SSX Tricky

Game Info

Publisher: Electronic Arts

Developer: EA Canada

Platform:  PS2

Genre(s): Sports

Players: 2

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone)

Release Date: November 6, 2001

Intro:

SSX Tricky begins with an opening montage showing the characters doing crazy tricks, mostly tricks that will be uniquely theirs.  Between flashes of snowboarding excitement, players get a glimpse of the character personalities.

Getting Going:

Players are given a 3D view of the character choices in action as they spin the rotunda to view each character in turn.  Some characters will only be available once they are unlocked, but they still appear on the rotunda along with a written blip of what needs to be accomplished in order to unlock that character.  Each character has a bio, a backstory and an interview.  This gives the player greater insight into the personality of the character as well as giving the player a hint leading to the best move and venue for that particular character.  Players can choose the costume and board for their player but, once again, they are shown items that they will have to work to achieve.  Once the character is chosen, players can look into the trick book and practice tricks before hitting the hills in either Racing mode or Show Off mode.

Fun: 

SSX Tricky gets going right away and offers more depth of character than many sports games.  With so many characters to choose from, it should be relatively easy to pick a character the player identifies with.  The rapid pace of a racing game combined with outrageous tricks and personality makes this game immediately fun to play.  And, if the tutorial has been completed and the tricks have been practiced, the player will hit the mountain with a degree of confidence that they can succeed at the game from the first competition.

Visuals:

The texture mapping is only fair and SSX 3 will go on to have more detail in both environmental texturing and character detail.  But, the artistic style is part of the feel of the SSX franchise, creating characters and moves that are larger-than-life instead of realistic.  It works.  The tracks are involved and convoluted.  The tricks are out of this world.  Many of them are improbable, which is part of what makes them so fun to play and watch.  It would be nice to see a map or have a better fly-over of the track before racing for the purposes of strategy, but it creates an air of realism to be on a track for the first time.  Each rider has a set of outfits and boards that match their personality.  I admit, you're not going to notice much of either in the middle of the course, but it's amusing and rewarding at slower points of the game.

Sound:

Big Radio is gone in this version of the SSX franchise.  It's missed, too.   The announcer comes on only at checkpoints and doesn't sound much like an announcer at all.  It's a stark difference.  Gone, as well, are the rocking hits that pace your way down the mountain.  It is replaced, instead, with some rather repetitive created tracks.  The boarding sound effects are accurate and blend well with gameplay.  There is one place in which the sound design stands out very positively:  the voice-acting.  Well-known artists in acting and music were brought in to give voice, and personality, to the characters.  Oliver Platt brings Luther to life; Billy Zane gives Brodie a zen feel; Macy Gray brings style to Seeiah; Lucy Liu gives Elise a confident attitude; Bif Naked just brings attitude to Zoe; David Arquette brings Eddie to life with zany energy; Jim Rose makes Psymon insane; Patricia Valesquez adds rich cultural character  to SSX Tricky in the personality of Marisol; Nick Malaperiman, EA Sports Product Manager, helps Moby shine with a boisterous energy; and DJ Precise, aka Ryan Wall, gives Mac his youthful exuberance.  My only complaint would be that, when playing through one character, the repetitive lines get a bit stale.

Intelligence:

The other characters definitely know you're there.  They'll run you over, push you and there is a system in the races in which you are able to tell how aggressive the playing field is.  NPC's are assigned the classes of friend, enemy, and neutral.  Each PC has a mix of each and it does appear that being aggressive to a neutral character can turn them into an enemy, although I didn't try to find out.  In one race, however, I accidentally took out Moby and the announcer mentioned at the end of the race that "he's unlikely to forget that".  Time would tell if Moby would turn against me in future events.

Immersion:

The game is both addictive and fast-paced, two qualities that almost guarantee immersive play by virtue of being unable to do anything else.  The rewards system creates the addictive quality, leading the player through the game in continuous forward motion.  The amount of playable characters, ten in all, each with their own set of tricks and rewards, gives players many reasons to return to the game or to simply keep on playing.

Rewards and Punishments:

EA doesn't seem to be big on player punishment and SSX Tricky is no different.  Each character has a "disappointed" CG for failing to medal in the Show Off mode.  In Race mode, the player is confronted by another racer, which seemed to be random.  Win states, however, offer a multitude of rewards.  Players rank up when they medal with a high enough score.  Ranks also bring new boards and XP.  XP can be used to improve the player stats.  Completing all of the tricks in a chapter gives your player a new outfit.  Earning a medal also opens up new venues and certain characters can only be unlocked after certain ranks or mountains are achieved.

Cameras:

There simply isn't much to say here.  You can't control the camera, but you shouldn't ever feel the need to.  Rushing at speeds of 74 mph, your vision is as controlled in the game as it would be in life.  This is not a first person view, however, and while EA states in the developer diary included on the disc that they wished to make the player feel as if they were the character, this camera angle does not achieve that.  However, a first person viewpoint would make it impossible to view your tricks, which would dramatically decrease the fun factor.  Therefore, the cameras work the best, as is.

Controls:

It is utterly clear how much attention was paid to in-game physics and the physics seem spot on.  Lighter characters, like Mac, have more trouble sticking the landing while top-heavy characters such as Elise tend to lean more forward while airborne.  Luther is heavy; his stomach and bigger proportions are also taken into account in his moves and landings.  There were a few times that it seemed as if I was trying to push my character one way and they weren't moving the way I wanted.  There were also times when it seemed as if the portion of track leading to jumps was more slippery than the rest of the track, making the PC harder to control in those areas.  This was a minor observance, however.

Ideas:

EA does franchise work very effectively.  SSX Tricky, like many other EA games I've played, takes the best of the franchise and improves on it, without removing what makes the game great.  They messed with the radio announcer this time, which was disappointing and also a departure from their usual method of keeping the best aspects.  Disappointment wears off with the discovery of one of the really great "rewards" on SSX Tricky: the inclusion of the developer diary, an in-depth look into the making of the game.  It's not an unlock item, but more like a reward for buying the game; a bonus that gives the player an inside peek at the physics, sound design and voice-acting.  

Memory:

This game will go on the shelf next to all of the other SSX games to be played all the way through.  With so many ways to get through the game, replay might not be infinite, but it will be definite.