Metacritic Games

187 Ride or Die (Xbox)

187 Ride or Die is an urban-themed combat racing game that plunges players into a brutal street-racing gang war where victory depends on ruthless driving and deadly shooting skills. THe game features the voices and likenesses of Larenz Tate ("Menace II Society"), Noel Gugliemi ("Training Day," "The Fast and the Furious"), and Guerilla Black. 187 Ride or Die tells the story of a reluctant urban hero named Buck (L. Tate), a young man living a thug's life seething with money, fast cars and beautiful women -- with danger lurking around every corner. Set in the underworld of Los Angeles, Buck must defend the territory of his mentor Dupree (G. Black) from a menacing nemesis and his gang of bandit roughriders, led by Cortez (N. Gugliemi), who are determined to take control of the streets. The game features Adrenaline-Pumping Combat-Racing Action: Put your pedal to the metal as you literally blow your opponent away in non-stop, intense and unique combat-racing action intensified with replay and slow-motion camera effects, and spectacular blur and filter effects. Select from a number of unique vehicles ranging from vintage roadsters to modern muscle cars in your quest to rule the streets. Strapped to the Nines: Put your hand on the pump and take out the opposition with numerous weapons, including an array of pistols, shotguns, and much more. [Ubisoft]

Ubisoft
Racing, Driving, Car Combat, Action
Players: 4
M (Mature)
Developer: Ubisoft
Released August 23, 2005

Overall Metascore

This is a weighted, normalized average of all individual scores given by critics, on a scale of 0 (worst) to 100 (best).

51 / 100

Critic Reviews

83 Xbox World Australia
The graphics are great with plenty of detail, you are never fighting the controls, the speed effects and weapons are great and the storm drain levels rock. There are parts of this game that almost make you feel like you're in the middle of some Jerry Bruckheimer movie.
80 GameCritics
The game offers entertaining car combat with enough car, weapon, and track variations to keep players from getting bored.
79 Next Level Gaming
It's got bite, attitude, and is pretty fun. It feels a little repetitive with the track designs, but that gets made up with solid multiplayer and online gaming that always makes things better. Not too bad a game.
70 Total Video Games
Fans of the genre and hip-hop alike will enjoy 187: Ride or Die and there’s no reason why it shouldn’t become a hit for Ubi. Take a little bit of Burnout, add a sprinkling of Twisted Metal and a lot of bad attitude; the result is Ubi’s latest, explosive release that maintains the French publisher’s commitment to quality.
70 GameBiz
All the machine guns, sawed-offs, and rocket launchers can’t save this title. 187 Ride or Die lacks a number of things that could have made this a worthwhile action game so all we’re left with is a disappointing racing game.
65 GamingTrend
No matter how you slice it, it's a sub-standard driving game in the vein of the "Twisted Metal" series without the sense of humor or fun that was found in it.
65 Game Informer
I did enjoy the escort missions, and the co-op is decent, but they can't hide the fact that 187 is just plain mediocre. [Oct 2005, p.128]
65 Team Xbox
Absolutely rent it for a weekend of mindless fun, but return it and move on. 187 Ride or Die certainly took the best elements of some top-notch titles, but didn’t execute any of them in a way not seen before.
62 GameSpot
A fairly standard car combat game with extremely repetitive gameplay and a hip-hop theme that feels about as fake and forced as possible.
62 WHAM! Gaming
The developers of 187 Ride or Die definitely had the right idea. The game is easy to just pick up and play and has fun multiplayer modes. But the laughable plot, disgusting language and weak (very weak) single player mode keep this game from being great.
60 DarkStation
With gangsta-themed games growing in popularity, this ride and gun actioner provides some decent arcade-style action, albeit with limited replay value.
60 Worth Playing
Lacks the muscular gameplay promised by its street-tough premise.
60 GameSpy
If a little more focus had been placed on adding depth to the game, 187 could have been a solid title for Ubisoft. Instead, comical use of lingo and the otherwise average presentation make 187 Ride or Die feel more like a poser than a player.
59 GameZone
Aside from the poor controls and the limited choices in racetracks, gamers will quickly get tired of the game’s repetitiveness and lack of an interesting story.
57 Game Over Online
187 is one of those titles that you wish went in one of two separate directions: either it focused on the storyline and made an urban crime story, or they made a combat racer with a different theme. As it stands now, neither premise works in this title, and the game really isn’t that engaging.
55 eToychest
It is obvious that the game’s developers or publisher understood what a mediocre experience they were going to be selling. In a predictable stroke, they tried to bury it all under a smothering pile of street-smart buzzwords and hip-hop catch phrases.
55 MS Xbox World
The driving and shooting is something different yet the repetitive nature of the game, lack of true variety or tactics with the weapons means that the game soon becomes old.
50 IGN
A game that should have focused less on exuding street cred and more on gameplay. Larger, more varied race courses and greater differentiation between the weapons would have gone a long way towards making this game more enjoyable.
50 Sydney Morning Herald
The "rubber-band" rivals, where opponents appear to slow down or speed up depending on where you are positioned in the race, ensures clever driving skill is rarely rewarded.
50 Detroit Free Press
The profanity I can handle. But the other words just don't sit right with me.
50 GamerFeed
It doesn't suck, but it's good for all of the wrong reasons.
50 Gamers' Temple
187 Ride or Die just doesn’t have anything going for it. The gameplay is repetitive and uninspired, the campaign mode is tedious, and the multiplayer play is boring.
50 Pelit (Finland)
With its unresponsive driving and boring-as-hell shooting, Ride or Die is nothing more than a cheap attempt to capitalise on the ever-so-cool gangsta attitude. [Oct 2005]
50 Gamenikki
If the game focused more on the highway racing, and improved the track selection, everybody would be better off. However, as it stands now Ride or Die is a game that provides more lasting enjoyment as a scratching simulator than as a racing game.
49 XGP Gaming
Vehicle customization would have been a welcomed addition to a very shallow game.
45 Xbox Evolved
It tries to do to many things at once, and ultimately it looks like they took a bunch of the top racing genre titles of the past three years and slapped them together.
45 DailyGame
Straight outta' crap-ton.
45 1UP
187 basically defines "average." While the graphics err on the nicer side and the story dips a bit below the equator, most of the game is competent but unspectacular. Every good feature seems to have a bad one that balances it out.
45 Play Magazine
Hip-hop-fueld thug culture that seems too forced to come anywhere but from a marketer's meeting. [Oct 2005, p.69]
45 BonusStage
I can't really find one redeeming quality about 187 Ride or Die, outside of the fact that the game runs smooth online and the two-player dynamic of car combat is something we definitely wouldn’t mind seeing in something like "Twisted Metal."
45 Gaming Target
You might find a few minutes of amusement playing against your friends but why bother? There are a lot better games out there.
43 Electronic Gaming Monthly
If only the Eskimos had 144 words for "tasteless" in their language, I would totally learn Inuit just to describe 187. As a game, I give 187 a 40, but as a product, my score is a negative f*** you. [Oct 2005, p.115]
40 G4 TV
If you’re looking for a game to kill some time with and don’t mind if it’s a little stupid or embarrassing, Ride or Die is a racer that’s easy to pick up and fairly easy to put down.
40 Cheat Code Central
187 Ride or Die is bad - but it's not so bad that it's good. There's nothing good about it, period.
40 Computer and Video Games
It's so gangsta. It's so street. It's so shite. Painfully forcing every urban cliché going into every line of dialogue, the cutscenes reduced us to fits of laughter. That's laughing at, not with. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]
39 Official Xbox Magazine
It tries so hard to keep it real that it comes off hilariously fake. [Nov 2005, p.130]
33 Game Revolution
The dialogue is wretchedly forced in its unrealistic, overly ghettoized slang penned by writers who have read every stereotypical hip-hop street language book on the shelf. Expect something like: “My big dog G-gangsta Buck, dog! You blaze down the streets and show them that I'm the real street O.G. Ya heard?”
31 TotalGames.net
Even the hippity-hop music is utterly lacklustre, and somehow it feels out of place in a G-Ridin' gangsta game. How is this? Avoid this unless you bought "FIFA Street," in which case you're beyond our help.
25 Gaming Age
This whole game just offends me. Offends me more as a gamer than anything else.
20 Gaming Nexus
At it’s best moments, 187 is an entertaining, if only slightly piece of action gaming. In it’s worse, it’s attempting to convey it’s horrifically trite storyline to you by means of ancient looking CG and characters as cliché as the stereotypes they were meant to portray.