Riders Republic: a journey through images

Riders Republic

Let's go back to exploring game worlds through words and shots captured during our games of video games with great photographic freedom (for those who were left behind, you can recover the most recent of these specials, dedicated to the journey through images that we did in Far Cry 6) . The protagonist of this new journey through images is Riders Republic, a new product developed by Ubisoft Annecy that takes players into a "concentrated" American territory, made up of the unique (and inimitable) boundless spaces of US national parks.

Exploring Sequoia

Riders Republic: down the paths of Sequoia Our journey begins in Sequoia National Park, precisely at the height of the burnt forest. The place is extremely impressive. The white snow, struck by the sun's rays that manage to break through the thick fog, is sporadically interrupted by dark tongues of land burned by flames.

Strictly riding our downhill bike, we scapicoliamo down the mountain , following the impervious path, traced by the wheels of a thousand other fellow cyclists.

Riders Republic: the suggestive burnt forest The pass between the mountains begins to tighten more and more, until a stream reaches the place of the dirt road. To make up for this lack, the organizers of the festival have well thought of building elevated wooden paths, so as to allow all lovers of reckless descents to pursue their crazy goal: to reach the valley of the canyons to the south, all in one breath. The boards of the gangway creak and sway like a stormy sea not only with the passage of our wheels, but also with that of other bicycles, much faster and more surgical than us in the descent.

After a few meters, the first, reckless ramps begin to arrive. If there is anything enjoyable in this game world, it is taking flight with ten other players, performing the most unthinkable stunts and landing in the least conventional ways. And if you fall, get up and go, back in the saddle.

The panorama around us is sadly spectacular: the skeletons of the bare and charred trees branch out like venous cavities on the white opposite sides; but to our eyes, launched at seventy kilometers per hour down the mountain, they look like only a kinetic black patch.

The closer we get to the valley, the more the terrain begins to change. The snow begins to disappear, until there is no trace of it. From the cold glacial whiteness of the north to the dry and hot lands of the south. Black becomes green, then yellowish: from death to life, and back.

The valley of the canyons

Riders Republic: back on the asphalt The southern area is much more punitive than its counterpart northern. The roads are few and the cliffs many: you never know if another one awaits you behind a curve or just a precipitous fall towards the wide and impassable waterways that have sculpted the territory for centuries. Without risking too much, we enter a well asphalted state road. This runs along the ridge of the mountain from which we have just come down. Even in the south, the fog seems to have no intention of clearing, which makes the landscape, already desolate in its own right, even more fascinating.

Riders Republic: the fog also hits south Along the way, we approach another player, who starts doing small tricks on his bicycle, with the obvious intent to attract our attention. When he realizes he has obtained it, he makes us understand that he wants to do a race. With no stopwatches, no points, no countdowns, we start pedaling as hard as we can. In the distance, a long and majestic concrete bridge creates a stark contrast to the Martian-toned landscape: we tacitly decide that that will be the finish line.

Since the bikes are essentially the same, the fight is all about timing with which shooting is used. A few hundred meters from the bridge, we both have not yet taken advantage of the latter, aware that it will be the only element to decree the winner. The goal is getting closer and closer. Suddenly, we see the opponent moving away quickly from us, hurled towards victory, but the only thing we think is "too soon". In fact, the other player begins to slow down more and more, now with his reserve of vigor exhausted, while we put the fifth right at that moment, passing him and crossing the fictitious finish line.

Riders Republic: not only down from the mountain, but also from the bridge A little taken by the exaltation, a little aware of having reached the end of our descent from the mountain, with an unpredictable impulse, we throw ourselves off the bridge, towards the torrential waters that the latter crosses with so much elegance.

Having rewound time, we retrace our steps and continue to follow the road to the valley of the canyons for a few more kilometers, until we take the painful decision to leave our trusty bicycle and move back to the mountains for a short snowboard descent.

Down to Mammoth Mountain

Riders Republic: let's take off with our snowboard Through the infinite teleportation routes, we arrived in top Mammoth Mountain, one of our favorite snowboarding spots, as there is a good mix of natural ramps and man-made acrobatic courses. Accompanied by our gorgeous outfit, we kicked off the action. With the sun high and the fog disappeared, the sky lights up with an intense blue, on which our avatar stands out to say the least. The path is jagged and we make sure not to miss even the smallest chance of making crazy and reckless evolutions in the air.

As nature is overlapping the steel of "recreational" structures. Here, the situation becomes more interesting for us, as we begin to combine reckless grinds with overly elaborate stunts, considering the very short amount of time given by the proximity to the ground. However, we miraculously manage to reach the end of the path. Arriving at the valley, however, we feel a lack: that of extreme speeds, unlikely curves and "falls with style". So, here we are again in our element, on two wheels, launched off the icy slopes of Sequoia, ready to take flight again.

Riders Republic: back in mid-air, on our bicycle Our Riders Republic image journey ends here. The little malleability of the photographic mode (no camera rotation, no zoom) made it one of the most complex to make, but it remained a stimulating experience, which pushed us to make the most of the dynamic possibilities offered by the game in a way to create some very interesting shots in our opinion.

We are waiting for you in the comments to find out what you think of the new Ubisoft arcade adventure and, perhaps, to see some of your in-game shots.

Hai noticed errors?