Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam lets players experience the breakneck speed of downhill skateboard racing as they tear up the steepest terrains in the world while performing tricks and outmaneuvering opponents in locations such as the crowded streets of San Francisco and rocky terrain of Machu Picchu. Developed for the Nintendo Revolution, gamers utilize an innovative and intuitive control system as they take on the role of Tony Hawk or one of nine characters and compete in specific time-based challenges in one of three gameplay modes including race, trick and slalom. Gamers can also challenge friends in head-to-head competitions as they pull off a variety of high-velocity stunts and crashes in living, populated environments filled with cars, pedestrians and buildings.This is the Wii launch title that I’ve had my eye on since it was announced at this year’s E3. I’m no great shakes at the Tony Hawk series; in fact, whenever I play one, I am apparently playing a hilarious minigame of my own invention that revolves around finding new ways to inflict neck and head trauma.
Downhill Jam, though, isn’t a skate game as such, so if you’ve been avoiding the Tony Hawk series until now, this may be of interest to you. Instead, Downhill Jam is a racing game that’s half luge, half Jet Grind Radio. Unfortunately, like all launch-window Wii games, it doesn’t have any online functionality, but you can still take on three of your friends in splitscreen multiplayer.
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You begin a round of Downhill Jam at the top of a steep hill somewhere in the world, and your goal is to get to the finish line first. Instead of being a simple case of starting at point A and moving to point B, each route is covered with shortcuts, secret passages, and places where you can do special tricks. You can grind along curbs and tracks, slide along walls, and generally do whatever it takes to sneak into the lead.
The best part may be that there are very few areas where you can actually fall off a track. Most of the time, you’ll wind up taking a detour instead of suffering a setback, which means you’re actively rewarded for taking crazy chances and exploring the environment.
Playing the game takes some retraining, like all Wii games; you have to abandon years of gaming habits and just wing it, and it’s nothing I was able to master in the time that I spent with the game. You steer your skater by moving the Wii Remote left or right, so you sort of lean with your skater as you turn corners. To put on a brief burst of speed, thrust the Remote forward, and your skater will kick on the nitro-burning death engine that’s hidden somewhere on his or her body. This, in turn, lets you build up an epic head of steam for even more impressive and death-defying stunts.
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The four-player splitscreen game may be the best part of Downhill Jam, because this is a game that was made with smack-talking your friends in mind. You can hit the other racers with the touch of a button, slowing them down or making them slam into the all-too-frequent obstacles. One of the game modes, a disturbingly surreal match that involves stealing the heads off the other skaters, relies upon the strike move to be effective; if you fall behind, it’s over.
Other game types include straightforward racing, another kind of race where you have to constantly get through hoops in order to stay in the game, and an elimination match. Each one has its own unique challenges, and each one is fun in its own way. It’s hard for me to say that it’s guaranteed to be fun, because I absolutely suck at this game, but for every setback and control difficulty I encountered, I found myself wanting to jump back in and give it another try.
Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam is something I’ve grown to expect from the modern Nintendo: a quality four-player party game that makes good use of the Wii’s new hardware. It’s not a traditional Tony Hawk game, which is a point in its favor from my perspective, and like all Wii games, it’s easy to pick up and play after a few minutes of experimentation. Give it a try; it’ll be out at the Wii’s launch.
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