Championship Surfer

To anybody who has ever surfed (or even wanted to surf), Champion Surfing is a slap in the face. Not only does it not recreate the rush of surfing, but it fails so miserable that it isn't good for anything.

Graphically a game like this has only a couple of choices. Champion Surfer chooses to look at your character from a front diagonal view. You can zoom in if you want, but everything is pretty much done like every other Tony Hawk rip off. The problem is very simple, the game lacks much change, and the depth in the game play is short lived.

In Tony Hawk you could play for months, maybe even years, and hone your skills ... but in Champion Surfer after you've mastered the waves you never really get much better. The game is also terribly dull. Catching a really gnarly wave should look a whole lot more spectacular than it does here.

Even the control feels loose. The whole control hinges on getting up and staying up. While granted that's really a lot of what surfing is about, I don't think that's the way surfers look at it. Also, there isn't enough to do here to keep your attention. The different tasks, and the various circuits aren't too different from each other, and everything is marred by the tragedy that is the control.

It's hard to compare this game to other surfing titles, since all pretty much end up like this. But as extreme sports games go, this is on the bottom on the barrel. In fact, I don't know what's harder wrestling the control or finding something good to say about this game.