Shaun White Snowboarding: Origins, Advanced Mobile Applications’ entry into the winter games genre, is now available from the app store. Offering tons of tricks, smooth powder-carving gameplay, and a stylish presentation, we’re confident that this game can hold its own on the slopes.
Shaun White Snowboarding offers you the choice to play as any of the 4 characters, each with his or her own attributes that make them better at one thing or another: speed, tricks, or control. You can shred in 4 different locales: Chile, Japan, Spain, or Alaska. There are also 4 game play options (what’s with all the 4’s?): Free Ride, Challenge Yourself, Challenge a Friend, or Challenge the World’s Best Player. The last three involve racing against ghost players. There’s really something to be said for this new ghost option that’s showing up more and more in iDevice games. It used to be acceptable to see a previous score while racing to compare and try to beat. Actually seeing a ghost of the run that earned you that other score is so much more satisfying, as you can visually see when you are falling behind or have taken a significant lead on that previous run. You get real-time feedback regarding whether you’ve taken a turn better than before or you missed an important ramp. We are loving the ghost integration and hope it keeps showing up.
The gameplay is pretty decent. This is the first snowboarding game we’ve played that has come anywhere close to Crazy Snowboard. Unlike Crazy Snowboard, where you choose the 4 tricks you want to be able to perform, you can perform any of the 50+ available tricks at any time. Also, Crazy Snowboard only required that you release the trick with enough time for the game to properly land you on the slope. Shaun White requires you to align your board with the slope to land safely, putting the onus on the player and increasing the difficulty of landing a jump. Levels are seem a bit longer in Shaun White than in Crazy Snowboard.
Graphically, this game shines. The characters all have unique looks and the game has a polished presentation. The graphics are certainly on par with Crazy Snowboard. The soundtrack is expected, loud quick-tempo tracks that generally appeal to snowboarders and the younger, X Games generation. Controls are intuitive and well-implemented. Tilt the device to move left or right. There is a button for boost/jump. Hold it down to pick up speed and tap to jump. While in the air, a d-pad and virtual snowboard appear to allow you to do tricks. Left/right on the d-pad control spins and up/down control flips. Touch the snowboard to pull off grabs corresponding to the grabbed area. Mix these with the d-pad controls to pull off different tricks. Rail grinding requires you to use the accelerometer to maintain proper balance. This trick system is much preferred to that of Crazy Snowboard, allowing for more creativity and greater control. The tutorial outlines controls and how to play with nice visuals.
Shaun White Snowboarding utilizes OpenFeint for tracking achievements and high scores on levels. Replay value is high, with 59 achievements to try for and the aforementioned ghost modes to motivate you to keep improving your runs. This game easily dismisses the likes of Adrenaline Snowboard and Slope Rider, with its main competition being Crazy Snowboard for best snowboarding title. Each has aspects that best the other, so it’s a close call. Shaun White feels like a great start, provided the devs commit to improving and updating with more content. Currently selling for $4.99, this is the priciest game in the bunch, but worth the look. Shaun White Snowboarding: Origins is an enjoyable 4-Dimple breath of ice cold fresh air.
Shaun White Snowboarding: Origins gets our AppSmile 4-Dimple rating:
