For a game released in 2008, I think it still holds up surprisingly well against more modern console horse simulation games. With bright graphics and cheerful, peaceful music and characters, this game was a simple delight to experience. There’s no difficulty curve to learn to overcome and ride through, instead, your difficulty can be chosen on your skill level: do you want an easy time, or have you gotten a handle upon the controls that you’re looking for a little more manual control?
It’s really simple to pick up and drop, nothing too complicated for you to remember when you come back to play it years later as I have done before. I remember playing this game years ago, probably 2010 or something, and enjoying it a lot. I probably tried to finish it one day if I had been allowed to, and I distinctly remember it being one of the best horse games I had played in a while, which is saying something.
My Horse and Me 2 follows the antics of a girl named Emma who has come to stay at her uncle’s ranch. Upon her arrival, it is clear that the ranch is not doing so well, with sick horses and an evil entrepreneur trying to steal the ranch from her uncle’s hands. Emma will need to use her skill as a rider to win the biggest international events from around the world to win back her father’s ranch and save the horses. You are helped along the way by your two friends, Katelyn and Brandon, who seems to be the romantic interest in the piece. It is a decent storyline, but fairly simple in its content as it is a game aimed at children, after all.
The controls for the games are very simple and easy to learn and master, it took me twenty seconds to understand how to move after having not played the game in 10 years. There is a simple tutorial at the beginning to get you started, easing you into the gameplay and introducing you to the various activities you are required, or can simply choose, to do. The grooming activities are pretty much the same as any other you might find meaning that they are pretty easy to do, and takes you less than a minute to complete sometimes. One thing I did enjoy was the ability to take your horse out of its stable and into the fields where you can canter and gallop around to your content, unfortunately within a limited space which can make the world feel a little small to explore as you are primarily based on your uncle’s ranch. You always need to make sure your horse’s ‘cores’ or ‘gauges’ are full and not depleted otherwise you cannot compete in any competitions and this can severely degrade your performance as well.
Now, I don’t mean to insult the game too much, as I always have had fun playing through it, however, my experience with the game on the Wii was not always a pleasant one. Those experiences usually being tied to the dressage. The showjumping and cross-country are easy enough, especially when you have the auto-jump feature enabled it is just a case of pointing your horse in the right direction and making sure you are straight toward the fences. Unfortunately, the dressage element did not get the same memo. In the dressage, on the Wii, you are required to make certain motions with the Wii remote which unfortunately did not always register or provide enough time to complete. This was possibly one of the most infuriating experiences I had with the game, the rest usually being quite enjoyable. However, for many the events and the competitions start to become quite repetitive, and that is something I would agree with. The competitions don’t change all that much apart from possibly a few different movements in dressage, a new course for cross country and showjumping, but that reflects the world of eventing for equestrians. No event is exactly the same, but they have the same elements (sometimes varying in order). Therefore, the events, when played one after the other, can feel repetitive and boring and this is where the game relies on its story to try and bring some new flavour to the gameplay.
Despite a few of its downfalls and the fact that it is aimed at children, I wouldn’t suggest that you miss this one and move on. It is still a delightful game to play, especially because there are varying levels of difficulty that you can play with, and it is a very simple game to pick and play around with for a couple of hours. I personally enjoyed playing this game, and it’s significantly better than its prequel which lacked in many regards with its gameplay and graphics, however, I believe that this one is far superior despite being made in 2008.