Originally revealed during the June 21st Nintendo Direct, the pixelated party game based on Cygames’ immensely popular horse girl racer series “Uma Musume: Pretty Derby” has just released its final trailer ahead of the game’s launch on August 30th.
In the seven-minute “trailer,” Gold Ship and Misato Akasaka explain the game mechanics in depth.
The trailer highlights a variety of mini-games, including:
Basket-Stealing Stakes (Blazing Baskets): A chaotic 4-person basketball game where players must control the ball and score in constantly shifting baskets while dodging stage hazards.
Uma Dodge Championship (Dodgeball Demolition): A dodgeball battle royale where players use special shots to outlast their opponents and claim victory.
Competitive Eating Derby (Gourmet Gauntlet): Players team up with an eater Umamusume and serve them as much food as possible to rack up points and win.
Grand Steeplechase (Hurtling Hurdles): A race through an obstacle course set across school grounds, city streets, and even private homes, aiming to be the first to cross the finish line.
Up to four players can participate in these mini-games.
Players can choose from 20 different characters from the franchise, organized into Team Cosmos, Team Freesia, Team Lily, and Team Rose.
The staff also teased an additional team with five more playable characters. Players can personalize a custom room for the horse girls with furniture purchased with in-game currency.
The trailer also offers a sneak peek into the single-player story mode, with each organized team having its own storyline centered around them.
Additionally, the trailer showcases the game’s Clubroom Mode, where players can purchase furniture for their clubroom and watch the various horse girls interact with different objects. This subtle feature is sure to be cherished by diehard fans.
The new trailer also previews “Gold Ship’s Grand Adventure 2,” a side-scrolling bonus minigame included with Party Dash, centered around the lovable and quirky Gold Ship.
The end of the trailer reveals the game’s various editions: Digital Standard (Nintendo Switch), Digital Special (Nintendo Switch), Digital Standard (Sony PlayStation 4), Digital Special Edition (Sony PlayStation 4), a regular Steam version, and a Steam Special Edition.
The Special Editions include a Team Bundle that contains three team DLCs and “Special Titles.” The first DLC is Team Iris, featuring characters Satono Crown, Cheval Grand, Duramente, Sounds of Earth, and Royce. Two additional downloadable content packs are slated for future release.
The regular physical edition of the game comes with stickers and an in-game special item set. The Deluxe Box edition adds DLC team sets, the Hachauma Block Figure Set, the Hachauma Special Pouch, and the Hachauma Art Works book.
Despite the failures of Arc System Works seemingly destroying the Guilty Gear franchise and bastardizing Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising with horrendous localization, this simple and sweet party game might actually be an ArcSys game worth buying, with support for solo play and, crucially, four-player competitive online play.
Cygames are sparing no expense in expanding the Uma Musume: Pretty Derby franchise globally. They recently announced efforts to bring their hit mobile gacha game to Western audiences back in June.
The mobile game has generated more than $2.4 billion domestically since 2021, leading to various anime adaptations further highlighting the immense fanfare surrounding anime “horse girl” renditions of real-life racehorses, a sport synonymous with gambling addicts wrapped up in a more commercially viable and more cute package.
