The English version of Cygames’ hit free-to-play game Umamusume: Pretty Derby is out now globally on mobile and PC.
With over 30 million downloads across Asia, Umamusume: Pretty Derby tasks players to train aspiring racehorse girls, an Umamusume, to achieve their dreams in becoming the best racehorse girl. This is a racing strategy game about horse racing that’s been crossbred with the appeal of anime idol girls based on actual Japan horseracing lore.
Consider how Azur Lane anthropomorphised battleships into anime girls, Umamusume: Pretty Derby is doing that same thing for racehorses.
It’s not as ridiculous as it may seem: a raceday is like seeing athletes do sprints and track events, but they abide to horse racing rules, and they for some reason dressed in idol-style getups. And the podium ceremony is an idol concert.
Okay, so it is a bit ridiculous, but the management/visual novel gameplay is legit. It’s a gacha game, but the Career Mode where you are tasked to prepare your Umamusume of choice to achieve their dreams, each with their own story and objectives, can be a proper challenge that does test your skills.
The English release is behind the Japanese release by a good four years. However, it won’t follow the exact cadence of its Japanese brethren in terms of content and feature releases. Features like landscape mode when viewing races and jukebox, which were added later in the Japanese release, is here right at launch of the English version.
And according to the letter from the developers, more features like Guided Career and other quality-of-life changes will make its way into the English version earlier.
In addition, Events and Scouts (gacha banners) will release quicker with less gaps in between them but will still run at the same duration length. So English version players will experience less downtime between new banners and events.
Plus, the English version Umamusume: Pretty Derby also support cross-platform play, with cross-save between mobile and PC.
Umamusume: Pretty Derby is a media franchise that started out as a manga run and has now spawned an anime series as well as several video games. The first English release of an Umamusume: Pretty Derby was for this party game.
Plus, Cygames have been partnering with actual horse racing events around the world, including the the Breeders’ Cup World Championships and 151st Kentucky Derby, and will be the main sponsor of Grand Prix de Paris taking place this July. The horseracing idol girl franchise is big enough to sponsor actual horse racing.
Umamusume: Pretty Derby is out now on iOS, Android and PC (Steam, Google Play Games).