The side events..

I realize that the side events were supposed to bring a nice change to the consistent rhythm of the game.. but I found them distasteful. I kept thinking "I hope that this is over soon". Isn't that a sad thing to say?

The first side event is when you have to go fetch a book from the chapel, and there is a time limit to returning it. I found that it was quite frustrating to figure out what to do when the bridge breaks under your character, and suddenly you become your horse. I had to search through the internet for some hints. For those of you who are looking for some guidance on this, I will tell you that you need only gallop farther along the roadway past a house, you will notice a pile of boulders, some fencing, and a small field. Just keep running until you get to the northeast edge of the field. If you found the right place, your horse will automatically jump over a chasm, and then you only need to run up to your character. She will mount the horse, and now just retrace your steps back home.

The second side event is to go to the little pond following a map, and get a rubber ducky that is floating on a pond, and return it to the library to win the prize of taking care of a young colt. It sounds simple, but takes time to accomplish. OH.. here is a warning for this week.. The game forces you to go to the library on the day that you receive your colt... so honestly, I don't bother going to the library on Monday as I usually would do. Which also means that I do not bother training in Dressage that Monday because there would be question marks in those movements that I haven't "studied". Remember to take notes of the books that explain the various motions of a colt. These may come in handy when you need to take care of your colt.

Training with the horse

I found that I enjoyed the dressage section the most out of the three training options that one has in this game.

It was similar to DDR as that you have to match the timing of the strikes on the buttons with the arrows entering the little circle. However, there is a pleasant pause, or resting moment, when you can just watch your mount do the various cadences that you have achieved. I loved how the camera showed more than one angle, and how the character/horse moved together.

I wasn't as thrilled with the show jumping course. That bar of green on the ground with the red stripes just seemed too fickle.. maybe it was me, and my lack of skill, but I found myself becoming annoyed. After many tries I still had troubles figuring out how to get a perfect jump. OH sure.. when I hit that perfect jump, I was happy.. but it happened less frequently than I had hoped even with much practice.

The Cross country race was a nice combination of the Show jumping, and Dressage challenges. The only issue that I had at first was realizing the lay of the course, and how those little tiny signposts were guides. When I was concentrating on galloping, and how far the jumps were, at first, I would tend to ignore the little white signs showing me which way to go.

The different breeds of horsez

Honestly, I've tried the game with each breed, and I haven't seen a difference in how they move, how they respond, how well they do, etc.

It seems that it is only an esthetic thing such as how big the horse looks in comparison to the rider. This would be similar to the fact that you can change the color, and shape of the saddle. For me, this is disappointing. I would have like that the Arabian would have a certain attitude/movement that you would see as classically different from a French Saddlebred.