather promoting the arcade fun with features that most players can enjoy in bite sized racing chunks.