bike

I got this game the first chance I got, plunked it in and started to play.

And I got my [behind] whupped.

I chalked that up to me needing to learn the system. So, I kept on Circuit mode. And I got my [behind] whupped again. And again. And again. I was getting better - landing the jumps, doing the tricks, but damn, the AI was just so cheap, and seemed to have better bikes, better speed, better everything. I kept getting beaten, and not just by a hair. I'm talking last place finishes. Frustration started to set it. It was firmly entrenched 5 days later after countless attempts to beat the second race in circuit mode. THE SECOND RACE!

My point is, Freekstyle is a solid racing game seriously dogged by overly tough AI. The courses, tho cool, are not up to the level of SSX design, and they get old fast, especially considering each heat of a race is three laps, and each race has three heats. That's nine laps per race, people. The tricks are cool, but without the ability to flip and turn, coupled with the fact that it takes much longer to pull off a trick here than in SSX (You need major air to get a double. You'll be lucky if you can pull a trip. Forget about a quad.), you're limited in what you can do in the air. And of course, you get penalized for repeating, but again, you'll exhaust the trick options pretty quickly in this game. And you need to land tricks to get boost, and you absolutely need boost to have a hope of placing in the top three. Throw in a good measure of lady luck and you just might finish first.

This game does have some neat shortcuts, but they're too few and far between, and what's more, they consist of things like a jump that lets you skip a turn in the track. There's nothing that takes you into a completely different part of the board from the track like in SSX and Tricky, save a mine shaft you can drive through in the first board.

Not that I hated the game. The graphics are sharp, the racers pretty cool (Mike Metzger is a goof. He's great.) and the trick animations are awesome. The music is also solid if you're into the New Metal sorta thing. Seems to go with the dirtbike theme well. However, none of these were able to compensate for my frustration with the AI and somewhat bland level design, and I wound up taking this game back and going back to SSX Tricky, which I've been playing somewhat religiously for half a year now and still get a tremendous kick out of.

Bottom line, if you're a bike game nut, and you're good at it, this game's probably for you. If so, please buy it and each time you win, give the computer racers the finger for me.

I borrowed my friend's GB Copy, And LOVED it. So about 6 Months later, I bought the PS2 copy. I got it and tryed it out, but it wouln't load! So I took a paper towel and wiped it down, popped it, and it worked like a charm! Loved it ever since.

IF YOU ASK ME, THIS GAME IS GREAT. BUT YOU SHOULD USE THE MASTER CODE "LOKSMITH". IT WORKS. AND IT'S NOT SPELT WRONG.