It's really rare that you come across a game for the Play Station 2 that doesn't quite cut the mold in terms of game play and just having fun in general. But then you find a game like Cool Boarders 2001, that tries too hard towards realism, and falls down flat on its face with horrid control, lack luster game play and a total lack of a trick option! Putting you in control of 10 real life, professional snow boarders, you take them down the hill through several events that range from Big Air to the downhill free for all race, CBX. Anyway that you slice it though, unless you have a real grasp of the game controls and a slightly better reflex than the computer, you're going to be stuck in a downhill snow boarding ride to Hell!
The game play, even though with all of the options and different things that you do, hasn't changed at all since the original release on the Play Station. You have 10 riders that you can choose from, or you can create your own if you don't feel like taking a Pro Boarder down the slope. From the start, you'll be locked into a single event, which upon completion, will open up other events and eventually different areas of the snow boarding world that you can compete in! Now, this is where it gets a little hazy, in terms of what you can and cannot do with your rider. You don't have a wide variety of tricks like you would in say, SSX, cause Cool Boarders tries damned hard to be real to life. With the real to life aspect in mind, you'll find that if you're not riding as a Pro Boarder, you'll have to fight your way down the hill and the slightest screw up can cost you the race and the gold!
You'll be able to unlock new boards, which increase your attributes in the races through excellent display of tricks and ability to complete different sequences that are found throughout the courses. This is strangely reminiscent of Tony Hawk games with the gaps, but twice as hard to complete because you're working against the clock and with a rider that doesn't have much control! Something that is apparent in the first few minutes, is the lack of tricks that you can perform, and in order to gain the extra four or five special grabs and tricks, you have to prove yourself flawlessly in different competitions, all of which have the odds stacked against you from the green light.
A redeeming quality that the game play does have, is the two player competition, which allows you and a friend to play any of the following events and at least have some fun doing it. You have the Big Air competition, which allows you to see just how high and far you can get with a single jump. The Half Pipe, in which you can try to bust off tricks to get the highest score before time runs out or you reach the bottom of the hill, and the CBX in which you take on computer controlled boarders in an all out race for the finish line. However, you're on a merit system, if you miss a gate, it's a strike against you, if you miss three, you're DQ'd from the race and have to start all over again!
Control is a key part of any racing game, and this is a point where Cool Boarders 2001 fails horribly! The stiff and most times unresponsive control leads to smashing into trees, or even course walls as well as not being able to bust off any real high scoring tricks. Each rider seems to be very slow to turn, and the trick controls revolve around button presses with the shoulder buttons as well as the use of the directional pad, but doesn't come off smoothly enough with jumping being either over-balanced or not getting high enough! With this in mind, snow board game fanatics will find that performing the tricks with the analog leaves even more room for error, with the analog being over sensitive to pushes and presses, and not quite accurate with the directions. Frustrating!
The visual part of the game, while not all that important, seems to almost be a direct port of the original Play Station version that includes image break up and several instances of pop up and missing frames of animation! The boarders, while they are all dressed differently, look, act and move the same in all of the tricks, and there isn't anything in the environments that will catch your eye or impress you either. Lighting effects in certain areas, and the fog effect in the distance of some stages only accentuates the fact that there is extreme pop up where the courses are concerned, so anyone who is looking for clean and crisp visuals out of this powerhouse, will find nothing impressive worth looking at!
Audio wise, Cool Boarders 2001 makes up for all of the other problems that the game may show. With top notch bands such as Fear Factory, Stone Temple Pilots and Blind Dog, anyone with an alternative taste in music will find the music selection to be well worth the aggravation of playing, just to hear some of the more popular tunes from these bands! However, the sound effects are nil and the music repeats itself on every stage depending on what is playing. It is something of a disappointment to have the same music track, which sounds good at first, loop over and over again until you're sick of listening to it and want to turn off the sound as well as the game!
Overall, Cool Boarders 2001 is an average game that tries to deliver too much realism while leaving the sheer fun of what it is supposed to be on the cutting room floor. With stiff and un-balanced control and ultra challenging game play with a limited trick set, this game is one for gamers who have an appetite for mediocrity. While the music selection is decent, it doesn't do anything to help with the rest of the game, other than give you something to listen to! If you're into games like this, it's worth a rental, but nothing more. If you're an SSX fan, looking for a different version of the same genre to play, bypass this and look for something else that's worth your money and your time!
5/10
