What do you get when you mix snowboarding, arcade racing, and animals? You get Slopecrashers, and it feels like a mix of SSX and Mario Kart. Developed by byteparrot, Slopecrashers has a mix of events to play through including races, time trials, slaloms, and boss battles. On top of that each character has their own ratings for things like speed and stunts. The demo I played also showed that there a ruthless and tough snowboarding game to be found beneath the friendly exterior.
The Slopecrashers demo, available on Steam, is quite generous. There is the tutorial which gives you the basics, a short campaign, and an arcade mode that lets you race on the three courses that are unlocked, out of a total of seven by my count. The slopes available are Snowman Slope, Snowy Mountain, and Neon City.
Snowman Slope and Snowy Mountain feel pretty similar, while Neon City shows the glimpse of some of the more outlandish snowboarding locations you’ll visit, with this map having cars driving around that you can hit and the race taking place through a construction site and shopping centre. Already, I was looking out for the shortcuts that would get me ahead of my opponents, though only managed to access a couple.
Throughout the demo, Slopecrashers showcases a decent variety of activities to enjoy. Races can have items included or turned off, with items being weapons or boosts to help in classic kart racing fashion – fireworks to launch at opponents, balloons to lift opponents of the ground, and more. If you get caught by a balloon, there is a bit of button mashing to get free of them. Respawning back onto the track is similar too, and there are plenty of areas where you can fall of the edge.
The boosts include chillis and a rocket that help you speed up, but to really keep up with the pack you will need to hit the jumps and grinding bars to perform tricks, filling up your boost meter allowing you to speed up temporarily. Characters also come equipped with gliders as there are some big gaps to cross occasionally and trying to jump across will result in failure. Both boards and gliders have ratings similar to characters including speed and handling, so creating the perfect pair will be essential to success.
Time trials pit you against ghosts of other characters as you try to get from the start to the finish as quickly as possible, and you will really need to pay attention and be almost perfect to really reach for a gold. It appears the gold ghost knows all of the shortcuts on the tracks, and know when to boost so it will take time to challenge for that medal. Other events include the slalom, where you have to go weave through gates of alternating colours in an effort to keep your time down, a boost package event where you need to collect items to give boosts, and boss battles, such as where a giant snowman called Hamster is snowboarding, with your aim to get his health down before reaching the end of the course. It was very entertaining to play, as you have to juggle keeping your speed up, avoiding Hamster’s obstacles, performing tricks, and firing projectiles at him.
Though it’s been regularly updated by byteparrot, the Slopecrashers demo is an alpha preview of the game so there are some things that will likely be tightened up before a full release. While each character has their own handling rating, some turns do feel a bit too wide and slow, leading to you sliding off course edges. Additionally, there is one section in Neon City towards the end where you go down a large chute where the camera just spins and you cannot really get a sense of direction. The full release will have more characters, a Grand Prix mode, and both online and local multiplayer.
Slopecrashers does capture that feeling of arcade fun, with it’s array of animal characters, and variety of events and challenges, all of which is wrapped up in a colourful and friendly package. Underneath that is the potential of a challenging and versatile snowboarding game that could really see a casual competitive audience build up for it.
