Shaun White Snowboarding for Nintendo DS Reviews by Gamers

Ubisoft has all its bases covered with the multi-platform action sports game known as Shaun White Snowboarding. Available on every system under the sun this holiday, the Nintendo DS version is, unfortunately, not as compelling as its Wii counterpart. The portable game lacks a sense of speed, making it feel more like quicksandboarding. Shaun White's touch screen controls work well and he's powered by a decent 3D engine, but I'm pretty sure action sports should be more exciting than this.



Your goal is to complete a variety of speed and trick challenges and earn enough passes to join Shaun White at his favorite, secret snowboarding spot. I like the array of contests available. For a trick run you'll be given a list of objectives (score a certain amount of points, trick off a certain object, pass through certain gates) and you can complete any and all you desire. Knock 'em all out at once or clear them one at a time, it's your choice. Each mountain also has branching paths and before a run you can plan your route. It's nice that the developers took the time to give these choices to the player.



Steering and jumping is handled on the touch screen. The higher on the pad you touch with your stylus the "faster" you'll go. But you never get the feeling you're barreling down a mountain. This is like Snowboarding Miss Daisy. Drawing a line down and then up on the touch screen will get your avatar to jump, but it'll be with mixed results. Anytime you take an action that can be performed with the press of a button and turn it into some sort of swishy maneuver you're going to lose precision. You'll find yourself missing certain jumps and jumping when you didn't intend to.



Once you achieve liftoff, you can draw maniacally all over the touch screen to perform tricks -- just make sure you finish scribbling a moment before you land. Your board can be grabbed in different places with the D-pad. The game is very forgiving, actually, and you'll land things that maybe you shouldn't and find your body magically drawn towards any grindable rails.



Scattered around mountains are decals you can slap on your board to alter its properties (speed, trick, and balance). There are dozens of stickers but your board can only handle three at a time (must be big stickers), so you get to make strategic choices based on what challenge you're trying to accomplish. These decals can also be traded with friends who own the game. While you're connected, up to four players can compete wirelessly in racing and freestyle modes. Don't even bother with the extremely limited single-card multiplayer mode, though, unless you have lots of time to wait for the game to download.

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