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The first game to both relax and infuriate
at the same time:
If you've played SSX or any other of the many snowboarding
games on the market, then you may think you have a pretty
solid grasp of what Amped is all about. Trust me, you don't.
You may also think that all extreme sports games should play
like Tony Hawk. You're wrong. Amped is like nothing that's
come before it, and it is very, very good.
Sure, it's another snowboarding game... but it's the first
snowboarding game to focus on the freestyle nature of real
life snowboarding rather than some fantasized snowboarder
racing circuit. Not that I have anything at all against SSX.
Amped is just more realistic in my opinion. You don't race
down fictitious mountains. Instead, you shred down accurately
reproduced digital versions of real life mountains. You don't
pull off physically impossible tricks. Instead you pull off
tricks that are honest to god in the repertoire of any seasoned
snowboarder. Sure, people generally don't grind the cables
of the ski lifts, but Amped takes the attitude that if you
can find a way to get up to them, you can do it.
The objectives of Amped are also more realistic. There are
eleven levels in all, which are each divided into different
"runs" that are essentially drop points at different
spots around the mountain. Each level, or mountain if you
will, has high score, media, sponsor, and pro challenges of
which there are three each (except for Gunny's Gulch and the
Nixon Jib Fest which have only one high score and media challenge).
Every challenge you finish improves your world rank by one,
with your final goal to be ranked the number one snowboarder
in the world.
You get points for each trick you land, and the harder the
trick the higher the points as I'm sure you expected. Every
trick you land counts toward your high score, while every
trick that you perform near a member of the media counts for
twice as many points and is added to your media and high score
points. You simply have to get enough high score and media
points in a single run to beat the requirements for those
challenges.
For every media challenge you beat, you unlock a sponsor
challenge. Now you are limited to only the tricks that the
sponsor likes. Perform a trick of another type, and unless
it's particularly awesome, the sponsor isn't going to like
it. If the sponsor is "amped" by your performance
by the time you reach the end of the run, you win the challenge.
Pro challenges are a different matter all together. Beating
a sponsor challenge unlocks a pro challenge (as long as your
rank is high enough for the pro to even bother with you).
This challenge plays out like a game of horse with the pro
making a predetermined set of tricks that you have to beat.
The challenge is though that you have to start your trick
from the same place the pro started his or hers. If you miss
a trick, crash, or don't score more points on your trick than
the pro did on his, you fail the trick. Fail four times an
you lose the challenge and have to start over. These challenges
can be extremely frustrating at times, yet feel so rewarding
when you finally finish them. They're hard, but not so hard
that they're not fun.
The final type of challenge is called an exploration challenge.
Scattered on every mountain, in very out of the way places
sometimes, are eight evil snowmen. OK, so perhaps they're
not evil, but they do laugh at you incessantly. Your goal
is to simply find and kill (knock over) all eight of these
bastards on each mountain. Their audio cues change depending
on how close you are to them, so this basically plays out
like a game of hot and cold where you can't go back up hill
if you pass one. It's fun, and if you turn off the music so
the only sounds are the crunching snow under your board and
the vile voices of snowmen, it's actually very relaxing.
Actually, the entire game can be very relaxing. Try just
taking a run and not worrying about points or anything like
that. Turn off the music, turn down the voices, and turn up
the sound effects. You'll seen find yourself feeling like
you're actually there on a snowy mountain enjoying the crisp,
cold air and the bright sunlight. This suspension of disbelief
is helped greatly by Amped's amazing graphics. You can literally
see all the way down the mountain and there is no draw-in
what so ever... a feat made possible by the Xbox's hard drive
and thus not possible on the PS2 or GameCube. The replay mode
is spectacular as well as it lends a very genuine cinematic
feel to it all.
The two player options are ample, but not spectacular. Fortunately,
what there is of it is good. You and up to three other players
can play for the highest score, the highest media score, or
the highest scoring single trick. There is also a "King
of the Hill" mode in which you all play middle aged Texas
men with beer bellies. Just kidding. It's a mode that turns
the first player's run into a pro challenge for the other
players to try and beat. Other settings can be customized
such as time limits and scoring methods as well as several
mods such as "Dash till you crash" and "Trick
or die". These end your turn when you crash or when you
fail to trick within a repeating time limit respectively.
All of that being said, there is one last part of Amped that
is by far the best of all... the humor. This game has made
me laugh out loud so many times I've lost count, and I find
myself laughing at the same things. The entire game has a
very off beat sense of humor, but the best part has to be
the scathing comments the media guys throw at you when you
crash a trick in front of them. Whether it's laughing their
ass off at you or a heartfelt "Dude! That had to hurt!"
it's always funny. The best though was when I accidentally
flew face first into the rocky side of a mountain and a nearby
photographer's only comment was "ShaZAM!". Sure,
maybe I'm just sick, but I laughed myself sick at that one.
I find it amusing when people make fun of someone who has
just plummeted a hundred feet straight down to land on their
head. That doesn't make me deranged... wait... yes it does...
Like that's news.
-K'Tok
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