Shaun White Snowboarding Review:-

Aussie Style

by Lame360gamer

©2008 Warren Marshall

To be honest before I gave this game a try I had to look up and see if Shaun White was  an actual person and not just added to a snowboard game to give it a sense of  individuality.  After all I didn’t know who Tony Hawk was until a sea of video games came out!

While I am not a snowboarder (though we do have skiing here in Oz) nor a skater, having played them in the past I  thought was enough for me to take a look at what Mr. White has brought to the 360.

My first reaction was ‘Oh so it’s like Skate?’ as I custom made a character with  over-priced boards and clothing before being dropped into the middle of a mountain side to  begin my snowboarding career. Taking one set path of the mountain teaches you the  basics to handling the board and some simple tricks.

Ubisoft have gone out to make a solid title but even snowboarding enthusiasts will be  left feeling out in the cold with this one. By the time you reach the bottom of the  first mountain you have experienced the core fundamentals of what is on offer.

They  have taken the open world approach like most games seem to do these days (Skate,  Burnout Paradise) and while this idea works in theory and creates a realistic feel to the characters world, I for one am not a fan.

The structure of having a list of various  mountains to conquer, tracks and courses for each one laid out in front of you would  have eliminated so much time I found having to wander around using a radar for various objectives or races.

The problem with SW: Snowboarding is it can take you a few minutes to locate these and then  most of the time races are finished in half that time. This wasted downtime could  have easily been eliminated from the game with simple menu choices.

Much like other similar titles there isn’t much to have to replicate besides the actual  snowboarding portion of the game. You want this to feel as realistic as possible.  After all that is all this game is about and correct me if I am wrong but I am pretty  sure that the laws of gravity still apply.

I selected a couple of different boards but regardless of choice I felt no change in weight behind the character. Whether I had to race down to the finish or preform numerous tricks, trying to grind along a railing, it seemed your board was drawn a certain direction.

When it came to actual navigation down the mountain it was impossible to keep on your set path.  Often you would be heading towards an objective and just fly past as you cant keep control of the direction your board is pointed.

I haven’t had the chance to play this on any other console, but I can only imagine that  even if the controls were the same it would be a lot more forgiving on the Wii format with the use of the board. The control wouldn’t be as frustrating as  it is with just using the controller.

The graphics are nice enough considering that most of the time you are facing snow but the various ski lodges and such are very barren. NPC’s seem to aimlessly run in various directions (oddly some seem to be drawn to running at fences and barriers). The four various country locations look good from afar but pretty empty on close inspection.

The soundtrack features a few well known songs which is expected from most games these days, some fitting more so than others. They get repetitive but have their place in this game.

The online aspect of the game is very similar to Burnout Paradise. You will find some objectives or races which let you jump into multiplayer trying to seamlessly integrate the two together. I can’t comment too much on how the multiplayer portion of the game holds up as at the time Xbox Live constantly disconnected me.

Overall it was a disappointing title. Snowboarders will probably find more life in the title but I am guessing that would still be short lived compared to many other games. A sea of fantastic titles have been released and this will be one that will sink into the bargain bins in no time.

“5/10

©2008 Warren Marshall

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Filed under: Console gaming, Xbox 360, Xbox 360 3rd Party Games, Xbox 360 Game Reviews Tagged: | Shaun White, Shaun White Snowboarding review, Snow boarding game, Ubisoft