That said, there are also other side missions which help drive not only the narrative of the story, but also give you an idea of where you are on the mountain and help orientate your position.  Collecting the coins is a great way to learn the mountain, but it’s also massively annoying when you pass a coin which is either way above your or somewhere you can’t see.  This will see you trekking back up the mountain to find a route that will take you to the coin. It’s a tedious game mechanic which has sadly been given too much prominence by the developer.

Even though you can get off your board at any time, or place a checkpoint so you can warp straight back to a location to try a trick or jump again, you don’t want to be doing it in a bid to find coins for Shaun.  You want to be placing markers when you’re playing with friends online, and with the ability to invite people into your game from within your solo run is a great bit of innovation from Ubisoft.  At any one time up to 15 other boarders can be found hovering around your white wonderland, with up to eight people getting involved in some powdery-snowboarding fun.

At its heart, Shaun White Snowboarding isn’t a bad game it just suffers when compared to the genre classics.  We’ve also played the Wii version of the game and, whilst the pared-down visuals are nowehere near the 360 version, the gameplay is streets ahead.


Shaun White Snowboarding delivers a game experience that feels a little confused. It’s not a simulator, nor is it just a fun arcade ride, it’s somewhere in between, and this is the game’s biggest problem.   Although it’s quirky and it has some interesting gameplay elements, I found myself yearning tfor the kind of excitement you get from the more exagerrated titles (eg. SSX Tricky) Bigger jumps, bigger tricks, bigger fun. Realism can be a plus in gaming, but sometimes it comes at the expense of fun and Shaun White Snowboarding doesn’t quite know what sort of game it wants to be.

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