Playstation 2 - BMX XXX

Format
Playstation 2
Publisher
Acclaim
Developer
Z-Axis
Country of origin
US
Genre
Sports

BMX XXX

By David Rasmussen
7th Feb 05

Yup, folks, this is it. The "infamous" "topless bike riding" game from Acclaim.
The people who screwed up The Red Star's video game premiere like nobody's business and who went bankrupt last year. Those people.
But what about this game? Is it as "topless" as it sounds?
Actually... no. Not that I've seen of it at any rate.
I took some time to check this out, and found it to be a rather poorly made BMX game.

With only one interesting mode of gameplay you set out to do "challenges" in rather urban city settings in New York, riding about a city filled with stereotypes. Bad stereotypes. Very bad very nasty stereotypes.
Thus, before I go any further, I want to award BMX XXX the "Chet R. Chase" Award for Bad Stereotyped characters! Congratulations! Your characters are only two steps shy of being worse than the stereotyped characters in the blasphemy "Lil' Pimp" from Sony Pictures, and that's bad considering it's so darn close to a movie that should be considered the "Anti-Animation" of animation!
From the African American individual with the bad choice of clothings and even worse choice of occupation, to the immigrant who runs the weiner wagon, the wise guys with the "corpse" problem, and so on and so forth. This game makes the stereotypes in The Sims : Bustin' Out (GBA) seem downright pleasant and enjoyable by comparison!

Back to the gameplay! Each level has a set of raunchy nasty challenges... raunchy nasty challenges that are NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE to pull off because of the tight time limit! Yeah, you're given a task that should take about 5-10 minutes, and expected to do it in about 1-2 minutes! Way too tight!
Not to mention the fact that the slightest "accident" along the way in any task brings said task to a grinding halt no matter how well your doing! So if you crash, get run over, make a jump wrong, etc. you are disqualified from the challenge your undertaking and have to do it all over again!

Of course this isn't true of all the tasks, but a good amount of the tasks fall under this Mission Impossible directive! I mean how the heck AM I suppose to beat the heck out of a pretty boy band member if I only have 60 seconds to pull it off while performing 10000 points worth of tricks?!? Gimme a break here!

The challenges can be a little easier if you scope out the Challenges board before you start a level... some you can do without even having to sign on for a job, so checking the "board" of challenges beforehand might yield some of these easy to accomplish jobs that'll get the ball rolling on gameplay.

But what are you doing?! Sure the gameplay's raunchy, bad, and just plain terrible but what incentive is there to play? Besides the so-called "humor" that's supposed to make you "bust a nut"... hmm... guess I shouldn't have reviewed Resident Evil : Code Veronica X before this one because I seemed to have missed the "humor" of this game... maybe I'll rent Silent Hill 4 : The Room next since I could use some normalcy after this awful game.

Humor... humor... humor in this sad excuse for a game... humor... the "humor" (if you can really call what they do in this game "humor") isn't as pointed as A Bard's Tale, and it's not as endearing as either Ratchet & Clank : Up Your Arsenal, Sly 2 or Hot Shots Golf Fore!... but it's there. Maybe.
Think of it as MTV meets SPIKE TV style crude humor... which might not be your cup of Cherry Pepsi... it's most certainly not my type of humor.

So what is there then? The gameplay is, oddly enough, solid.
You got at least decently done gameplay, though I can't tell if it's right on BMX mechanics or not since I know about as much about the BMX scene as I do about the goings on at British Parliament. In other words it just looks nicely done but I don't know enough to know I don't know enough to say if it's good or not.

So past the gameplay, Mission Impossible style "challenges", and the so-called dreary and dreadful humor? Would you believe there's... strippers? No, no, when I say that I don't mean in the Grand Theft Auto way.
I mean in the pointless, you do enough on a level and unlock a movie scene of a woman stripping kind of way. Yeah. Pointless. At least in Tony Hawk's Underground you could gain access to a strip club, even if it was a rather lame strip club, but this game has zero access and just unlockable movies.

Worse yet is the fact that... well... despite the fact this game has a M for Mature rating, and boasts Partial Nudity and Mature Sexual Content...? The girls are CENSORED!
Censored?!? What's the point of THAT?!? Considering this game is about as adult as it can be I don't see why they didn't go the extra mile and just show it already (you know what I mean)!

Yeah. Well. That was pointless, much like this game.
Despite the fact that Morgan Webb once (when reviewing the PS2 game Crimson Tears) said you might as well head on over to Scores instead of buy that game? I don't think she meant the virtual "Scores" which is present in this game... you're better off going to the real thing than buying this game.

Want a game that thrashes? Get Tony Hawk's Underground.
Want a game that's adult oriented? I heard that Hefner guy's got his own video game coming out around now for the PS2, so you might as well check that out instead of this. I'll even review it sooner or later since anything has to be better than THIS "game"!

As for this "game"? Guess what! There is NOTHING redeemable about this game!
You want to find the stuff in this game? Guess what! You can find it elsewhere, and find it better done elsewhere at that! Be it the "extreme" action, the questionable "humor" or the adult "content" of this game you would be better served finding it elsewhere. Yes. Find it elsewhere! Find it anywhere else!

This game is a mistake that shouldn't have happened. But, then again, since it came from the people that single handedly butchered The Red Star video game I can't say I'm surprised by my conclusions.
Anyone out there ever feel like making another game about riding bikes around to unlock reluctant strip videos that seem to stop short of showing what it's supposed to show? Do us all a favor and don't do it!
Friends don't let friends make crappy games.
Okay. Let's break it down and wrap it up for easy disposal.

BMX XXX Breakdown
What's Hot? - Yeah. You'd think a game with strippers would be at least passable... heck, it's a game that extolls the virtues of "punishing" pretty boy boy bands so why is it so horrible? Because it is.
With missions that are just timed so badly, characters that are more annoying than loveable (even in a crude sense), and a bonus that mysteriously becomes reluctant despite the fact the game has the most severe M for Mature rating slapped on it I can't see a single thing that's good about this.

Yeah, yeah, the game mechanics seem solid enough, it's just the stuff that wraps around the game that I have severe questions about. Go find another game if you want the thrills of BMX-ing... and I don't know anyone who'd want that so why bother looking for it. Sigh. Move on.

What's Not? - Just about everything about this game is a Not. Yeah. Everything. Forget about it!

Moments to Remember? - Uh... yeah. If I end up having to say the strippers than this game is worse off than I thought. But some of the moves you can pull off in this game is pretty solid... but no amount of slick moves can save this game from itself. Forget I said that one nice thing about this game.

What to Ignore? - Help! I've fallen through the ground and I'm flying through "air"!!
While jumping ramps I've accidentially fallen "through" holes in the game and ended up falling through the "air" for seconds before reacquiring "land" to land on. Eh? What the heck was THAT about?!?
At least when that happens you have the best chance to pull of multiple "tricks" to pass certain "challenges" that require a set amount of tricks pulled off.

Oh, and yes, ignore the fact that the game seems to be shy about excessive nudity in it's "movies" despite the fact the game is SUPPOSED to be a Mature audience game! Gimme a break, people!

Overal1? - Even the most desperate person shouldn't have to buy this game!
Lots of other games does what this game does far better, and they deserve your money more than this... except maybe for the questionable Hefner game... the game? That'd be Playboy : The Mansion... yeah, I'll review that at a later date, but that's another review... like next week.

For this one I'd have to say that you should avoid this game at all costs!
Even if it's selling for dirt cheap prices it's just not worth it. Bypass this game as if it were the plague.
Mostly because it IS the plague, video game wise at least.

NOTE - Remember how I said last time that The Red Star is on it's way to being canceled release wise? Looks like I spoke too soon! The game MIGHT get a May 2005 release and, yeah, NOTHING seems to have been changed on it! Nothing at all! I sense a disturbance in the Force... how about you?

-- David Rasmussen 7th Feb 05

Playstation 2 BMX XXX Images