If you’ve been playing games for most (if not all) of this century, you’ll probably remember the “wow” factor you had when you played the original SSX on the PlayStation 2. Since then there have fourteen different SSX games for multiple platforms (counting SSX 2 on two platforms as two games, of course). This time around SSX Blur is a Wii-exclusive and features a new control scheme – since it’s a Wii, you’ll be moving your controls around quite a bit.
When you first start the game up, you are given the option of jumping right to the tutorial (highly recommended in order to get the Wii control basics down), start a multiplayer game (you have the option to play two player split screen or up to four player hot seat using one Wiimote and Nunchuck), start a career, or jump right into a quick game where you select the character, track and type of race.
First off, let’s talk about the graphics. EA has done a very good job with the graphics considering the capabilities of the Wii. Rather than go for realism, the graphics seem more cartoon-animated and there’s nothing wrong with that. When you are boarding down the mountain, snow is flying around and you’re making tracks. It actually looks pretty good, although not photo realistic. When you’re dealing with a game like this that promotes a fast and furious atmosphere, the concern is whether or not the graphics can keep up with the game as far as keeping the backgrounds drawn and the game does surprisingly well here. The bottom line is that you’re not going to be commenting about how great the graphics are, but they aren’t bad either.
Of course, the big question here is how do the Wii Controls work and do they work well within the game. Well make no doubt, this is a very challenging game (which is why you really need to start with the tutorial – but even completing that is difficult – and the bummer is that you don’t even get any gamerscore points – but I digress). As you might have guessed the nunchuck control stick controls movement down the mountain – slowing down, speeding up and moving left or right. Jumps are done by lifting up the Wiimote. You can throw snowballs by pressing the B button and tricks are done my moving around the controller while you’re in the air. That being said, it seems as though when you’re in the air, you’re just trying to move the wiimote around as much as possible with a total disregard for the actual trick you want to perform – it becomes an exercise in snapping the controller just to get as many points as possible without any sort of strategy.
Of course there are also ‘ubertricks’ which occur when you have your meter filled up and you press a button – in order to do the ubertrick you have to trace a pattern with your Wiimote. For example, you’ll jump, press the A button and then have to trace the letter Z – just like in real life. Okay, just kidding, but this whole idea of tracing stuff has to stop in these games. It seems insanely difficult to perform (similar to star power in Trauma Center) and just doesn’t deliver the sort of bang I’m looking for given the amount of work involved.
The career mode is where you’ll spend most, if not all of your time as a single player. In career mode, you select a character (only four characters are available at the beginning, but you’ll be able to unlock more as you progress through the game, bringing the total to twelve). Once you select a character, you can then select a board (again, only one to start out with but you can unlock a ton). You then embark on a series of challenges and of course the better you perform, the more you’ll unlock.
Audio in the game is pretty good. While there’s no RUN-DMC to be found (who didn’t like the whole Tricky chorus when you filled that meter up), the beats in the music are pretty good and the idea of a radio station with the announcer mentioning requests and PM’s is pretty neat, although again as a snowboarder going down a mountain, I doubt you’d really hear all that. The audio overall is pretty immersive and adds to the fun in the game.
