Skaters have always had a love/hate relationship with gravity and now Tony
Hawk’s Downhill Jam takes that relationship to a new level. The object is no
longer to pull off as many tricks as possible before Mother Earth comes calling,
but rather to start at the top of huge hills and let gravity take its course in
the kind of racing that’s usually reserved for those who prefer snow under their
boards. Tricks are still a part of the game, but here they are used to fill your
boost meter for even more speed rather than to score points. The result of all
of this is some crazy fast racing action down busy city streets that should be a
blast but begins to feel repetitive too quickly.
The tracks in the game are set in real-world cities set among hills like San
Francisco and Hong Kong. You pick a skater from a list of stereotypical
characters like the goth chick with the bad attitude or the take-it-easy stoner,
are taken to a ramp at the start of the course, and then race to be the first to
the bottom. Along the route you’ll encounter strategically placed ramps and a
ton of different rails to grind. Grinding is important in this game as it’s much
easier to ride a rail around a tight turn than it is cut the turn on the street
without splattering yourself on a wall. And it has the added bonus of keeping
you out of traffic and leading you to secret shortcuts. Since there is such an
emphasis on grinding in the game, the balancing act that you have to do to stay
on the rail has been made easier than in typical Tony Hawk games. You won’t be
able to stick to grinding throughout the races though as the game’s boost meter
rewards you as much for mixing up your tricks as it does for pulling them off.
You’ll find the basic assortment of tricks here that are found in other Tony
Hawk games, but the trick list is nowhere near as extensive. You do get to punch
or kick close competitors off of their boards, though.
Your first few times down a track won’t be easy – things move quickly and
it’s hard to look for rails and shortcuts. Once you do find the best route
through a track you’ll pretty much stick to it each time, though. Outside of
finding the alternate paths there’s no real exploration factor in this Tony Hawk
game, and you’ll pick up on the majority of them by watching where your
competition is going. There aren’t all that many tracks in the game and although
the game adds a few race variants such as slalom racing to the mix, you’ll
pretty quickly see all there is to see.
The game’s multiplayer support consists of two-player splitscreen racing on
the courses available for the single player game. It adds a racing variant
called “steal the head” in which the first place skater gets the head and at the
end the winner is the one who held the head the longest. Unfortunately there is
no support for online racing, which certainly would have added a lot more fun to
the title as well as extended its life.
Downhill Jam is not a bad game per se, it’s just that there’s not enough in
here to make up for everything that’s been taken out of the normal Tony Hawk
game. It’s an interesting enough concept and there’s potential for a good game
in a reworked sequel, but for now it’s only worth an afternoon rental by Tony
Hawk’s fans.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated:
66%. It’s fun at first but then things go rapidly
downhill from there.
