Week 1 : First day

I'm not going to go through all of the details of this program. In fact, there is a splendid walkthrough being offered by the GirlsHorseClub.com Blog which explains quite alot of things. My blog will give some little additions to the information already provided.

Week one:

I understand that many hours may have gone towards putting together this game. I appreciate all of the time, and effort that went towards it's creation. However, I would have to say that I found the video scenerios to be more annoying, and negative in the gameplay than productive, and impressive.

The opening moment when your character, Flora, flies off of her bike, and then suddenly you are the horse, and you have to "do" something was bothersome. There was no indication as to what you could do, or how you could do it. I stood there watching the world swirl around me for minutes tapping different keys before I realized that I had to hit the space bar again just to have control of my horse. After only a few seconds of moving forwards until you reach a door, turning right, and heading for what looks like a small bush, you can activate the hand icon that appears by striking the spacebar again.. and ONTO another long video scene. I had to shake my head and ask "Why?"

The first two days are scheduled for you by your instructors. Honestly, don't follow their pattern of placing events. I found that the best routine is to go to the Center, and Library in the very first two slots on Monday. Then you can look up the weather on the student computer (www.online-weather.ubi), check up the news (), and information on the racetracks (www.horse-sports.ubi). Next, in the Library, you can find the latest dressage techniques, and foal care information. Save the third slot for Horse care to bring up your horse's status to 100 percent. If you do the care well,you will not need to do Horse care again until near Friday, or Saturday. If you choose to bring up your money, and popularity, I would suggest an extra day of really well done horse care. Knowing the weather ahead of time makes horse care an easy thing. You can choose to take care of the horse on a sunny/cloudy day so that you can hose the horse down, and bring up his/her strength.

I found that choosing a light colored horse made brushing or showering much easier as the dirt was a grey color. If I picked a grey, or mottled colored horse, I had more difficulty seeing the dirt, and getting it off. OH.. and you have to clean the tail. I didn't know that at first, and I was surprised that my horse wasn't clean.

Dressage is a nice part of the play. It's similar to Dance Dance Revolution where you have to hit the arrow keys at the right time. I even enjoyed the replay portions where you can watch your horse perform.

Cross country is lovely, and well done. I especially enjoyed the Matrix moments when the horse just freezes in place, and you can see it in full jump. Beautiful. The muscles of the horse just look so active... and the sounds of the gear jingling, the hooves pounding..the horses breathing.. awesome!

Show jumping was more demanding, I found. It was more meticulous on timing, and execution. I found my patience lowering as I had troubles getting my horse to perform properly. I still cannot tell you if you have to hit the space bar just before your horse hits the green, or exactly when it hits the green part of the section before the fence. It really seems to be linked with the way your horses feet land on the ground.

Warning: On the second day right after the third event, you will notice that your character, Flora, is a sore loser. She is a selfish, uncaring, ungrateful, awful person that I would be ashamed to have representing me in reality, and I cringe at having to roleplay her in this game. This video scene is one of the nasty moments of the game where Flora throws playing cards into a fire, and has to replace them. (There are more.. much more coming up..) I honestly wish that I could skip these vignettes, and just play the game, but that isn't possible.