Game #1027: Splashdown - Rides Gone Wild

 Nope, this is not a 'Gone Wild" spinoff.

 Splashdown was a surprisingly fun game, and while I don't think the IP ever got as much recognition as it deserved, it at least got enough sales to warrant a sequel, Splashdown: Rides Gone Wild. The game's cover tells you everything you need to know, as the game turned up the wackiness dial but, thankfully, without turning it into a parody of itself.
 

 The modes are: Training, which is a very decent tutorial on how to play the game, Arcade mode which is basically Single player events, Career which is a series of events and multiplayer. The game has one major change in its design, now there's more than just racing, and every event type has its own set of courses. Circuit events are your basic races to the end, you get 8 different themed tracks as well as all 12 'stadium' short tracks. These 8 tracks are the best in the game, and man... they look gorgeous. They are pretty large and they change from lap to lap, sometimes the changes are just visual, other times shortcuts open up if you can spot them. THAT said, these tracks are so intense.... that you'll probably be playing sub 30fps most of the time, which is disappointing. The wackier and crazier the track gets the more slowdown you'll suffer. Then you get Freestyle, which is a Single racer event in which you try to score point on five stadium-themed stages. Then you get Time Trials, single player affairs again, and Technical Time Trials which feature 20 different small tracks. You can race against other racers on these ones.

 As for this new event-driven courses I'm not sure what to make of it. Racing is when the game is at its best, and I'll tell you this, the 8 themed tracks are brilliant and better than anything the previous game had to offer... but you do get less racing 'non-stadium' tracks than the original game. Sure, the Stadium-themed tracks can be used too, but these are a bit boring.... although as a consequence of that, the framerate holds up much better! Plus, as a whole, this game is much bigger in quantity than the original.

 As far as gameplay goes, its basically identical to the previous game. Submarining, Bunny-hopping nad the performance gauge all return and play exactly like they used to. Well, almost. The performance gauge is now tiered, and now you get different tiers of stunts to fill each tier faster. In execution it doesn't really matter. Plus, the original game got the basics so well that not making any major change was probably the right idea.

 At first I wrote in my notes how the new music was very whimsical and tropical and... boring. Turns out that the 8 circuit tracks, by default, play this 'cinematic' music, but you can change it in the in-game pause menu to the licensed music that I expected. The new licensed music is a bit harder sounding that the original, and truth be told, I preferred the original game's soundtrack, but this one isn't bad at ALL.

 I'd hesitate to say that this sequel is superior to the original, while a lot more work went into the new racing tracks and the graphics are definitely better... the game has a lot of framerate issues that the original simply didn't have or didn't have it as bad. So taking the good with the bad... It's just as good as the original, exceeding it in a few areas while being inferior in a few others, which is why I'd find it hard to recommend one over the other.

 8.0