Shaun White Snowboarding
- June 23, 2008 15:31 PM PST
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Peaks, powder, and heart-pumping speed may introduce Shaun White Snowboarding, but it's authenticity that defines the game.
White, with an Olympic gold medal around his neck and another dozen X-Games medals under his belt, has partnered up with Ubisoft to help create the most fun, realistic, seamless snowboarding game ever made. It's not just a licensing arrangement, either; White makes regular trips to Ubisoft's offices and converses constantly over e-mail to nail down what works and what doesn't in each build.
Running on the Assassin's Creed engine, the game will allow players to start at the top of mile-high mountains and literally board anywhere, in any direction, all the way down. It's ambitious and brilliant at the same time. A bevy of camera options will let you view the snow cascades from any angle, including first-personsomething White himself insisted on. Slopes will be broken up into tiered sections, still seamless, but with different styles of terrain that match the gradual vegetation growth of real mountains. And the courses themselves will be mind-numbingly massive, with ten-minute runs commonplace.
Sports games that appeal to the masses are few and far between, but Shaun White Snowboarding could very well bridge the gap. It's intuitive and graceful gameplay won't just make you want to play it; it'll make you want to get out on the slopes yourself.
