SSX (2012) Catch-All

Man, do I suck at this or what? I do. I haven't played an SSX game in a long, long time and it shows. A lot.

Blind_Evil wrote:

All this chatter makes me want to buy.

Hoping to pick it up on the cheap sometime in the next month.

when I booted it up tonight i got the message that i had five friends playing SSX. And then a sixth logged on. And then I got two friend requests related directly to the game.

And I keep dropping lower on the leaderboards.

And loving it every minute.

Mine's waiting at work for pickup tomorrow, which is D&D night ... hope to start catching up to you launch-day people on Thursday!

Ludditus wrote:

Mine's waiting at work for pickup tomorrow, which is D&D night ... hope to start catching up to you launch-day people on Thursday!

Thursday is launch day for some of us international Goodjers.

My commitment to wait for price drop on this one is wavering. I'd only be able to play it on the PS3 (which is fine by me) since EA has screwed up my Xbox gamertag (long story), so I'd be in the smaller crew. However, I looked at upcoming releases, and nothing excites me for the next few months (I'm still playing through Mass Effect 2, so the sequel purchase is on pause for now). Here's the Giant Bomb quick look for further enablement.

Minarchist wrote:

MOTHER OF GOD, rickyyo. I went back to re-run a short trick line in the Alps, and barely beat Shaol's respectable score (itself like 60% more than the gold time). Then you post a run that's nearly double mine?

So after some practice, and likely gear that's 4 levels higher than his, I did beat this score by a couple mil.

If anyone asks you how awesome this game is, the correct answer is: SO awesome. I haven't had this much fun in a long time, and the multiplayer just works so very, very well. I had some difficulty adjusting to the new control scheme (I know the old option was there, but figured this was probably improved in some way) -- I kept trying to use the RS to connect combos on the ground, pre-spin tricks with the d-pad, etc. At any rate, I think I'm mostly broken of those habits at this point, and the RS control scheme seems to work really well. It's also nice that trees don't present quite the game-killing obstacles they used to; I think the devs made up for this by making many runs that are sheer drops on either side of a pretty narrow course.

Does the LS control when carving feel way more exaggerated to anyone than it used to be? I find myself waaaay over-steering most of the time, and going way off-course. I guess I need to think more Forza and less Burnout.

This game makes me want to drink Mountain Dew to keep up with its extremeness.

Good thing I like Mountain Dew.

Just got my confirmation call that stock is in, and will be released tomorrow. I've also asked them to call me back if anyone breaks the street date embargo so I can go and get it today.

If that doesn't happen, I'll be down there at 8am to grab my copy as soon as they open. Now I just need to make sure the kids are tired out enough in the morning so they 'need' a nap around lunchtime.

Minarchist wrote:

Does the LS control when carving feel way more exaggerated to anyone than it used to be? I find myself waaaay over-steering most of the time, and going way off-course. I guess I need to think more Forza and less Burnout.

I thought that was just me because I'm playing on the PS3 and the stick is so loose compared to a 360 controller. Good point about the more "sim" way of thinking.

This is everything I could have dreamed for the reinvention of one of my favorite franchises. This should inform other attempts to do the same with other franchises.

However, I really wish this had an instant restart like Trackmania. When I'm juiced on caffeine it really sucks to wait that 3-5 seconds

Aaron D. wrote:

It's stupid addictive.

Truth. And when you get the notification that a friend whose score you'd previously beat because of that feature has come back and topped your score? Even more addictive. And getting credits while off-line for people who have challenged your scores as rivals and failed? Awesome.

What does everyone think of the survival modes so far? I've really been enjoying most of them. I did avalanche this morning before work and that was the most fun so far. The flysuit stuff is really cool, too. Personally, after seven peaks, I've struggled with the ice axes more than anything else -- probably due to my tendency to oversteer, which that level only exaggerates.

Global events seem really fun so far, too. You are competing against your friends scores, but you're also competing against others in real-time as they run the event, and there are lots of prize tiers. I ran the big-ass trick one four times until I got a respectable score; I may go back and run it again with better gear.

garion333 wrote:
Minarchist wrote:

Does the LS control when carving feel way more exaggerated to anyone than it used to be? I find myself waaaay over-steering most of the time, and going way off-course. I guess I need to think more Forza and less Burnout.

I thought that was just me because I'm playing on the PS3 and the stick is so loose compared to a 360 controller. Good point about the more "sim" way of thinking.

I've read that instead of using left/right directions on the stick to steer, it helps if you keep the LS pointed forward and slide around the top curve of the plastic circle at the base of the stick between 9 and 3 o'clock. This give you finer control than hard left/right.

The Recommendation feature in this game is insidious.

When you finish a run it says, "Hey, your friends are competing on X slope. Wanna give it a go?". The kicker is that it sets the easiest time/score to beat as your rival. So it may say something like, "Why not go after Joe Blow's score?" and when I look at the rankings, Mr. Blow may have a best time of 2:00. But when I look at other friend's scores, they're likely in the 1:30 range, so I say to myself, "Oh hell yeah, I can beat Joe's score!", and immediately press A to drop into the competition.

It's stupid addictive.

Yeah, it's a gas to see other players competing on the same drop in real-time in Global events.

I'm primarily a single-player guy, but having live players competing in an indirect manner (i.e. I'm just doing my own thing regardless of their progress) is golden.

Really enjoying this as well. I swore to myself I would stick to only Strategy and RPGs due to my old age but waxing nostalgic over the original SSX put me on this one. OptimisticGWJ if you want to add me.

Aaron D. wrote:
garion333 wrote:
Minarchist wrote:

Does the LS control when carving feel way more exaggerated to anyone than it used to be? I find myself waaaay over-steering most of the time, and going way off-course. I guess I need to think more Forza and less Burnout.

I thought that was just me because I'm playing on the PS3 and the stick is so loose compared to a 360 controller. Good point about the more "sim" way of thinking.

I've read that instead of using left/right directions on the stick to steer, it helps if you keep the LS pointed forward and slide around the top curve of the plastic circle at the base of the stick between 9 and 3 o'clock. This give you finer control than hard left/right.

Hmm, I was already doing that. I know I need to put more time in before everything clicks. Right now I'm thinking too much about my movement.

I backed out. Maybe on sale for $40.

garion333 wrote:
Aaron D. wrote:

I've read that instead of using left/right directions on the stick to steer, it helps if you keep the LS pointed forward and slide around the top curve of the plastic circle at the base of the stick between 9 and 3 o'clock. This give you finer control than hard left/right.

Hmm, I was already doing that. I know I need to put more time in before everything clicks. Right now I'm thinking too much about my movement.

Yeah, same here. I was hoping that you wouldn't have to press forward anymore to maintain speed, but it appears that you still do. I do wish there was something like a "mouse sensitivity" setting for the LS.

I haven't actually tried one of those yet, but I'm going to have to assume that it's a one-time fee.

Question about Global events.

Most are have an entrance fee, but is that a onetime only thing?

If I spend 50K to get into a heat and blow it on the first run, I'm not keen on paying to try again. Also, if you can retry for free as much as you want in a session, does that carry over to different sit-down times (turn off the console and come back the next day to try again)?

EDIT:

Forgot to mention that I really appreciate the "Press X to optimize loadout" option before each run starts. I accumulated a bit of gear last night and it was great to just press a single button to equip the highest rated and most appropriate gear for that particular drop.

It's a one-time fee, and you can definitely come back to them when you get bumped down a bracket (which the game notifies you of).

Are all the fee-based ones right now user-generated? I only did the two or three that appeared to be dev-created and had no entry fee.

Minarchist wrote:

Are all the fee-based ones right now user-generated? I only did the two or three that appeared to be dev-created and had no entry fee.

No

Blew off some things I shouldn't have last night. After dying a whole lotta times beating my face against walls in Patagonia last night I tried a run on Explore. Liquid, you have some work to do in Alaska.

I'm also finding the steering too sensitive. I never thought I would EVER say this but I miss the d-pad for that. I keep forgetting myself in the middle of combos and trying to run rotation with it.

momgamer wrote:

I'm also finding the steering too sensitive. I never thought I would EVER say this but I miss the d-pad for that. I keep forgetting myself in the middle of combos and trying to run rotation with it.

I'm not 100% sure if I'm interpreting this statement correctly, but if you're talking about trying to pre-wind tricks, the effect the LS has on your movement is drastically reduced if you're holding down jump (either A or RS down; I prefer A). You can still veer off-course, but it helps a lot.

No, that's not it. In the original games, you handled steer and rotation with your d-pad. I preferred it over the stick. And sometimes I forget that doesn't work at all anymore and move over to the d-pad, usually when I have fingers flying in all directions during a combo string. This is a not-so-good thing.

Another part of the problem is I bought a new and much better board right before the last run last night and I can't do a thing with it.

I gave the new controls a pretty hard workout last night. I'm going to re-do the training and Rockies missions with button controls, and then with Classic to see which ones I really prefer. I need adjust my muscle-memory and grind some levels anyways.

Played through a good chunk of the world tour mode or whatever it is called. Yeah, I'm completely sold on the game. It is a bit faster than SSX of old but it's just as fun. I love how much more open the slopes are... there are all sorts of paths, shortcuts, hidden routes and goodies all over. I'm digging the new control scheme with the face buttons; don't like the analog stick as I lose too much accuracy but the buttons work great.

Once I started remembering how to link tricks together and working the boost/tricky meter I started to remember how brilliant this series really is. Love the push-your-luck element with combo linking and all that. Skateboarding games give you that as well but I feel like those have just kept getting too complicated. There's certainly something to be said for the sheer simplicity of SSX.

Can't wait to finish up the world tour and dive into actually putting down scores and times! I think this game is going to pretty much consume me for awhile.

momgamer wrote:

Liquid, you have some work to do in Alaska. ;)

It's done been brought.

Momgamer, I think there's a control layout that lets you use the D-Pad for steering.

There's actually 3 control types, but only two are mentioned in the sky-dive tutorial...Standard [both sticks] and Classic [L-stick and face buttons]. If you go into the options menu there's a 3rd option that is mapped just like the old-school SSX titles. I'm not sure what it's called as I haven't tried that scheme.

I fought my muscle memory pretty hard for a few hours, but I think the new control scheme just works better in the long run. Your hands have to move around the controller less, and you can reach more of the important controls simultaneously (this becomes crucial on survival runs when you need a hit of oxygen or something). It's worth working through the pain, IMO.

LiquidMantis wrote:
momgamer wrote:

Liquid, you have some work to do in Alaska. ;)

It's done been brought.

No, more like tripped over on the way through. rickkyo brought it and left it behind for all of us to deal with.