Fall from Grace – MX vs ATV Supercross Encore Review

<p>The series responsible for one of my favorite games of all-time&comma; <em>ATV Offroad Fury<&sol;em>&comma; races onto the next gen scene with <em>MX vs ATV Supercross Encore&comma;<&sol;em> developed by Rainbow Studios&period; The series has truly fallen from grace&comma; as I went into this title expecting to be disappointed&period; <em>Supercross Encore<&sol;em> is at best&comma; mediocre even with a surprising amount of content&comma; and at worst nearly unplayable because of its frustrating handling&period; With dated visuals and poor controls&comma; the future does not look bright for this once beloved series&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The game is split into various modes&colon; the standard Supercross&comma; Nationals&comma; Rhythm Racing&comma; and Waypoint&period; In Waypoint&comma; players are tasked with racing from point to point&&num;8211&semi;a mode seen in many games of the genre&period; This is similar to National races&comma; although the checkpoints are stripped away for a more traditional race setup&period; In Rhythm Racing&comma; players are tasked with landing on dirt ramps with the objective of carrying your momentum towards the next jump and the next successive landing&period; Chaining multiple landings creates the illusion of rhythm&comma; hence the name of the mode&period; The problem here lies within the controls&period; I fought tooth and nail to hit the apex of the oncoming hill I was rushing towards&comma; only for the game to deny me my safe landing&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 1280px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;11&sol;04113956&sol;tt&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1280" height&equals;"720" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;MX vs ATV Supercross&comma; Nordic Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>From an audio&sol;video perspective&comma; <em>Supercross Encore<&sol;em> looks immediately dated with stiff movements and dull textures&period; Pop-ins are regular fare&comma; and the color pallet is made up of bleak grays and worn out browns&period; While the soundtrack is decent&comma; it gets tiresome quickly&comma; and the poor vehicle sound effects don’t allow the player to be immersed in the experience&period; In terms of the UI and presentation&comma; menus can be navigated with ease&comma; though not without performance issues&semi; and the customization options are plentiful&comma; though a little light on avatar choices&period; I would have also liked to have seen more variety in vehicle parts as the exhaust and tires section&comma; for example&comma; have limited scope in choice&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Focusing on the gameplay &lpar;stiff and awkward controls aside&rpar;&comma; there’s a trick system available in <em>Supercross Encore&period; <&sol;em>Unfortunately&comma; its use is limited and doesn’t benefit the player&period; Once performed&comma; tricks don’t give you a boost or unlock content further down the line like completing trick challenges does&period; They are also frustrating to complete&comma; as sometimes I would land a trick successfully that the game would not register as complete&comma; my avatar consequently face down in the dirt as hundreds of fans watch&period; Additionally&comma; the handling seems to be random at times and I constantly struggled with the controls to perform certain moves&period; Thankfully&comma; the online play is stable&semi; lag in addition to the bad controls would have been a nightmare&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 1280px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;11&sol;04114011&sol;tr&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1280" height&equals;"720" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;MX vs ATV Supercross&comma; Nordic Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Despite THQ&&num;8217&semi;s bankruptcy and what was surely a messy affair getting this game onto other platforms with the help of publisher Nordic Games&comma; it doesn’t excuse the low level of quality that is present&period; Fans of the series are not going to be happy with the latest entry whether it&&num;8217&semi;s because of its overall lack of innovation and drop in quality from past games&comma; or its frustrating controls and poor visuals&period; <em>MX vs ATV Supercross Encore<&sol;em> is the lowest point in series history and could be the last&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><em><strong>A PS4 copy of MX vs ATV Supercross was provided by Nordic Games for the purpose of this review<&sol;strong><&sol;em><&sol;p>&NewLine;