14 DAY TRIAL // I knew it! I knew there'd be a time when the Wii's motion sensitive control would suck. Not that I wanted it to suck but I just knew it. Hear this: SSX Blur is a snowboarding video game published by EA Sports BIG and developed by EA Montreal for the Wii, right? The game control uses both the Wiimote and the Nunchuk controller. Movement, speed, and jumping are controlled through the Nunchuck. When airborne, players use the Wiimote to make tricks. The Wiimote is also used for throwing snowballs at targets or foes during a race. Pretty neat!
Now, 1UP's Andrew Pfister gave it a 5.5 (that's average with their ranking system) and it made a 75% score on GameRankings - better than the previous grading but not enough to scream the winner title for the Wii. Andrew's thoughts, in his February review on the game, were that "...it always feels like you're racing against the course instead of using the course to score points and recharge boost so you can beat your real competitors." True. The Wii is first of all a fun to play console. That's what Nintendo banked on right from the start. If a game gets too difficult to play, people lose interest.
OK. Then Gamasutra talked to EA Montreal's Eric Chartrand, after finishing work on SSX Blur. Of course, the man couldn't take a time out until he answered some questions, thus he explained why people misunderstood his intentions with the game, mainly in regards to the control scheme:
"The reaction to the game was very... how can I say that... interesting." (we're certainly dotting the "I"s here, what can I say). "We got very, very good reviews and very, very bad ones. Some said they thought we provided the best of the control scheme currently on the Wii, while others thought it was the worst. I think it is mostly the same for all Wii games: the public, the game industry and the reviewers are not at all aligned with each other. So those kind of extreme reactions are to be expected. All in all, I think we delivered a damn fine game." Of course he's going to say that. Ever heard a game developer saying "we've just released a game that blows, but we hope you'll buy it and play cause it uses the Wiimote?" No. And certainly this is not the case here. Although I haven't played the game, I'm sure it doesn't suck. After all, it got 75% on GameRankings. That's not so bad.
But, where are those "very, very good reviews" anyway? I'm not hearing anyone saying SSX Blur this and SSX Blur that. Quite frankly, this is the first time I've heard of a Wii port of the game.