White Out

Will Shaun White Snowboarding be as good as SSX or will it, well, SSUX?
6/13/2008 12:00 AM | 0 Comments | Page 1 of 2

Like Tony Hawk before him, professional snowboarder Shaun White is moving from the boards to the controller with Shaun White Snowboarding, an extreme sports game Ubisoft will release on the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii and PC this holiday season. But for every great snowboarding game we've played (SSX, 1080 Snowboarding) there's been one that's wiped out on the slopes (SSX Blur, 1080 Avalanche). So how will Shaun, and the game's developers at Ubisoft Montreal (Assassin's Creed, Splinter Cell), keep this from being total yard sale? We recently spoke to Louis Lamarche, the producer on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC versions, to get the lowdown on this (hopefully) cool game.

Crispy Gamer: Obviously, given the name, Snowboarding is a snowboarding game. But is it more of a snowboard racing game, a snowboard tricks game, a snowboard sim, a snowboard arcade game, or what?

Louis Lamarche: We're calling it a snowboarding lifestyle game, in that it's about snowboarding as a whole. So it's not just about competition, racing, or tricking, but also the idea of using and exploring the mountain as your playground.

Crispy Gamer: If someone just wants to play it as a racing game, or as a trick contest, can they?

Lamarche: Yes, totally. We'll have about 90 specific competitions and activities set up within the levels, but the mountains are open, so you can, for example, set two points on a mountain, and you and I can race from one to the other, with both of us deciding how we want to get there. And you can do that with racing or tricking, it's what we call "custom activities." We also have seamless multiplayer, so it's easy to set something like this up.

Crispy Gamer: So how long would it take to race from the top of the mountain to the bottom?

Lamarche: Right now, depending on which board you use, it takes about 10 minutes.

Crispy Gamer: How many mountains are there in the game?

Lamarche: Four.

Crispy Gamer: Are they real mountains?

Lamarche: The names of the mountains are real but the topography is aimed at maximum fun rather than realism. So while we have Park City, Utah, it doesn't look anything like the real Park City.

Crispy Gamer: Are there plans to add a fifth or even a sixth mountain later on?

Lamarche: It's a possibility, and because it is, we structured the game's engine to support the additions, but as for a specific plan, no, not yet.

Crispy Gamer: There have been a number of snowboarding games over the years. Is there one you feel this one is most akin to?

Lamarche: I would've said yes before, when the game was more structured -- here's a course, here's another course -- but we switched some things around, and made the mountains more open, so now my answer would be no.

Crispy Gamer: Now correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't actually play as Shaun, do you?

Lamarche: No.

Crispy Gamer: That's a little risky. Some people buying this game are going to want to play as Shaun. Why did you decide to do that?

Lamarche: Well, the first reason was because of the seamless multiplayer. We don't want everybody to look like Shaun, or to play like Shaun. Though the more you play the game, the more reputation points you gain through experience, you can become like Shaun.