Review: SSX3 - Xbox

First, the visuals—for those of you with HDTVs and component cables, SSX3 is gorgeous.  It is probably one of the most visually impressive games I own (you can see my library of games if you like in my profile), and that is saying a lot considering its competition of games like H2, Doom 3, and Forza.  10/10 on visuals.

Second, interface navigation—the menus are pretty straightforward and intuitive.  There is a twinge of redundancy (i.e. a “Buy Gear” menu and an “Equip Gear” menu could be easily consolidated) but minimal confusion or randomness.  The biggest gripe I have is “confirmation prompts” that appear to ask you if you are sure you want to make a choice (overwriting your save file, quitting a race).  You basically have to make the choice twice.  While I’m sure this is just a precautionary measure, it can get annoying, especially when trying to quickly restart a race or something of the sort. 8/10

Third, the levels (a.k.a. “the Mountain”)—EA Big did a really good job of tying levels together into one big mountain (or “world”).  The mountain consists of 3 peaks, each of which has various runs. The runs have specific events that you can board right up to.  There are still load times, but you still get the feel that you “happened upon” the event, which is hard to describe, but adds to the game’s continuity.  Even better, though, is the ability to transport to a different peak or run from the start menu.  This option alone makes this game outshine a plethora of other xbox titles involving “worlds” or large levels.  I am reminded of MMORPGs like EverQuest and WOW, where travel is a fairly significant part of the game.  Sure you can use a mount, teleport, or other means of transportation, but in the scheme of the game, travel becomes monotonous and a significant waste of time.  SSX3’s transport feature allows you to zip to a different location at the touch of a button or two.  This time-saving feature keeps you in the action.  I can assure you I doubt I’d still be playing the game if I had to board down to a lift station or lodge or a specific location to transport elsewhere on the mountain.  The biggest gripe I have about the levels is their moderate linearity.  Sure, there are a few paths down the run, but for the most part they are adjacent to one another and not all that diverse.  It would be neat if multiple runs intertwined like a real life ski slope, but I understand that level-wise, it would be too large and add to load times and, in reality, be just one single massive run that had more drastic path diversity.  So I’ll let that one slide. 9/10

Fourth, the gameplay—controlling your rider is pretty simple.  It takes some getting used to using both the left thumbstick (steering) and the D-pad  (trick rotation) but it soon becomes second nature.  I was slightly disappointed at first because I remembered SSX Tricky being a bit easier to control, but I realized this was only because my rider’s stats were low.  Bumping them up to par reunited me with the fluid control I remember, which is pretty spot on.  I do have two gripes about the controls, though.  The first is what I call “slope push” which is when you are steering toward a jump, rail, or obstacle that is on a horizontal slope (left to right, not downhill/uphill).  The slope pushes your rider back down toward the center in a slightly over-exaggerated way.  It’s kind of like eccentric gravity, and the biggest detriment of this slope push is that it makes it significantly difficult to hit rails you wish to ride that are on a horizontal slope, as you will often miss the rail to the lower side of the slope.  I remember this being much easier in Tricky, but it’s not a crippling negative.  The second gripe is EA Big’s assigning of the “X” button.  On snow, X is used to boost your rider to achieve greater speed.  In the air, X is used to perform a grab.  As you can imagine, the result is your rider going over a small bump, catching some air, and performing a grab by mistake, making your rider bust for not releasing the grab.  This gets pretty annoying, especially since each time you fall, your boost meter is decreased as a penalty.  EA could have done a better job of button assignment, having a dedicated boost button that wouldn’t perform accidental grabs.  For the most part though, if you can anticipate this annoying behavior somewhat, the problem is minimal.  The rest of the gameplay is fun and unique and does not grow tiresome.  8.5/10

Fifth, the music—no hard drive soundtracks stinks a bit, but the game’s soundtrack is extensive and is fairly diverse, from Fatboy Slim to Red Hot Chili Peppers to YellowCard to Chemical Brothers.  There is a decent amount of techno/drum&bass-esque music, but unless you hate that style, it’s tolerable (and you can lower the volume to your liking if you so choose.)  You can buy songs to create custom playlists, but if I understand it correctly, you’re just buying songs they would play anyway in the normal course of the soundtrack.  It would be worthwhile if you could unlock new songs as you progressed. 9/10

The last thing I’ll discuss as part of the game is the Lodge.  As you progress, you can use money you earn from events and collectibles to purchase just about anything you can think of.  First and foremost you can buy attributes to make your rider better, which is sweet and crucial; some events you simply cannot win until your rider is better.  I spend most of my cash here.  By winning events, you receive rewards not only monetary but also in terms of “unlockables.”  These include gear (boards/apparel) and things like trading cards and posters.  You can buy some unlockables in the Lodge, but unless you have money to burn, it’s pretty pointless to do so, and the concept is a bit lame in itself, since the posters/cards are framed as opposed to full screen and aren’t that visually impressive.  Another thing you can buy in the lodge is “UBER tricks” which are the special moves you perform after performing a series of successful tricks.  The Uber tricks were the highlight of Tricky, although I remember them being easier to “activate” in Tricky.  In SSX3, you have to do 4 consecutive grabs that each spell a letter of “UBER” and once you fill in the 4 letters, you activate your UBER tricks and can then bust them out.  Anyway, you can buy different UBER tricks than the 5 or 6 your rider comes with if you wish, but they’re pretty expensive.

In summary, the open feel of the game and ability to “freeride” rather than jumping from event to event makes this game very fun and enjoyable.  Another awesome addition that I don’t think was available in Tricky was the ability to restart a Heat without having to restart the entire event, so if you have a great Run 1 and botch Run 2, you can restart and keep your Run 1 score/time.  I recommend this game to anyone that is even remotely interested in the series, and overall give it a 9/10.

Game Difficulty: hanging in the balance.

Game Difficulty: hanging in the balance.

I’m speaking to the masses, here.  Not the gurus or the ditzes.  To clarify, gurus are the guys who either own a handful of games and play or have played each one often and more than once.  Ditzes are the guys who get 25% through a game, and box it up to play a newer game, never resuming the first.

The masses are the majority, I think, who like to get a game and finish it at least once, but don’t master it, play it on every difficulty level, or write a FAQ on it.

Now that I’ve established my audience, I’d like to comment on the importance of default difficulty of a game, with some notes on cheat codes and glitches.

Aside: I saw a laptop commercial w/ Shaun White (snowboarder/skateboarder) and me mentions he uses it to go and get all the cheat codes for his games so he can beat them as fast as possible.  Keep that in mind when reading.

The masses, in general, buy a game, start it, beat it, and then move on to the next game if one worth playing is available (and these days, there is).  Very few people, I believe, start a game on a harder or easier difficulty than default (exceptions being having played the game before; for example playing the previous year’s Madden before).  Though more common, not many people, while traversing through a game, say “this is too easy/hard; I’m going to bump up/down the difficulty level.”  Most of us, when a game is difficult, enjoy the challenge of discovering how to beat it, and the reward in doing so is much sweeter.  Sadly, the masses (and significantly more so-the ditzes) have a relatively short attention span, such that if a game isn’t firing on all cylinders, it will see early retirement.  Approximately 80% of my game time goes toward Halo 2 on XBL, where the experience is diverse enough to remain entertaining (in other words, I’m not burnt out, and the 2o2p site had even renewed my vigor for the game because of the community).  I must confess that to this day I have never played all the way through the Campaign (of H2).  I played H1 Campaign with friends before I got my xbox and likely played every mission at some point, but H2 was out when I got my xbox, so while I got H1 with it, I haven’t played it more than maybe once.  Honestly, I couldn’t even tell you what level of the campaign I’m on in H2… The last thing I remember was I think rescuing marines from a ship and trying to get out.  Sad, I know.  For me, the story just didn’t grab me and make me want to not only see, but Cause, what happens next.  Further, given my 80% statistic, I play the Campaign so seldom that I don’t really recall what was going on when I last left, so it’s difficult to immerse myself in the world that is H2 Campaign.  With other games, it may not be the story that fails to draw attention, but other factors.  I hate games that give you the super-bad-mofo weapon/car/ability right when you’re 98% through the game.  If I’m going to get a bad mamma-jamma sword that glows blue and hurls demons at the bad guy, I want to use that thing!  Not the entire game, mind you, but enough such that at the game’s end, I’m not saying “would’ve been nice to have that a few levels back…”  This is where cheat codes and glitches make or break a game.  Codes can add or subtract to a game in terms of enjoyment, difficulty, and replay value to name a few.  Since very few of us play through the game a second time on a higher difficulty so we can see 2 minutes of extra cut scenes, it can be nice to use codes at times to throw in additional variety.  For example, in Final Fantasy 1 (NES), you could use a game genie to learn spells you otherwise wouldn’t have been able to learn, which is good; in Forza (xbox) there is a glitch (before you go online) to make as much money as you want; in Fable (which rocks) there is a glitch to duplicate keys that opens a chest containing the 3rd best weapon of the game (cool looking hammer).  For me, things like this do not break the game, but rather take out the “grind” aspect that may be tolerable at first, but quickly becomes monotonous and dull.  When I used to play Everquest… that game is the definition of “grind.”  On the plus side, you could always improve; you were never “capped” at a certain level of “bad-arseticity” where you just run around and own everything in your path.  However, the means to improve were ridiculously tedious.  Looking back, I ask who in their right mind would “camp” an area, killing the same respawning monsters over and over and over for hours on end, to see a bar slowly creep up and eventually give you a point to spend toward an ability that costs 9 points…  Insanity.

Circumventing “grinds” adds value to a game.  Yes, it shortens the game and makes it play differently than intended by the developers, but IT KEEPS THE GAMER’S ATTENTION, and in today’s market, Attention Retention is what sells games.  There are some games whose codes/glitches break the game, making it ridiculously easy such that the game is completed in record time, and the motivation for upping the difficulty is nil, since the initial experience was so easy that replay would be far to difficult or time consuming, by comparison.  That is why it is vitally important for developers to establish a healthy, balanced default difficulty, strictly control what cheats/glitches exist (easier said than done) and provide online patches to fix “game-breakers.”  (Like Halo did with pulling weapons/items through walls and other quirks), and lastly make the reward for completing the game on a higher difficulty worthwhile such that a gamer would want to give it another run through.  So many games have great potential but fall short due to these factors.  On the bright side though, it’s a competitive industry, technology is forever advancing, and achieving this perfect model is getting easier by the second.

Gaming on the Cheap

Gaming on the Cheap

I’ve never been the first on the block with a new system, product, or service.  I’m always hesitant when getting new things because I live on a budget-not a strict one really, but I am always mindful of how I spend my money.

My system library looks something like this:

ColecoVision; Atari 2600; NES; Game Gear; N64; PS1; Xbox

The most notable consoles I skipped out on include the SNES, Game Boy, Genesis, PS2, and Dreamcast.  All these systems I wanted at one time or another, but held out for the next one – a sort of “every other” plan if you will.  This has been good and bad in that I have not spent a fortune on new systems and games and that has paid dividends in terms of savings, college, and other things.  It’s bad in that I’m always behind the times.  I’d love to own a 360, but it’s really just not in the budget right now – perhaps when H3 is released, if the price drops a bit.  The good news for those of you who are like me is that there is a LOT of fun to be had still with your old systems, if you just look at them as an investment.  I say investment because there are always going to be “bigger better” systems with HD graphics and state-of-the-art this-and-that.  I would argue, though, that the true game can have as much or more fun playing Super Techmo Bowl on NES than the newest copy of Madden (or any comparative “then-and-now” game/genre.  I was in Game Exchange the other day and saw a guy trade in about 10 games and some type of system.  I think the games were PS2 or Xbox, and the clerk said they wouldn’t even buy the used system because the serial number was too low.  The guy got around $55 for all his games (and let’s assume that on average he paid $35 a game for them new or slightly used [probably more though] – that means he had a net loss of $295, and even more loss if you take into account of owning a system with no games to play on it.  I pity the foo’.  Granted, everyone owns some games that ended up being mediocre and will never be played again, so $2 is better than a dust collector right?  I would agree, and would sell some of my games for $2 if I thought I could get that much.  I think the question gamers should ask themselves is this: will I EVER in my lifetime play this game again, or will my children EVER play it?  If yes, then it is worth holding on to.  So, continuing with my “gaming on the cheap” theme, as I mentioned, I have no qualms snagging second-hand games for half the price (or cheaper).  I didn’t get my xbox until Christmas of 2004, after it had been out for quite some time.  (Thanks to my wife for the best, though likely most regrettable, Christmas present ever; nothing says “I love you” like a present that you know will consume potential quality time and money.  You rock, babe.)  The financial benefit of “holding out” is obvious when you look at eBay and game stores’ prices on used merchandise.  Take someone with an identical library as mine, and I can probably guarantee you I’ve spent less.  One may argue that I’m “missing out” on all the fun of the new system, and to some extent they are correct.  When and if I do get a 360, I will never have the same amount of fun playing GRAW or COD2 on Live as they are simply because the online community for those games will have dwindled by then and have moved on to the latest and greatest.  And, I’ll admit that some games would have been more fun had I entered the online scene of them sooner (Forza, Doom 3, NFSU2, NCAA05/Top Spin).  I have no regrets though, and no debts either, which is something of which to be proud.  To those like-minded fellows and ladies who prefer, or must, save a buck or two here and there, don’t be discouraged that you’re not “in the loop.”  You’re just not in THAT particular “latest & greatest” loop, and, wait for it, THAT’S OKAY.

Check out Gamespot.com or ign or your “all things gaming” website of choice.  At gamespot, you can choose a console and sort ALL the games by rating.  Just looking at the “winners” over the years, you can build a substantial wish list of some awesome games, and then proceed to acquire that wish list.  Meanwhile, the price of the latest system and its games is declining.  So while you’re having fun with your shiny used copy of Ninja Gaiden Black, a) you do not feel so alienated from “the IN crowd” since you’re having a blast yourself, 2) you’re obtaining enjoyment at a fraction of the cost, and d) you will never run out of titles to “catch up” on.  My newest game is Fable: The Lost Chapters.  It is a blast and my next blog will likely be based on it for the un-informed.  I’d put it in this post, but don’t want to be too long-winded (so much for that).  Regarding budgeted gaming (aka “gaming on the cheap”) though, know that it is possible with a bit of patience and the ability to be content for the time being.  As a disclaimer, this blog is in no way derogatory of “the IN crowd” that has 360’s or pre-ordered PS3’s or the best of the best.  Many of us, myself included, would have a 360 if we could, but must refrain for the time being.  Don’t sell your copies of GRAW and PGR3, and be ready to dust ‘em off down the road when I can give you a run for your money.  Happy gaming to all.

Perspective and Consistency

Killing time in H2