Shaun White Snowboarding (PSP)
Hey, look: A new PSP game! And this one's not half bad.
12/5/2008 12:00 AM | 0 Comments | Page 1 of 2
What's Hot: A worthy game for a system that lacks so many; Familiar gameplay; Better than PS3 and 360 versions
What's Not: Light on content; Unnecessary trick objectives; Not as fast or big as the Wii version
Blake Snow
Status: Thank you Mario, but the status message is in another castle!
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.
