Trials HD on XBLA

[spadgy]

No thread about this yet as far as I can tell, so here goes?

Who's playing this little beauty? If you like Excite Bike or Motorcross Maniacs, it's going to be right up your street. Really simple, but very precise controls. Gets really tough. Score focused. Very short levels. Amazing extra mini-games. Shit loads of explosions. Instant list of friends' scores when you finish a level. Insanely hard to put down. Feels every part like an arcade extreme sports title.

I love it - anybody else loosing hours to it?

[Lordstar]

I really dont like it. Sure its HD but it has little graphical charm and its not worth the 1200 points its selling itself at right now.
if it was cheaper and it looked more quirky instead of some shitty generic home brew bull shit i would be a lot more in to it.

[Khan]

its 1200 points!?!?! I was going to buy it and originally thought it was 800?

[Lordstar]

aparentley it was going to be 600-800 but it got a little hype and then it was released in a dry spell = 1200 points.

[Bootaaay]

The price is a bit much, but it's quite a fun game - although it gets waaaaay too hard too quickly imo, some of the later levels are so damn frustrating.

[E. Randy Dupre]

The price is about £10. If you honestly class that as too much, then I'm puzzled as to how you managed to afford the console in the first place.

It's easily worth that price, too - it's helluva addictive. Stupidly difficult in places - I'll never complete the last three courses, because my patience won't last long enough (and I can't even get over the first gap on the last one) - but great fun.

There's something a bit unfortunate about somebody complaining about a game's visuals while ignoring its gameplay on Shmups.com, of all places.

[msm]

yeah this is an awesome game, one of the best this year so far imo, easy worth the money. it's so addictive it's rediculous, great difficulty curve too

[Zaarock]

I'm playing this a lot, love the game. I've got no faults on every track until the last three extreme levels and am making some custom tracks which I try to make very polished. Send me a friend request if you want to try the tracks out, too bad there isnt a public track sharing system. A lot of other people have made some great custom tracks as well.

I dont see how the graphics are bad at all and they follow the graphics style from the previous Trials games.

[Damocles]

After seeing Zaarock on it for seemingly days at a time I decided to try out the demo. It's good stuff, but I could see myself wasting too many hours trying to perfect every track and constantly restarting. I don't think I need that type of game right now. Even the demo was addictive as hell.

[Doctor Fugue]

The game is great. Rock-solid controls, more interesting designs than the earlier games, and near-perfect learning curve for me. I might find some faults (hah!) if I were to write a full review but overall it's fantastic and terribly addictive. I finally managed to stop playing a week ago.

Zaarock, I don't like making tracks, but I would definitely like to try some new ones. My skills are not the greatest, but I have at least gone through all the tracks. Is Zaarock your gamertag?

[Zaarock]

After seeing Zaarock on it for seemingly days at a time I decided to try out the demo. It's good stuff, but I could see myself wasting too many hours trying to perfect every track and constantly restarting. I don't think I need that type of game right now. Even the demo was addictive as hell.

Yeah, it sure gets addictive. Luckily the controls and stuff are nice and precise for the harder tracks, so you do become much more skilled overall with practice.

Fugue: yeah, my GT is Zaarock. I only have three tracks up right now, I spent a long time on them and havent worked on more in a while (getting addicted to Ninja Gaiden 2 again )

[nem]

it got a little hype and then it was released in a dry spell

Trials was a summer of arcade release between Splosion Man and Shadow Complex (three games in three weeks), so I would hardly call it a dry spell.

It's a great game and well worth the points

[Khan]

The price is about £10. If you honestly class that as too much, then I'm puzzled as to how you managed to afford the console in the first place.

It's easily worth that price, too - it's helluva addictive. Stupidly difficult in places - I'll never complete the last three courses, because my patience won't last long enough (and I can't even get over the first gap on the last one) - but great fun.

There's something a bit unfortunate about somebody complaining about a game's visuals while ignoring its gameplay on Shmups.com, of all places.

Some commercial games are £10 and better, I would personally say 1200 points is too much for this game look at MVC2 I would also factor in the lastability of the game and to me it looks like theres not much to go back to.

[E. Randy Dupre]

Oh dear. Trials HD *is* a commercial game. What with it being sold for money, and all. That's partly what commercial means.

[Zaarock]

I would also factor in the lastability of the game and to me it looks like theres not much to go back to.

It's a time-attack based game with leaderboards where you can watch replays and there is a great editor through which you can create tracks as complex as the default ones.. I fail to see the lack of replayability.

[Khan]

Oh dear. Trials HD *is* a commercial game. What with it being sold for money, and all. That's partly what commercial means.

Actually technically speaking its being sold for points. Point is for a game on live it is over priced and what im saying is I could go out and buy elder scrolls oblivion for £9.99 the game is on my shelf and available in box form for me to trade sell on ect and go back to whenever i feel like and the game offers hours of game play and replay beyond belief.

I personally dont believe trials is worth 1200 points, time attack mode for replayability? oh come on man they could have done better than that for robbing me of 1200 points.

Battlefield 1943, Super street fighter 2 HD remix, MVC2, are all 1200 points but I can guarantee they will outlast trials in the replay value.

[Elixir]

Every man and his dog whines about 1200 point games. I don't think there has been a single game released at 1200 points that people haven't complained about.

[Damocles]

I personally dont believe trials is worth 1200 points, time attack mode for replayability? oh come on man they could have done better than that for robbing me of 1200 points.

Battlefield 1943, Super street fighter 2 HD remix, MVC2, are all 1200 points but I can guarantee they will outlast trials in the replay value.

Robbery! I say! Heh.

We're not talking fifty bucks for a game with four short tracks and a level editor. We're talking 10-15 for a game that has no pretensions about what it is. It's a time trials game where you go for speed and perfection. ...and theres a level editor. This is a very odd argument on a shmups forum.

[E. Randy Dupre]

I personally dont believe trials is worth 1200 points, time attack mode for replayability? oh come on man they could have done better than that for robbing me of 1200 points.

Like Damocles says, this is yet another bizarre argument for somebody on this board to be making. Also, how are they robbing you of anything? I thought you weren't buying it.

With points. That you pay for with money.

[dcharlie]

fantastic game that's worth every point.

[spadgy]

I've easily got my 1200 MS points worth out of it. I know it does get very hard pretty quick, but after just a few tries on a new course, the seemingly impossible quickly becomes something you can easily achieve, and the resulting leap in your own skill makes return to the earlier 'easy' courses really exciting, as you discover new quirks and routes.

I love the level of control you can mastee with such simple inputs.

The achievement point (I succeed on Friday), where you have to complete the 'Groundhog Returns' level without adjusting your balance at all might one my favourite achievement ever. It made me learn so much more about what you can do with the game.

If you like the Skate series, you should love this...

[Daigohji]

Kickstart II was one of my favourite Spectrum games, so it goes without saying that I snapped this one up. It's a lot of fun, but insanely frustrating on the later levels. I lost count of the number of times an 85 degree incline made my rider backflip onto his head at the slightest mistake on the throttle.

[Zaarock]

Heheh. By the way, for anyone trying to no-fault the hard tracks the two hardest tracks in the hard set are Technique and King of the Hill, the others took me far less time. I actually found the first extreme track to be a bit easier than king of the hill, though I ended up getting no-fault and platinum on king of the hill right after I finally learned the trick to doing the backflip part of the track.

The first extreme track made me realize the importance and fun of using the brakes, I had mostly ignored them before and after learning how to use them effectively a lot of old obstacles seemed much easier and there were fun time trial techniques to discover. Also, it is important to notice that a back and forth swaying motion causes much more sway.

[JAPJAC]

Trails HD is one of the best new games I have played in years.

However, the exclusion of a 2-Player real-time versus mode is a crime and a huge oversight. It would of brought Trails HD up there with SF2, SMK, Tetris and Sensible Soccer etc. Why didn't they include it!!??

I loved Eddie Kidd's Jump Challenge.

[Khan]

Every man and his dog whines about 1200 point games. I don't think there has been a single game released at 1200 points that people haven't complained about.

actually i dont ever remember anyone whining about ssf2hdremix being 1200 me personally havent whined about a single game that is 1200 until now, maybe im not as easily pleased as some of you or maybe I expect too much by your standards that is my opinion im sorry you dont agree with it but thats just the way it is.

I personally dont believe trials is worth 1200 points, time attack mode for replayability? oh come on man they could have done better than that for robbing me of 1200 points.

Battlefield 1943, Super street fighter 2 HD remix, MVC2, are all 1200 points but I can guarantee they will outlast trials in the replay value.

Robbery! I say! Heh.

We're not talking fifty bucks for a game with four short tracks and a level editor. We're talking 10-15 for a game that has no pretensions about what it is. It's a time trials game where you go for speed and perfection. ...and theres a level editor. This is a very odd argument on a shmups forum.

Its the recession buddy £10 goes a long way in my house :p if i wanted a cheap thrill ill pop down my local brothel and get me a blow job for a tenna it'll probably last longer than this game's and its community as I said before id rather spend the £10 on a game I'll still be playing which has the option for me to trade in and earn cash back in the long run.

I'm personally going to save my points if it goes on a deal of the week or becomes 800 points again maybe ill buy it then till then

no thank you!

[dcharlie]

Kickstart II was one of my favourite Spectrum games, so it goes without saying that I snapped this one up.

yeah, game feels like a Kickstart / Motocross Maniac hybrid - tracks tend to be more Motorcross Maniac but game play feels more like Kickstart and is more geared towards clearance times than style (which i'm glad for really, suits the trial nature of the game), though the mini games do provide a nice set of variants.

seen a few review sites mention Excite Bike, but other the two game both having bikes and ramps i don't see the comparison at all.

as JJ said, two player local would have been great, certain would have given the game even more of a Kickstart/2 feel. But i'm guessing shovelling in split screen with what is a fairly decent engine (+ physics calcs) was probably too much of a strain. Maybe in Trials HD 2 (getting all confusing now - Trials 2 on PC, Trails HD on X360, web game etc..)

[Zaarock]

I cant imagine how multiplayer would work apart from taking turns: if the two players were on the same physics plane they would collide which would uh, be stupid. If they were on different planes but raced across the same track (others as "ghosts") the physics objects that the tracks have would either have to be invisible/ghosts for the other player or the players would interact with the objects.

[dcharlie]

Doesnt need to be that complicated.

Same as kickstart would be fine, split scrren racing the same track seperately. Clock up the times cumulatively then declare a winner after X tracks.

However i think the issue is technical - engine ia possibly not optomised enough to handle two sets of independent physics calcs on (effectively) two tracks simultaneously

[JAPJAC]

It was called 'KIKSTART 2', no 'C' BTW.

If they could not of done a split screen VS mode due to technical limitations then fair enough.

That doesn't sound like fun (previous poster) at all, this is the way I would of gone:

I believe they could of done an on-line VS mode (single screen) where your opponent appeared as a ghost-like-bike, all in real time. If it can manage to indicate your mates times via the arrow at the top in real-time, then they could of done the former easily.

A great shame and something that a sequel or an update should put right hopefully.

[dcharlie]

It was called 'KIKSTART 2', no 'C' BTW.

thank you - i'm getting my Junior Kickstart and my Mastertronic mixed up.

I believe they could HAVE done an on-line VS mode (single screen) where your opponent appeared as a ghost-like-bike,

probably easy enough if done synconised, but then that's not addressing my original gripe (yours too? not sure (?)).
this gen has been a little too eager to ignore offline coop and vs play - having a ghost bike is fine, but the current set up dynamically changes the progress indicator to match against the ghosts of people who aren't even on line at that time - removing the need for a sync up and without rendering the bike on the track. so... i dunno... online sync up vs mode? okay, but not important. Current implementation is more than good enough

off line local would have been more important IMO - it addresses one of my on going concerns with this gen (i.e. online focused multi). Given your love for Sensi/other games locally etc. i'd assume you feel the same way? the tension of a true PHYSICAL head to head would have benifited the game, and that's what is missing from a lot of next gen titles. Online banter is good, but in room banter is still king for now.

anyways - that said, still a great game - with or without local versus. Simple controls, simple idea, excellent execution, fairly decent looking, cheap. Not much to complain about really - but enough ideas to make the next edition worth while

(tech stuff removed)

again to reiterate, in an ideal world the game would have full split screen racing with the tension of seeing your opponents time and the overal cumulative time with it a battle over 5 tracks or so to rack up the tension. Hope it's possible, but we shall see.