Developer: Ubisoft Montreal

Publisher: Ubisoft

Release Date: Nov. 16, 2008

Systems: Xbox 360 (reviewed), PS3, Wii, DS, PSP, PS2, PC

ESRB Rating: T

Official Web site

0:00 All these years later, I'm still looking for a snowboarding game I'll like as much or more than the original SSX. Here's hoping the Flying Tomato is up to the challenge.

0:01 This minute spent downloading and installing the obligatory Xbox Live update.

0:02 Jump directly to the title screen, with a simple red text against a white background. "Need help? Visit www.shaunwhitegame/com/help." What if I don't have Internet access? Huh, game? What should I do then?

0:03 "Man, me and the mountain, there's no way to describe it," says what I assume is White as we pan over the mountain. "It's like I'm the slayer and the mountain is my dragon." Um, I think that counts as a way to describe it, right there. "What's the first bit of advice you'd give a new player?" asks some snowboarding commentator. "You need to look good, you know what I mean." No, I do not know what you mean, Shaun. "Like, freaky, sexy good." Oh, OK, now I know what you mean.

0:06 I've got $4,000 to spend on boards, bindings, jackets, pants, boots, gloves, hats, goggles and backpacks. The prices are a bit insane ... $820 for a white checkered backpack. That's inflation for you!

0:07 I skip the shopping and just head straight into the game. I can putz around a bit on a half-pipe during the short loading sequence ... a nice touch.

0:08 Tap Y to put on my board, use the left stick to steer around. Simple enough. In the background, an excellent song about revolution and televisability is playing. This game has earned some early brownie points with that song.

0:10 The graphics are almost distractingly detailed. I find myself mesmerized by the texturing on my boarder's coat. Controls are pretty smooth ... nice, simple jumps with the right trigger, easy-to-pull-off spin and grabs in midair. Boarding speed varies between "slow" and "moderate," depending on whether or not I hold "up" on the left sick. I miss SSX's boost button already.

0:12 The game seems very forgiving about landing on rails, which is nice. I've already found some cool lines and pulled off a four-part combo. Booyah!

0:13 Abrupt transfer to a first-person cut scene, where I bail on a big jump. "Hey, are you all right? How many fingers do I have up?" says Shaun White as I get up. He sounds permanently stoned. He introduces me to Alex, "the best chopper pilot there is"; Enkai Lakido, his friend from Japan; Lars, from somewhere in Europe; Badger, from Alaska; and Harley, from here in Park City. Then he asks me to find 12 "Euros" hidden around four different mountains. These Euros are not currency, but rather large, floating orange discs. Why didn't they pick a different name?

0:15 The first Euro is trivial to find, sitting right in front of me, but the others are already up the mountain, way behind me, according to the radar. That's OK ... I'm having decent fun just riding down the mountain, pulling off grinds and air tricks.

0:17 Down at the bottom of the mountain, I have my own personal chopper to go back up to the top. Very convenient! I take it all the way to the peak, dropping into some pristine white snow with a bee-yoo-tiful view of a big blue sky. Breathtaking.

0:21 Holy crap! While completing a "freestyle score challenge" (which I completely sucked up, by the way), an avalanche starts behind me. The camera zooms out, the screen shakes, and the controller rumbles as little bits of snow race down the mountain and bump into me. I manage to outrun it pretty easily, but one false move would have been bad news. Intense!

0:23 Instead of taking off the board and walking like a normal human, my boarder does a kind of ridiculous straddling waddle. He looks like a penguin or something.

0:26 I decide to accept entry into a "rail competition," where I can only score points by grinding on rails and boxes and such. I put up what I think are pretty pedestrian numbers, but it's enough to take first place. Still, I only earned two of the four "medals" you can get for each challenge.

0:29 A new challenge asks me to do ground tricks on an icy section of track. No one has yet told me how to do ground tricks, but I just wail on the right stick and manage to somehow get enough points for a one-medal performance. Meh.

0:31 At the bottom of the mountain again. This time I take the chair lift up. I actually get a first person view of the chair lift ride. I can skip it and warp to the top or press RT to drop off at any point. Kind of cool, I guess.

0:32 While riding the lift, I notice the d-pad can bring up music controls. NICE! I flip back back to Social Distortion's excellent cover of "Ring of Fire". I am a big fan of this soundtrack.

0:34 The lift drops me off a few feet below a Euro, so I spend a good deal of time doing the penguin walk up the mountain to get to it. This involves going around a mountain ridge, grinding a convenient downed tree, and jumping off the roof of a barn. Euro GET!

0:37 I'm liking the way the mountain is laid out, with just enough rails and jumps to avoid being boring, but not so many to feel cluttered. Lots of little shortcuts and such to find, too.

0:40 Instead of riding back up the mountain this time, I decide to jet off the European mountain. During the loading screen, I get to look at an ad for the McDonald's Dollar Menu. "You could win 400 MS points. Text dollar to 38132 and be entered for a chance to win." Oh Ubisoft ... don't you have enough money already?

0:42 For some reason, the game starts me at the bottom of the mountain in Europe. I helicopter up to the peak, where I'm greeted with yet another breathtaking vista. Just white ridges as far as the eye can see.

0:44 I can't be sure ... but I think I just fell in a sinkhole.

0:45 Apparently the key to high scores is doing a bunch of lame spin tricks from a standing start to slooowly raise your multiplier. I miss the ridiculous air and strings of grabs of SSX. Everything here just seems so grounded in comparison.

0:48 Another competition where you can only score points on rails and boxes and such. I'm guessing challenge variety is not going to be this game's strong suit.

0:51 "Death Race!" is just like it sounds, except without the death: Be the first to reach the bottom of the course. "There is vun vinner and the vest are LOSAHS!" says the extremely German-sounding European guy.

0:52 An accidental tap of the B button lets loose a snowball at my nearest opponent. This comes in rather handy ... a charged-up snowball can knock the opponents down for easy passing. Of course, I also get knocked down a few times. One such snowball knocks me off the course, disqualifying me automatically. D'oh!

0:56 Number of times the game has popped up to tell me that freestyle boards are "not the best in any one category but good overall": Five.

0:59 Another scoring challenge ... this one is a very short sequence with a big jump and then a longish rail. After three tries or so, I get what I think is a decent score, finishing in the top three. Still, I only got one of the four available medals. I need to get five times as many points to get all four medals. I have no idea how that's even possible. Am I missing something?

Would I play this game for more than an hour? No.


Why? It's very well made, but so far a little too sedate for me. I'm looking for EXTREME SNOWBOARDING ACTION, and instead get a relaxing jaunt down the mountain. Not bad, just not what I'm looking for.

This column is based on a retail copy of the game rented from GameFly.



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