Pass me a Towel (Wave Race - Blue Storm (GC))

Member Name: Dringostarr

Product:	Wave Race - Blue Storm (GC)
Date:	03/08/02 (45 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: REALISTIC you'll need a wet suit, Brilliant to play after you get used to it

Disadvantages: Takes a while to get into, Control questions, Commentator must die

I loved Wave Race 64, sadly my copy disappeared and I was left Wave Raceless and so when Nintendo announces a sequel I am very keen indeed. Wave Race: Blue Storm is part of the same series of games as 1080 Snowboarding (the sequel to that is cleverly named 1080 Snowboarding: White Storm), it incorporates tricks, incredibly realistic water effects and much like its older brother shows how the rest of the industry should be making water racers? or does it.

Preliminary reports of Wave Race had been positive, magazines scoring it highly and graphics that seemed frankly unbelievable. What I got wasn?t that, admittedly the graphics is nothing less than stunning, water splashing up against the screen, marine life such as whales, dolphins and pikes can be seen and each wave is different to the last, it is so realistic you?ll end up playing the game with your coat on. But the water effects is the only stunning factor graphically, the characters look good but at times seem poorly drawn and the trackside scenery is dreadful and something that ruined the realistic feel of the game. But as we all know graphics aren?t everything and so what of the gameplay, if you get frustrated easily this is not the game for you, whereas most Gamecube games are easy to play hard to master this one is hard to play even harder to master. I despise the control system of the game, turning is such an incredibly infuriating experience and only once you learn how to turn tighter by holding down and a direction or the L and R buttons does it every begin to get easy. And then there is the crashing, and you will do this a lot, the buoys are so annoyingly placed that you need to go really out of your way to go round them and by doing that your heading in the complete wrong direction and you slam into a wall! Then to top it off your rider falls off the Jet Ski and this is where it gets really annoying he/she takes a good 6 seconds to get back on and your pounding the buttons helplessly to try and
get him/her back on (although it does nothing) and the commentator will say ?Come on get back on? and you feel like yelling back ?I CAN?T HELP IT?, once your rider gets back on you need to swing the Jet Ski around to get back on track and now your in last position and more often or not by trying to turn around you?ll crash again. In several races I have been first for the entire race only to smack into a wall at the end and to roll over the line in 8th place.

So the game is frustrating, but you will learn to play it well, you will reduce the falling and crashing, you?ll learn where the buoys are and how to get round them easier. And despite the frustrating problems there are bits in the game that feels so much like the Wave Race we know and love, leaping over ramps and landing on nearby drivers, pulling off a flip in the air, boosting past everyone to get in first and there is some nice new touches too as you can now smash through the scenery, smashing down walls and leaping through wooden buildings all add to that smart feeling and you can?t help but watch your friends cringe as you held towards a building only to smash through it. And there I move onto another problem, friends. Super Monkey Ball and Smash Brothers: Melee were going to be the obvious choice for early multiplayer fun on the Gamecube but Wave Race could have made the 4 player mode at least slightly interesting and considering how hard it is for new players a handicap option would have been useful.

So in conclusion I have a game that has enough graphical flair to keep you happy, we have realistic sounds that are only ruined by the commentary (that can be turned off), a game that is difficult to master so will take you a while to complete, and a nice stunt mode with a competitive racing affair makes it an all round good experience. Just be warned you won?t like this game too well for the first day or so give it time and it will all grow on you and it will eventually live up to its aw
esome prequel.


Dringo

Summary: