Dark Summit

You, my friend, play the role of Naya, a radical, snowboarding rebel who is sticking her nose in where it doesn't belong. For whatever reason, Chief O'Leary, the head ranger of Mt. Garrick, has banned all the good-for-nothing, trouble making snowboarders from shredding on the mountain. So, of course, it is your job to get to the bottom of this and expose what sort of conspiracy is being concocted. THQ has labeled the storyline in the game as being УcompellingФ. But this is certainly not the case. For me personally, I'd use words more in the vain of lame, boring, and redundant. The concept itself is laughably bad, and never did I even care what was going on. Just goes to prove the point that a well thought out plot and the sport of snowboarding will probably never go hand and hand. Fortunately, the game plays very nicely and the whole story attempt comes off as more of an afterthought.

When I first heard that the game contains mission-based objectives, I immediately expected the game to contain many levels, each with it's own unique goal. As it turns out, the game only contains 4, albeit large, levels. Throughout each of these levels you'll encounter over 45 different challenges and missions. They range from the standard escape from the ski-patrol or do a certain amount of tricks in a given time span, to the odd Ц knock Chief O'Leary's turkey off the picnic table or destroy 10 snowmen. These of course are just a few examples of what you'll encounter. And as you can tell, the game isn't really all that serious, but there is no denying that the game is entertaining. Many of the missions are fairly challenging and will require multiple attempts to complete. Thankfully for us the developers added an option accessible from the pause screen that allows you to restart the mission you're currently on, which goes a long way in making the game less frustrating.

There are two ways to receive your missions. A Ц accept a mission from one of the 5 secret operatives located on the mountain, or B Ц step into one of the many Challenge Com Link Stations. The actual point of completing these missions is basically just to progress to the next level and get closer to the summit, or peak. Each completed objective gives you something called Уlift pointsФ, УliftФ pertains to lift chairs that'll you'll need to ride on to make your way upwards.

Obviously, the game is packed with many tricks to perform a long the way. And thanks to a simple set-up and decent controls (needs a little work), this facet of the title is a joy. Dark Summit is complete with your regular tricks that involves pressing in any direction on the D-pad and hitting the B-button, as well as your super tricks that come in the form of different button combinations while in mid-air. For example, to do an Inverted 540, you simply press A, B, A. Just make sure you have enough air when trying to pull off these special moves or you'll be eating the snow. The game starts you out with a nice variety of these moves, but the more impressive ones are hidden throughout the game. Grinding, or jibbing as they like to call it, is a pretty standard thing in games of this sort, and you're not going to find it any different here. Dark Summit does come complete with a grind button and many things to jib off of.

I admit the trick system does lack depth; so don't expect another SSX Tricky. However, Radical did a fine job in balancing out the importance of completing missions and tricks. Actually, the main draw in with the tricks is the fact that they are how you earn your extras. There are many different costumes and boards to choose from once you gather enough points, all easily accessible via the УEquipment HutФ.

The four courses you will be spending all your time on are of good size and offer a lot of diversity. There are multiple paths to take, tons of hills to do tricks off of, and they offer their own little government conspiracy charm, with huge puddles of toxic waste scattered about, electric fences, and helicopters flying through the sky. And to prove that this is just a regular, everyday snow-covered mountain, you'll see many pedestrian skiers and the aforementioned snowmen. I should point out that the courses are very linear, meaning you can only go downhill, there's absolutely no turning around involved.

The visuals and the sound in the game are somewhat disappointing. The graphics are on the plain side and in no way take advantage of what the Xbox has to offer, but the game does move at a fast pace with barely a hint of slowdown. Plus, the sheer size of the levels is impressive in its own right. There are not really many good things you can say about the sound department. The character voices are average and the music is mostly some funky techno beats that for some reason remind me of games in the 16-bit era. But its one saving grace is some decent sound effects.

Different multiplayer options are available once you have finished the main game, leaving for some decent replay. But the odds of you replaying the single-player game aren't good, even when you throw in the fact that 5 different characters can be unlocked. These characters don't really offer anything unusual, except for them looking different.