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There’s been a lot of positive talk about 1080 Snowboarding ever since the first screen shots and movies of it appeared on the web. Indeed, those early glimpses were impressive. The recently released final game lives up to expectations graphically, but its gameplay is something of a mixed bag.
The atmosphere in 1080 is a faithful re-creation of the modern media’s representation of snowboarding culture. Everything’s included, from the Tommy Hilfiger license, to the mildly edgy attitude, to the techno music.
The characters fit the snowboarding image as well --except for the female snowboarder. She is given an annoyingly high pitched cartoon voice (something like the voice actor had just breathed in some helium) and she yelps at the slightest bump of the snowboard. Overall, she’s just your typical stereotype of a weak female. With such socially up-to-date (albeit unrealistically proportioned) female game characters as Lara Croft, there’s no excuse for this. I don’t understand why the female character isn’t as true to the snowboarding culture as the rest, but then I don’t understand a lot of what Nintendo has done lately.
Ok, ok, enough character analysis. As with any racing game, the sense of immersive speed is very important. 1080 creates a sense of speed as each snow course slides by, but it just isn’t as immersive as I would have hoped. I found it a bit like Extreme G. In other words, it felt like I was merely pressing left and right to direct the motion of a looping FMV rather than navigating the contours of a snow-covered hill. This left me feeling rather detached from the action. The graphics, while impressively clear and smooth, don’t vary much. This hampers the sense of speed as well, because despite the awesome lens flares, the scenery just isn’t that interesting. It’s like running along the same gray wall for a mile.
When I play a racing game, the other key aspect that I look for is excellent control. Without excellent control, such fast-paced gameplay is frustrating. The fact is, because of the subtlety of 1080's control, the game isn’t easy to pick up and play. It doesn’t have that sit-down-and-race simplicity that great racers like Wave Race or Ridge Racer have. In fact, it’s rather difficult to progress anywhere without at least an hour with the game. The most frustrating thing was the fact that the snowboards break if you bump too many walls or don’t land your jumps correctly. Imagine Wave Race with jet skis that spring a gas leak and stop when bumped around too much and you get the idea. The second most frustrating thing was how tough it was to pull off the flashy stunts. The controller gymnastics that are needed to pull off a 1080 degree jump ought to loosen up any controller in no time flat. Even the best Bowser-throwers will need practice to pull off the repeated perfect circles with the Control Stick. Landing jumps is also difficult. Sometimes it’s necessary to hold down Z for a solid landing, and other times that same action will cause you to wipe out.
So while 1080 Snowboarding looks nice, the problems with it’s control make it considerably less compelling than a more intuitive racer like Wave Race. If you’re into snowboarding, however, you’ll definitely want to give 1080 a look. There’s probably enough there that’s true to the snowboarding culture that the game would be nice to own during the long summer off-season. On the other hand, if you’re not an avid snowboarder, 1080 is fun to rent, but probably not worth your hard earned dough. It’s a
decent racing game, but there are better ones out there.
Overall Rating (for Snowboarding fans):
Rent Before Buying
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Overall Rating (for non-Snowboarding fans):
Rental Only
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