more AKLM info May 15, 2002 - In its quest for placing another major stake in the prolifically growing extreme sports category, developer Z-Axis has created an entirely new game that is genuinely its best effort ever. Ever. Aggressive Inline is everything that the respectable Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2 promised to be, and everything it should have been, and it makes inline skating look like the kick-ass, mind-numbingly radical sport it truly is in real life.
And what's cool about Aggressive Inline is that it doesn't feel like Dave Mirra one bit. Aggressive Inline takes the formula made popular by NeverSoft (and not so coincidentally, Z-Axis) and puts it to the metal, creating a phenomenally huge, compelling skating game that boasts some of the largest levels ever seen in a game of its kind, a brisk 60 fps framerate, perfect controls, and a wacky sophomoric humor that sticks. It's the first inline skating game on the system and it's got a feel all its own. To date, Aggressive Inline stands as one of the most unique, innovative, and upstanding extreme sports games on PlayStation 2.
The Basics
In my humble opinion, Z-Axis has just blown the door off the extreme sports genre. Having toiled with Dave Mirra for years now, the Hayward, Ca-based developer has created a game that answers all of the right questions and delivers everything this kind of game should. I'm quite sure Aggressive Inline won't revolutionize the industry like Tony Hawk's Pro Skater did years ago, but it's upped the level of gameplay, graphics, and innovation in one shiny, tight package that's impossible to deny and that's hard to match.
Who cares about inline skating? If you don't now, you should take note. Using inline skates in place of a BMX bike or a skateboard, Aggressive Inline enables players to pull off all of the radical tricks and stunts you're used to in Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2 or Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, but skewed into an inline skating form, using terms such as Cess Slide, for instance, instead of fakie, and adding in entirely new moves no other game has.
*****
Graphics
Z-Axis appears to have nailed the graphics on this latest effort better than in any of its previous games. Using the idea of humongous environments that we first saw in Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2, Z-Axis then bumped up the framerate to 60, added a slew of colorful and varying textures, and then took a few extra steps above and beyond the call of duty, constructing several new components that, with the exception of SSX Tricky, visually blow Mirra and every other extreme game away altogether.
*****
Closing Comments
While Tony Hawk and SSX have ruled the PlayStation 2 roost, the time has come for a new challenger, and Aggressive Inline is ripped, buffed, and ready for the fight. Aggressive Inline is deep, layered, and dense with stuff to do, and it's backed up with an enormously dense set of lines on which to shred.
The control is top notch and the animations also come in with flying colors. To be honest, there isn't much to complain about in Aggressive Inline. The fact is, it's an impressive, enormous game that's as good as anything else out there in the extreme sports genre, which is the most surprising thing there is to say.
Though it shouldn't be. I've been following Z-Axis for some time now, ever since Thrasher: Skate or Die, and the company's efforts all seem to have culminated in this nearly perfect effort. You don't want to miss Aggressive Inline, it's just that good.
-- Douglass C. Perry |
