A giant leap into the unknown

THE curse of the sequel, it seems, doesn't just afflict Hollywood. A successful video game franchise is just as likely to suffer the same fate.

Don't believe me? Just take a look at Tomb Raider. Other than a few visual niceties, the last instalment was pretty much the same formula as when Lara made her first tentative hop-skip-jump on Sega's late unlamented Saturn platform.

Hopefully, we can expect more from Lara Croft when she makes the transition to PS2 in a few months time.

The "what to do next?" problem afflicts sports simulations even more. After all, if gamers loved your sim first time around, why tinker? If it ain't broke don't fix it would seem to be the watch phrase at many codeshops these days.

All of which brings us neatly to Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2, a follow-up to the biggest selling bicycling game of all time. This time Dave has made the leap from PSOne to PS2 and the differences are considerable.

Not only do the visuals look a treat, but the pop-up problems that blighted the older game are now non existent. Now your BMX pro looks clean and crisp, his world is rendered sharply and background objects don't just pop into existence at the blink of an eye.

The detail is excellent, right down to the way your character's clothes fold and crease and the dust trails are kicked up by the tyres of your bike. Which is just as it should be given the PS2's advantages over its older brother.

Only the occasional slowdown serves as a reminder that this is a video game and not live TV. But there are other advances that are more subtle and require a modest investment in time and patience to unlock.

First up, the levels are huge, there's much more real estate to explore than before. Then there's the decent array of game modes (career/campaign etc) and, best of all, the multiplayer challenge where you and a mate duke it out on bikes. Wipeout mode is a great post-pub relaxation technique whereby you compete against a pal to perform the best crash. The animation on the characters' faces when they fall off is hilarious, albeit wince-inducing.

Other multiplayer modes include big air (performing tricks while soaring above the ground), longest manual grind and jump, best trick and stacks more.

Even better, if you do exhaust the game's eight massive levels there's a BMX Park Editor feature that allows for the creation of a brand new challenge.

BMX novices would have appreciated a tutorial mode, but the game remains accessible. After a short familiarisation period, I was performing death defying tricks with the best of them. As with all these titles, timing is everything. Hit the buttons in the right order and you'll be rewarded with stunts beyond the wildest dreams of those kids who practise for what seems like hours in a concrete pipe on your local sports ground. Of course, they probably own a copy too.

* YOU can win a copy of Dave Mirra's Freestyle BMX 2 by answering this easy question. Dave Mirra 2 is available for which games console? Answers to: Joanne Huggins, Burton's Byte Comp, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington DL1 1NF, by November 10.

MICROSOFT chose breathtaking cliff tops of Thole-Sur-Mer overlooking the Cte d'Azur to unveil its great white hope in the console war to the European games industry.

The Xbox will be available at retail outlets in 16 major European markets beginning on March 14, 2002 for an anticipated price of £299.

The majority of Xbox game titles are expected to be launched at £44.99. That will make them slightly more expensive than a PS2 game but prices are expected to shift downwards after the first six months.

Sony will likely respond with a new line-up of cut-price titles. It followed the same strategy when Nintendo launched the N64 and successfully cornered the market. A bullish Microsoft reckons it can shift 1.5 million Xbox consoles in Europe during its first three months.

Of course this means nothing without games. In total, there were 40 playable games at the Xbox launch party, with many more being announced for the first time or shown on video. Peter Molyneux of Lionhead Studios announced his second Xbox-exclusive game, BC, an exciting new title being developed by Lionhead satellite Intrepid Games.

In addition, Molyneux ran a demonstration of his previously under-wraps Xbox RPG, Project Ego, in which players control a character who ages from childhood to death, whose skin tans from the sunlight over time, and with graphics and gameplay that take advantage of many of the advanced capabilities of Xbox. Both titles will be published by Microsoft itself.

Other titles under development include Brute Force, a futuristic squad-based, tactical shooter played from a third person perspective and with stunning graphics, and Rallisport Challenge, a unique rally racing game with four different types of rally competition.

Tecmo showed off Dead or Alive 3 (complete with the obligatory heaving bosoms), Sega had GT 2002, Jet Set Radio Future and Gun Valkyrie. Football fans will be delighted to hear that the Collyer brothers are hard at work on Championship Manager: X Box for Eidos.

GIZMO OF THE WEEK

IF you love video games, it's a fair bet you can't get enough of science fiction movies. The Radio Times Guide To Science Fiction is one of the best one volume reference works ever.

A treasure trove of information, the bulk of the entries are references to films and television - more than 1,800 in fact. All the important movies are here (Star Wars, Star Trek, Metropolis etc etc) but so are the B-movies like Tarantula and Creature From The Black Lagoon and Star Crash.

In addition, there is a guide to 100 best sci-fi websites; a cross reference for directors, actors and writers; and a series of short essays on important people working within the genre.

If you like science fiction, you'll love this. Available from all good bookshops price £18.99.

Published: Saturday, October 27th, 2001