Ridge Racer V

Ridge Racer V (リッジレーサーファイブ) is a 2000 racing game developed and published by Namco for the PlayStation 2, as a launch game for that platform. It is the fifth title of the Ridge Racer series succeeding Ridge Racer Type 4 and was followed by Ridge Racer 6 in 2005. The game received a home-to-arcade port named Ridge Racer V: Arcade Battle.

Gameplay
In Ridge Racer V the player is a racing driver taking part in events across Ridge City in a variety of fictional cars. As with previous Ridge Racer games, the focus is on accessible and fun drift racing rather than simulating how a car behaves in the real world; as such the player is encouraged to powerslide around most corners by tapping the brake when entering the turn. There are a total of fourteen courses in Ridge City, and visual filters can be applied to change the appearance.

Racing on RRV is divided into different race formats. The primary mode is Grand Prix, a series of structured championships completion of which rewards the player with new cars. Other modes include Time Attack, a long distance endurance race called the 99 Trial and free runs on any of the unlocked courses. Two players can also take part in a split-screen race against one another. A special race is unlocked after the player fulfills certain requirements: it features the arcade game characters Pac-Man in a roadster and Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde on scooters. Winning this race unlocks special duel class cars for use in other game modes. Duel class cars can be won by defeating bosses in the game's Duel mode after fulfilling certain requirements. After all four bosses are defeated in Duel mode, Battle Royale is unlocked, allow the player to choose any duel class cars and challenge all four bosses in a boss rush race (including ones the player have selected).

Ai Fukami (深水 藍) serves as the game's mascot girl, replacing Reiko Nagase. The game features a fictitious radio station, Ridge City FM (frequency 76.5 MHz), providing music and commentary.

Development
Ridge Racer V was revealed and demoed by Namco at the Tokyo Game Show in September 1999, alongside Tekken Tag Tournament, and announced a month later that both would be launch titles for the PlayStation 2.

Unlike its predecessor, Ridge Racer V was made with a "back to basics" approach, featuring less tracks and no story mode as opposed to R4: Ridge Racer Type 4 but more akin to the original Ridge Racer.

Ridge Racer V was the first home console game in the series to run at 60 frames per second.

Music
Kohta Takahashi served as the sound director and lead composer of Ridge Racer V, who was previously involved as one of the composers of R4: Ridge Racer Type 4. To create an "exciting new experience", he brought in Japanese electronic music duo Boom Boom Satellites, Takeshi Ueda and German DJ Mijk van Dijk, along with Namco composers Nobuyoshi Sano, Yuu Miyake and Yoshinori Kawamoto, to contribute music to the game. This resulted in the game having a diverse soundtrack, including genres such as trance, death metal and breakbeat.

Takahashi connected with external artists via Toru Nagamine of Sony Music. Van Dijk felt honored to work on the game, as was already a fan of the Ridge Racer series, as well as the first game's ability to swap the music by replacing the CD in the PlayStation, where he raced to his own music tracks. To ensure that his music fit with the game, he played R4: Ridge Racer Type 4 while composing the tracks in his studio.

The official soundtrack of the game was released by Sony Music Entertainment Japan in March 2000.

Arcade
Ridge Racer V: Arcade Battle, the arcade port of Ridge Racer V, was announced as the first game to run on Namco's PlayStation 2-based Namco System 246 arcade platform in September 2000. The arcade version has some features such as Duel, Free Run and Pac-Man GP removed. It was the last Ridge Racer game for arcades until Pachislot Ridge Racer, which was a pachislot game released seven years later (and the last traditional racing game for that market).

Reception and legacy
The PS2 version received "generally favorable reviews" according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. David Zdyrko of IGN liked the return to the "basic feeling of control" as the earlier games of the series and named it "one of the most visually impressive" racing games to date, but noted the graphical aliasing and flickering problems. Jeff Lundrigan of NextGen, however, said that his quote "bears repeating: 'Like its predecessors, Ridge Racer V will amaze you with flashy graphics and a great sense of speed. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of meat under the basic shell of the game.'" Andrew Reiner from Game Informer said that Ridge Racer V would be no match to Gran Turismo 2000 (which would be released as Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec). GamePro praised the realistic graphical appearance, music and noted that fans of the series "will love it." In Japan, Famitsu gave it a score of one nine, one ten, one eight and one nine for a total of 36 out of 40.

Also in Japan, Game Machine listed the arcade version in their February 1, 2001 issue as the second most-successful dedicated arcade game of the year.

The PlayStation 2 version was a runner-up for "Racing Game of 2000" in both Editors' Choice and Readers' Choice at IGN's Best of 2000 Awards. During the 4th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated Ridge Racer V for the "Console Racing" award, which ultimately went to SSX.

Ridge Racer V would remain the only main Ridge Racer game for the PlayStation 2; its successor Ridge Racer 6 was released in 2005.