Snowboarding is the stuff extreme sports are made of. Where else can you jump out of a helicopter, board down a mountain for a few hundred (or few thousand!) feet, and land safely in a pile of white dust should you stumble and fall? Sure, it could be painful and potentially life-threatening, but it’s better than the Your Flesh vs. Hard Pavement competition that skateboarders have to endure.

Over the years, game developers have brought us several successful snowboarding games, such as 1080 and SSX. Soon we’ll get a crack at Stoked, the first snowboarding game developed in conjunction with a film production company. And right now we have seen the release of Shaun White’s first snowboarding game, appropriately titled Shaun White Snowboarding.

Tentatively based on the life and success of Shaun White, SWS is like SSX with the arcade gameplay cut out of the middle. With a trick system based solely on analog stick movements, SWS conjures a few memories of Skate. And when the collection-based quest sends you up and down each mountain in search of specific coins, SWS may remind you of a 3D platformer.

But none of the three comparisons can sum up SWS exactly; this isn’t a unique snowboarding game, per se, but it is its own game. The developers seem to be dedicated to carving their own path in the snow, creating an experience that is heavily dependant on the player’s ability to navigate while soaring down a mountain.

Like any extreme sports offering, SWS’s single-player campaign is made up of several different events. In SSX and 1080 (or most others that come to mind), each event is handed to the player on a menu screen – push the D-pad, click on an event and start competing. SWS’s setup is much more demanding, with events littered all over the game’s four mountains – Park City, Europe, Japan and Alaska (plus a bonus Target-sponsored if you get the Target Edition) – and the need to seek them out manually before they can be accessed.

In the beginning, your eyes will be so distracted by the rich backgrounds and impressive (though not perfect) snow effects that the event-hopping won’t stand out as being positive or negative. You’ll be amazed at how big the mountains are, most notably the first because its sheer size is so unexpected. When you finally reach the bottom, there’s a simple way to jump back to the top: click the map screen and select any of the available ski lifts or helicopter drop-off points. The game will then automatically transport you to the desired destination.

But what if you’d rather not leave every time you reach the bottom? Maybe you’d like to take a look around and see if there are any events to enter. In most snowboarding games, they don’t offer any kind of post-mountain exploration; among those that do, not a single one I’ve played allows the player to maneuver properly. You just kind of slide around on your board, ram into things, fall over, etc., until you lose interest and decide to leave. SWS is the first game attempting to remedy this problem by allowing players to drop the board and walk around the environment. These controls are by no means impressive and would not qualify for an action game where character movement is mandatory. But the system works – not flawlessly yet still better than the alternative.

Among the events are Death Race (race through the gates to win), Slopestyle (a skill-based competition), Big-Air (score the highest single trick while airborne), Ground Tricks (score as much as possible while on the ground) and Collect (the name says it all). There are grind-based competitions, speed-based events and other variations that fit within the genre mold.

This is the good side of SWS, which could have carried it to victory had it been allowed to stand as is. But there are some gameplay mistakes that bring it down a few notches, and could be the determining factor in whether or not this snowboarding game is right for you.

As environments, the mountains are great. As a hub for events, they aren’t too spectacular. Plan to spend a lot of time searching for each competition, and don’t be surprised if you accidentally select one that you’ve finished more than once. It’s very easy to do since the game does not clearly mark which ones have been completed. You can figure that out from the map screen, but that requires you to leave the game and cycle through a bunch of event icons. Plus, it’s not always clear which icons match the events you’re actually seeing within the game.

Coin collecting – a necessary task in order to finish the game (and the only way to score Focus abilities, which allow you to perform SSX-style speed boosts, among other things) – is a cool addition that can be very frustrating. Though the controls work well, the super-slippery, often steep and frequently narrow environments are most difficult near the areas of each coin. There were several times when I missed a coin by a few feet, got in a helicopter, flew back to the top and missed the coin a second, third or fourth time by a few feet! At best, the whole process is tedious; at worst, it’s downright boring.

With these things in mind, you might want to play Shaun White Snowboarding for a bit before making a final purchasing decision.

Gameplay: 7.4
The trick mechanics are very easy to learn and should be well received by those who are entirely new to extreme sports games. Those who have experienced the genre before, however, may not be as amused. And while the mountain presentation is easy to love, the event layout (and some of the events themselves) is rather bland. Coin collecting is moderately fun but also very tedious. SSX fans will love the Focus abilities, which allow you to board faster, jump higher, and plow through various objects. Other players, however, are not likely to care for them.

Graphics: 8.0
The mountainous environments are visually deep.

Sound: 6.0
Is it rock? Is it rap? Is it a cover song from some band you've never heard of? Actually, it's all those things and not much more.

Difficulty: Easy/Medium
The stunt system is a breeze but the mountain designs are fairly difficult to navigate.

Concept: 7.0
Nothing brand-new or eye-popping; just an arcade-oriented snowboarding game.

Multiplayer: 7.0
Integrated as a part of the main game, SWS allows you to jump from a single-player competition to multiplayer events without leaving the current mountain. It's a decent addition that will only be enjoyed by those who like the mechanics, environments, competition types, etc., that the rest of the game has to offer.

Overall: 7.3
A mixed bag of elements that are either very cool, frustrating or bland, Shaun White Snowboarding doesn't live up to the expectation of becoming the new snowboarding champion.