It’s hard to come across high-quality sports games for free, or close to it, particularly within the realm of snowboarding, but in Downhill Snowboard you have exactly that.
The game itself is a simplistic reincarnation of other more developed snowboarding games, asking you to perform flips and combinations to score points as you fly your way down the mountain. Pretty straightforward, but Downhill Snowboard manages to find the ideal balance of absurdity to make this game as entertaining as it could be.
The Graphics
Graphically, this game is as simplistic as it gets. The creators opted to abandon the third-dimension completely, and the end result resembles a game from the ’90’s.
Somehow, though, this is a good thing.
The game brings back memories of playing Snowboard Kids on Nintendo 64 all day long, or of running around trying to defeat Bowser in Super Mario 64, albeit on an updated graphics platform.
It also contributes to making some of the crazy features prevalent in the game a little more suitable.
The crazy features!
The weirdest element of this game is no doubt the main character himself.
Rather than create a normal human who is confined to the laws of physics like the rest of us, the creators of this game decided to bless us with a ragdoll.
This guy flops around like one of those blow-up things outside a car dealership but shows a remarkable ability to stay steady on his board despite his extremely flexible body.
When you do fuck it up though, you’ll know all about it.
Land awkwardly and his head just about flies off, his neck snaps in two and he loses three times the regular amount of blood in a human body within five seconds.
You can also be chased by an avalanche. That brings a whole new meaning to downhill snowboarding and surprised the hell out of me the first time it happened.
Going to play some Downhill snowboarding for a while. You might not hear from me for the next few days #games #snowboarding Click To Tweet
Difficulty
My biggest issue with cheap, straightforward games like this is that they are often far too easy.
Perfecting a game within an hour of picking it up is not at all what I’m after, and fortunately, this game avoids doing this.
Considering the game is a very basic side-scroller – that is, you work your way across the course from left to right on your screen – they’ve done well to make this one pretty difficult.
Initially, you won’t have too much trouble, with the first few stages completable pretty quickly.
As you progress though, the stages become more and more difficult, to the point where your phone, computer, or whatever you’re playing on is at risk of being thrown into a wall.
Each stage has new challenges and requirements, and each is a little bit more difficult.
Of course, this subtle increase in difficulty is exactly how they lure you in. With every failure, you become increasingly convinced that you’ll complete the level next time.
When, instead, you fall and break your little figurine’s neck for the 30th time in a row, if you’re anything like me you might just take a little joy out of watching him suffer, considering all the pain he’s brought you.
Problems
As with all games, particularly those for which you pay next to nothing, Downhill Snowboard isn’t perfect.
For starters, each level is pretty long. That might not be a problem for you, but it does mean you end up wasting a lot of time on the game.
If you snap your character in two near the end of a level, frustration will be at its peak as you envision repeating the entire level over again.
The other problem is that there is no multiplayer ability.
This isn’t a problem if you have no friends, but for the more socially inclined, isolating yourself from your friends and loved ones to play a 2D video game might not be so appealing.
Ultimately though, this game is pretty damn fun, particularly considering it’s available for $1.19 in your App Store.
You’ll while away plenty of pointless hours playing it, enjoy it at least some of the time, and probably won’t miss the buck you gave up to buy it.
To have a go at this amazingly fun and addictive game click the link below:
Have you had the chance to play Downhill snowboard? What are your thoughts about it? Did you complete it? Let us know in the comments below and as usual, make sure to share this page on Facebook and Twitter.
Downhill Snowboard - A Super Addictive Game
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