It’s that time of year again: Winter, unfortunately here in the UK there’s little chance of it snowing, I mean you can’t play drizzle balls with the rain now can you?! So to suffice us from boredom EA have brought us the next title in the EA BIG series and it happens to be the third incarnation of SSX, time to get tricky on the snowboard again.

Gameplay:
The previous 2 SSX games: SSX and SSX Tricky were both stylised in their own way, felt similar and you could feel they were part of the same series. SSX 3 has broken this tradition and it feels as if a whole new game engine has been put in the game, the way you pull off tricks and the way your rider is airborne is completely different. Plus the previous format of having 7/8 tracks is gone and has been replaced with 3 peaks over 1 mountain, which does include some tracks such as Snow Jam but the way the game is organised is completely different – ergo there are 3 peaks and you must complete race or freestyle events to progress to the next peak.

A race is as simple as it seems – race down the hill and come first, but the freestyle event incorporates many events under that title. Slopestyle is simply a case of earning as many points as you can by the end of the course, Big Air gives you 4 or 5 big jumps to pull as many phat tricks as you can, Super Pipe allows you to get some serious air in a half pipe and go for the tricks allowing 2 or 3 uber tricks to be pulled off in one jump, Big Challenges you will come across during a freeride and involve an extreme task to complete.

This time round the riders have also changed as there are 4 newbie’s along with 6 returning SSX veterans including Psymon, Moby, Zoe, Elise, Mac and Kaori with other players available to unlock later on in the game. Characters are fully customisable allowing practically every item of clothing and hairstyles to be changed along with you board and also buy you rider’s stats as opposed to earning them from last time. All the riders are the same; the only thing that makes them play differently is their board or their attributes that you earn, so your character is slightly more customisable than last time.

Courses are varied and usually in SSX courses are predefined but SSX 3 offers a more ‘go at your own pace type gameplay’, throwing in new courses allowing the gameplay to become original once again and the courses justify that with bigger drops, all new areas and features on the course. When travelling to one event to another in a game you usually use a menu system but EA have thrown us in at the deep end this time and you guide yourself between races and freestyle events through snowboarding to place to place unless you get a lift of course.

The game also controls differently with trick buttons moved around from last time but effectively separating the uber tricks from the usual tricks, there is also a huge amount of tricks of both types to pull off throughout the game, handplants can also be pulled off this time adding an extra dimension as if there weren’t all ready enough. If you do crash form a trick you have the option of recovering it which proves more annoying than helpful as this often slows you down and can be a pain having to tap X all the time.

Graphics:
Graphics are looking slightly improved over last time with some very nice tweaks too, character animation and basic appearance of your tracks is similar to SSX Tricky. Where the difference comes in is the draw distance, when you jump off a cliff as good as it sounds you can see for miles quite literally and the Xboxes potential has been used nicely here and really makes you feel like you getting huge amounts of air when pulling a uber trick and the like. One or two particular new effects which are nice are the snow effects which look very nice when playing except when there’s too much snow and mist effects also are looking amongst the best around. The game also incorporates no slowdown and is extraordinarily smooth and fast to play to, lighting effects, fireworks and the like are all regulars in an SSX game but there is no specialities such as way clothing looks in Amped per say. The graphics are looking very nice but only improve over the last game just by that little bit.

Sound:
This time round instead of having a small selection of tunes that randomly play you are accompanied with the DJ from radio BIG, with an all new set of music for you to listen to whilst jamming down the slopes. Just some of the artists involved include the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, The Xecutioners and The Queens of the Stone Age. But there is a diverse range of music to listen to and can even be customised in the lodge. Unfortunately after 3 games I would’ve liked EA to recognise the potential of the Xbox and allow us to have our own music on whilst boarding, but once again they have let use down because like any other game in house music can become a little annoying once you get towards peak 3.

Sound in the game is quite good allowing avalanches, trees falling and your board cutting into the snow to sound very nice indeed, voices from the last game have also returned and add all kinds of witty slogans into the game unlike SSX Tricky which was repetitive as far as voices went. Overall the sound is very good and the idea of a DJ and radio station announcing racing conditions and the like is top notch and really helps to capture you in the atmosphere.

Longevity:
The usuals with SSX you get are your single player mode to get practice without affecting your championship mode, then there’s the main mode called ‘Conquer the Mountain’ allowing you to play through all 3 peaks and tracks effectively. Then finally you also have multiplayer mode only capable of 2 player again 4 player split screen should be an essential by now, and because EA haven’t signed up to Xbox Live as of yet now online play which the PS2 version does, tut, tut EA. Realistically the single player mode will last you ages conquering all 3 peaks completely and mastering your rider but without the ability to take them online and compete against other makes the longetivity of the game fade away.

Round Up:
Overall a complete new game has arisen from EA you could say and snippets of the last 2 games have been stuck in to say it is indeed SSX 3. This is a great snowboarding game to play but players of the last 2 games may not feel as comfortable as they did with the last 2 games, but for the third in the series a good effort.

Pros:

• Great additions to the game to expand the gameplay
  
• Graphics worthy of Ben Nevis
  
• All new sound system informative and funky
  
• The game has been given a makeover effectively removing some glitches…
  

  Cons:
  

  • ..but has also removed some good points that Tricky had
    
  • SSX Veterans may find this too different to be classified as SSX