User Rating: 3.8 | SSX 3 PS2
By RCC1140 | Review Date:
When the Playstation 2 first launched, the original SSX was the killer-app. Nothing could come close to matching the hype surrounding EA Sports Big's innagural title. The game came out and was immediately met with critical praise and got high-marks in just about every category. It had everything, smooth graphics, great sound, and of course, some of the most addictive gameplay around. There was also a sense of speed when playing SSX that gave it a great feel. About a year and a half later, the Xbox and Gamecube were launching, and EA Sports Big released SSX Tricky on all next-gen platforms. The game did everything the original SSX did and more. The courses that everyone knew and loved we totally transformed and everything was bigger and better. New courses, characters, and slightly-improved graphics gave this game alot of bang for your buck. Now, in 2003 EA Sports is releasing SSX 3 to the unsuspecting public. Does it live up to it's predecessors success? Read on to find out. Gameplay: Wow. What happened? This game series has taken a huge slide downhill. I used to love SSX for it's fast paced gameplay, and amazing controls. This game has taken any and all of the sense of speed that the original two had and has thrown it straight out of a second story window, where it was then hit by a garbage truck. It is a very slow game now, and while the jumps are big, you never get that "feeling" of being 100's of feet in the air flying at 80+ MPH like you used to. The other thing that they have done, is made the game alot more open-ended. You are dropped onto the first of three peaks when you first turn on the game, and you are basically let free. Now, this was fun for a while, but it is like going down the highway. You have to follow street-signs, and in this game, there are far too many. You loose track of where you are going, and then once you finally find the course you wish to compete at, you are treated to a very slow race. You can do several things on the mountain like buy equipment from the lodge, free ride, and compete in big air and races. Big Air is basically a ride down alot of drop offs where you pull off as many tricks as possible and see if you can beat out the other competitors. Think of it as a half-pipe kind of thing. The races are pretty self-explanatory, and offer very few thrills aside from a few big drops on each course. The level design on these courses is also, almost too big. The courses are so huge, you can get lost from one point to another, gone are the straight forward, super-fast, and fun playing courses. The first course you start off at is Snowdream, and that is a perfect example of how the game is. Compare the new Snowdream to the old, and you will find very little to no similarities in the two. They tried to make a change for the better here, but it did not work out at all like I hoped it would. As I said before, the game is very slow, and I just did not have that much fun with it. Score: 4.5 Graphics: The graphics in this game are nothing short of amazing. The sun has a blur around it just as it would in real-life, trees sparkle with freshly fallen snow, chunks of ice are clearly visible while racing, and the riders look great as well. Lets start with the environment, the levels in SSX 3 look like a gift from the gaming gods, everything is so pretty looking. All of the levels have been clearly designed with care to their visual image, and it shows. If you run into a tree, snow will actually fall off of it onto the ground, leaving freshly fallen snow around it. The environments also sport weather effects, such as snow falling, clouds rolling in, and avalanches. This all comes out great looking, and lots of details are present in the game. The lighting in this game is also top notch, there are a few times where you will be boarding along a nice, clear sunny course, and you are forced to make a jump off the side of a cliff, into a huge grey cloud. Once you land in the cloud, the sun is no longer shining and it is up to street lights to provide most of your light. As you continue, snow will start to fall from the cloud onto the ground below. This is a sight to behold. The character models are also great looking, their clothing will sway in the wind, snow will fall on them, and they animate very nicely. This is an amzing looking game. Score: 9.0 Sound: The sound is also top notch in SSX 3, instead of having a typical music driven soundtrack, the developers have opted for a more GTA like approach. This time, you will hear the voice of a Dj that will give you hints, tips, and of course play music for you while you snowboard. The thing that makes this cool is that the Dj will really pick songs, totally at random. No pre-chosen music here! It is a nice little touch that adds to the game, although I heard the same song (by The Ceasers) quite a number of times. Another neat feature that has returned from the original two SSX's is that when you get big air, the sound of the music is drowned out and the sound of a heart beat comes in. This makes for some very tense moments. It is alot like the GameBreaker moments in Tiger Woods. While the music is all fine and good, it is the snowboarding sounds that really push this game ahead. The sound that you hear while you board on ice is not the same you here when on snow, everything is different. The snow really sounds as if you were boarding on it, and so does everything else. One thing I did notice is that when you grind onto trees, it sounds as if you were boarding on metal, and thus does not sound very real. But, that is a minor note. The character voices are horrible however, and do not come close to the rest of the games sound presentation. Mac sounds as if he were sucking helium before coming on the course, and Moby sounds really bad as well. Character voices aside, this games sound is in a world of it's own. It can't be beat. Score: 8.9 Online: This is a feature I had high hopes for, however, after trying it out, I came away disappointed. I tried this game three days after it came out, and there were a mere nine people online, including myself. Out of those nine, two had headsets and one had a good connection. I tried to play, but there was some severe lag, and the game was rendered useless. I tried it again the next day, and while there were a few more people (12) I was still unable to get a good game going. Score: 2.0 Final Thoughts: I just don't understand it. This game has everything going for it, great sound, graphics, and online play. It just falls flat on it's face with slow, and sometimes confusing, gameplay. I had some high hopes, and judging by the series track record, those hopes were well founded, however, I walked away from this game dissapointed. This game can not match up to it's predecessors greatness. Do yourself a favor and save some money by buying a copy of Tricky. If you must buy it, wait for it to be a greatest hit. As I said, everything else in this game is great, but the gameplay is just not that good. Score: 3.0

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