Discussion

[Editor's Note: Time can be a cruel mistress, and the worst victims in her wake are sports games. In the slow process of building this site, I knew I'd eventually have to face reviewing / discussing them. Aside from Tecmo Bowl NES, and to a degree Blades of Steel NES, I am the last person on earth you want reviewing them. I'm terrible at them. This is especially true when it comes to anything 'extreme'. I don't know anything about sports. I can tell you if the game is player friendly, though. Take most sports reviews on this site with a grain of salt. ]

The PlayStation got stuck in a really oddball rut in the late 90s that to this day I still shudder at when looking through the manuals of that era's games. Everything, and I mean everything, had to be extreme. There was one point where like, 3 snowboarding games, 2 scooter racing games, 5 skateboarding games and others all hit in one week of release. At least, that's what it felt like.

That being said, I can honestly say that MTV Snowboarding was a worthy attempt at the genre, specifically in the presentation. In one player mode, you can see the game's frame rate put up the best fight to be as smooth as possible, with only minor stutters. The hills you can race down are all different and each with unique style. Unlike other games where it's essentially a single path, here alternate routes present themselves; jumps over 'dead zones' and nifty half-pipe placements make replaying the stages a positive experience. You can even make your own course.

Character selection is the usual by-committee; politically correct set of generic race relations. You can choose from several boards, and the control is more or less competent, but not quite easy to use. In fact, in the 30 minutes I played for, I couldn't score higher than 1000 points; I couldn't land half the tricks, and the game subtracts from your score should you falter.

Oddly enough, the music is actually a great selection of real bands, but somewhat confusing track picks. The first two songs that come blaring at you are “Cars” and “Jesus Built my Hot Rod.” Considering there are no vehicles in the entire game, they seemed like poor choices to me.

MTV Snowboarding was a licensing machine that literally advertises its music selection before its game, which essentially tells you what the motivation for it would be should you want it.
 

• The following bands are featured on the soundtrack:
  • Blink 182
  • Ministry
  • Fear Factory
  • H20
  • Face to Face
  • Voodoo Glow Skulls
  • Pulley
  • Lagwagon
  • Ten Foot Pole
  • Joi
     
• There are over 17 different advertised products / companies in the game, not including the MTV license.
   
• Inside the manual are ads for the VHS versions of The Real World: Hawaii.