Trials HD review

Caution: This product contains scenes and activities that are highly addictive. Gamer discretion is advised.

Welcome to Trials HD, the visual ‘addiction’ your Xbox 360 has been desperately seeking, for a very long time. You play as a trial’s biker and must (in simple terms) complete levels by jumping, balancing, loop-de-looping, flying and crashing to see how many bones you can break. All in all, it’s fantastic.

First thing you notice, is that this is a quality product. From the first screens, the loading of the menus is incredibly quick. The rendering is hardly noticeable and the fluidity due to having no waiting times is impeccable. Instant restarts, game changes etc. never cease to amaze me, maps load instantly and it’s not because they aren’t detailed either.

The game graphically, is beautiful. Every object and obstacle has high resolution dynamic shadowing and the animations of rider and bike react with stunning realism. Okay, realism with the track design isn’t exactly… true, especially with the idea of having an explosive barrel perched under a plank that crumbles away. OR, having a jump go over a burning pit probably wouldn’t pass stringent health and safety regimes. What it does do however, is offer excitement.

A gamer said it himself: “I find myself moving the pad a lot, to try and help balance”, and it’s so true! With every slip of grip, every stumble and near crash moment, you’ll find yourself shifting weight not only in digital form, but also on your sofa. Never before has a game been so absorbing and addictive to make me do such a thing, it’s fantastic!

Okay, so it’s a bike game. Ride a few planks, do a few jumps easy… HA! How wrong could one person be? Throughout stages you will pass checkpoints. These serve as restart points for less experienced gamers and are useful for first play through’s of maps to get to learn the layouts in order to perfect them. There are 5 levels of difficulty, ranging from an introduction to hair tearing out of skull and screaming in rage and still come back for more level for the highly infected. Think you’re a gaming god? Well, this will test your metal.

Controls are easy and basic to get to grips with, but rewarding to master. Throttle and break are handled by the triggers, weight shifting by the left stick, Y is to bail out and B is checkpoint restart. If you’re a completionist and a perfectionist, pressing select instantly restarts the map from the begining.

Sound is also a key part to this game. There’s hardly any “cheese” in it, a solid thumping soundtrack is played subtlely in the background which is really fitting and doesn’t hamper concentration. Voice overs are rare and involve “woooooooooooohooooooooooo” over big jumps and “OUCH!” *crunch* for when things don’t go to plan.

Extras in the game are unlocked through main game progression. Get so many Gold medals and you unlock “Skill Games” which range from hurling yourself down the biggest staircase ever devised to see how many bones you break, to seeing how far you can travel across a course whilst being set on fire. Each add their own little competitive quality as you battle it out with your friends for bragging rights on the leaderboards.

Which leads nicely to the leaderboards and lack of multiplayer. Due to the games design, side scrolling racing games are notoriously difficult to make 2 player or 4 player so what the designers cleverly decided to do, was add a leaderboard for every level and a progression bar showing where you stand compared to your friends on each stage. This is a perfect idea, as introducing ghost bikes showing competitors would distract you, where as this is just enough information without getting confusing. Also worth mentioning, is the ability to insantly watch every competitors best times or scores via the leaderboard by dowloading their replay. Brilliant addition!

All in all, as I stated from the start, this is a quality product. In fact, I’m surprised that this is an Arcade title as it includes and perfects the 5 must haves for a stella retail game: Good graphics, great soundtrack, longevity, multiplayer (ish) and fantastic gameplay. Without a doubt, one not to miss and is sure to fill a massive gap of gaming drought prior to the Christmas bombardment of 5 star games.