Namco have released Alpine Racer onto the AppStore. based on the original Arcade game, the iPhone edition sees you Ski and Snowboard down various slopes across both a story mode and a time attack mode.
There’s two control types, touch and tilt. I prefer the tilt, as I found the touch too easy. Graphics are nothing to shout about. While the character looks good, the environments are low poly, and the snow looks terrible. There are no particle effects and when you are at a standstill you can see that it is a badly tiled texture created to look like snow at speed. It’s not a good look! Having said that it does run pretty smoothly, and it’s not a terrible game, just a bit average. Especially when compared to 1080 or SSX, and even the latest Shaun White game on Wii.
If it does well, then hopefully we’ll see a more fleshed out sequel and other devs bring out the better snowboarding franchises. But for me I doubt I’ll see it on my home screen for much longer.
Alpine Racer is available now for $5.99 or there’s a lite version for free.
