You have to go back almost a full year to find a decent PlayStation Portable game; Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee 2, Patapon and God of War: Chains of Olympus were all released before the start of the summer.

It's all about daisy-chaining tricks.

The PlayStation Portable version of Shaun White Snowboarding is as straightforward as they come. There's no story -- everything is implied here. You can't create your own character; rather, you play as one of four selectable boarders. And there are a limited number of modes and locations to bite into.

With little direction, the sole object of the game is to unlock new courses and perfect your skills as a rider by earning experience points, which can then be used to increase your abilities such as speed, tricks and control. It's a lot like Virtua Tennis in that regard and is the only version of the game to benefit from the addictive nature of leveling up your character.

One of four playable characters

As you might expect, Shaun White Snowboarding is all about getting big air and performing over-the-top tricks as you fly down a mountain. You'll spend your time overcoming challenges in five unlockable areas: USA, The Alps, Canada, Japan and Chile. Each area has four slopes where you'll need to perform specific tricks, collect a certain number of points or coins, and beat time trials. The only thing I didn't enjoy about slope challenges is that sometimes you're required to exit to the main menu to view a master "trick list" to learn how to perform a move, then jump back in the game to do it. This is clunky and lame, but only a minor quibble.

One improvement in the PSP version is the use of the trick meter, which fills as you rack up tricks on any given slope. It's an effective and ever-present gauge of where you stand in completing an objective, and it feels good when it fills, letting you know that you've achieved your goal.

Shunning the more realistic look of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions, the PSP version shares the same colorful assets as the Nintendo Wii version, although scaled down a bit. You'll even find it has some of the same visual effects as the big boys. For example, when boosting your speed, the peripheral area of the screen goes all fuzzy for maximum effect, and snow will splash the screen when you take a tumble. It's not the best-looking PSP game I've seen, but I was still impressed.


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The PSP version looks good.

After playing all five versions of the game, the PSP version is my second-favorite because it recreates the feeling of screaming down the mountain better than most (the only exception being the superlative Wii version). It's nothing you haven't seen before, but enjoyable nonetheless.

Unfortunately, once you've beaten all the objectives, there's not a lot to extend the experience. You can play other PSP owners of the game locally, but there's no online mode. And outside of managing your abilities and checking your stats, there's little else to do.

I had a lot of fun with Shaun White Snowboarding on the PSP at first, but the enjoyment fades after a while. You might still consider trying it on the go, as it's easy to get into, and there are plenty of tricks to learn or perfect.

This review is based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.