Just picked up the mag and scanned em in...

I kept them as large images so the quality of the text is still readable. What you see below are thumbnails to the larger images since they're big. So click on each one to see the full scan.

Enjoy!

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- KotW -

Could you post them to NeoGaf? Would love to see the reaction there.

If it's not against the rules or something.


Edit: Huge thanks of course, gonna read it now. I'm gonna put up some edits along the way, I'm compiling info for the sticky post.

2nd Edit: lol rewind feature.

3rd Edit: 17 regions spread across the whole globe, each mountain ridable in all their 360º degrees of slopes, Stoked style. They're aiming for 70 open mountains.

4th: Vix can surely help with this, I can't read anything on the picture on the right side in the page with the earth photo. Regions confirmed so far: Siberia, Himalayas (split into two mountains it would seem, for now), Kilimanjaro, Siberia, Caucasus, The Alps.

Helicopter dropoff as expected.

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I've got my XBL friend's list nearly full so excuse me if I don't accept your FR. Currently I'm only playing on the Xbox 360.

Holy shit. Thanks Vix. I just read the whole thing. Pretty much the entire article talks about getting real mountain ranges into the game and what you have to do to survive them, even though they still talked about SSX being a 'fantasy'. Seems a little too realistic if you ask me. They didn't write about the characters at all but that's Elise we're looking at.

I don't care if someone wants to do that, there's nothing keeping someone there from linking to our files - remember that doing so will not bring people here though.

Although I doubt it, it might not out of the realm of possibility to get a C&D order from EGM telling us to take them down, and if they send us one, I will. I haven't yet, but Game Informer's been overreacting about people posting scans of their mag, and so it's in the realm of possibility. Just keep that in mind.


I know, I had the same reaction. It makes sense in that you COULD DIE AT ANY MOMENT on these mountains. I'm sure it'll be more necessary than WTF this time around, I'm not worried about it.


Yes - it all sounds so impressive. But remember, auto-generated mountains might have the major problem of lacking character, and also reading this makes me wonder just how we're going to track this for the scoreboard. How do you keep track of competitions where the tracks are different each and every time?

It also sounds like they'll have a Hot Pursuit type Wall for the new game - given how much you all rave about it, that's probably a good thing.

I'm going to nitpick this article later, but right now I thought I'd post to give my reactions to things.

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i have a neogaf account but i'm not actually sure if i can post with it.

baka, the part that says shred the mountain?

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edit: just checked, i can log in there but not post. i don't have a suitable e-mail addy to verify my account since they don't like aol or gmail or any free e-mail service. anyways, it's against their ToS to post the article: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=390708

here's the ssx thread though, page 23 since it's the last current page: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=415618&page=23

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- KotW -

Nitpicks:



Simple, didn't your focus testing tell you that better than 90% of your audience DOESN'T snowboard? You make the best game you can for the gaming general at large, not a perfect replica of the snowboarding experience. OT was all about "toning it down to fit in with current snowboard trends", and that flopped.



Didn't I tell you guys that the reason they picked the name "First Descent" was because it was the same name of that snowboarding MOVIE ON YOUTUBE? I told you guys - they don't really have an idea what would work based on past games, because they made their names on other games. So they are pulling stuff off youtube to fill in the huge lack of inspiration. It's right there in print!



This dismissing-the-old-games mentality doesn't bode well for keeping the spirit of the past games. When this sort of thing happens, directors/producers don't listen to fans and feel like what they are producing is the best thing ever. Not to say this game won't be fun, but expecting it to have any sort of connection to the old series' might be a dream.



Don't fall for this - SSX 3's "one mountain" had 15 tracks, with multiple paths. And more isn't always better - 70 bland, characterless, computer-generated mountains could be way worse than 1 well crafted, amazing mountain.


This is bad voodoo, man. They said when everyone was freaking out after the trailer debuted that they weren't abandoning the traditional race/trick model. "Don't be silly, this is an SSX game", they said. Now they're saying they're moving on past these things.


HE JUST COMPARED AN SSX GAME TO CALL OF DUTY. So do you all think that the SSX Modern Snowboarding comparisons are stupid now?

This article is very thorough - but it doesn't change my opinion that this game could be major fail if they don't deliver on the SSX franchise.

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I haven't even read it yet. I got home from the store, scanned it in, and then went outside to take down all the xmas stuff since we're expecting two more storms between tomorrow and monday or something...

but from what people have posted so far...

looks like we really might be getting ssx black ops now, eh? oye

and these 70+ mountains has me worried. it feels like they're going for quantity over quality at the moment...i know, still too early to tell but it has this ominous feel too it...

the same feel for the moving beyond traditional racing and tricks also has me worried. are we gona had wing suit races instead? or ice pick climbing races?

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everyone go to facebook and post your concerns.

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- KotW -

He compares it to that sort of game, where you could "die at any moment", lol. I'm sure it won't have guns, but I think it'll have a whole lot of track obstacles keeping you from just enjoying the sensation of snowboarding.


We'll see how it goes. My guess would be they will hopefully throw in some custom areas for you to really trick in, but it honestly sounds like they're letting the computer do most of the tracks without building anything custom.

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My observations/short summary...

They have "moved beyond the traditional racing and points-based trick competitions of earlier SSX titles". It will no longer be "jump in the air, hold some buttons that make you flip and spin around, and then land," because that is supposedly "a two-dimensional experience". Ramps and halfpipes will be "natural", and, the article hints, you can "actually die" (including freezing to death if caught by the shade in Alaska).

SSXDD will have "walls" that you can "use". There will be "continuity" between air and ground; minor errors can become bigger; a "minor mistake" may cause you to lose steering or momentum which will be hard to recover from. But not to worry, as you can recover from a bail/crash with...

A "rewind mechanic ... like Forza and Prince of Persia", i.e. TIME TRAVEL! (Also, the masked rider carries 4 melee weapons, ice axes, that could be taken from Prince of Persia.)

Around 70 mountains to explore... which appears to mean at least 70 courses/tracks. Gameplay modes include 9 "deadly descents" (where you can, presumably, die), each with an environmental danger (rock, ice, snow, fire, low oxygen, gravity, cold, darkness, wind); shred, where chopper drops flares to show the path you must follow.

Apparently you can no longer drop large distances and land just fine, unless you're wearing a wingsuit (google: wingsuit flying). I'm guessing there will be an "airtime bar", which when depleted will make you bail (or die?) when landing. A "wind meter" might be another HUD feature, as when playing golf videogames.

Different gear needed for each mountain; "limited inventory" will force you to choose gear wisely.

Graphics still looking a bit too "dark", but this can be fixed by just tinkering with hue/saturation.





This is not how I read it. They generate the tracks using an engine they wrote, which is fed topographical data, so they don't have to model them manually. The tracks are not going to be generated every time you play.

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Are you a patriot? Then spend 1 hour reading this site.

I'm actually okay with the idea of the algorythmic-identified mountains idea. From my read of the article, they looked at the features that the good SSX runs have had, and then identified parts of real world mountains with similar dynamics.

(I'm guessing they didn't take much from the features of Tokyo Megaplex.)

I'd at least be willing to wait and determine whether I like the end product when I buy the game.


What I can't stand is reading the developers' thoughts on the old SSX games. I liked the games because they're about jumping, spinning, pushing buttons for grabs, and landing. If that's a 2d experience for you....chances are you're doing it wrong.
(Did that bit about the walls make sense to anyone? Me neither.)

I don't want Trials HD on snow; I want SSX 3 HD.
I don't want to have to pick my character's gear 'loadout' to optimize my runs; I want to wear a fighter pilot's helmet and carry a sword because they look freakin' sweet. (Make no mistake, they're turning your gear into a CoD-like perks system. If you didn't like switching your board artwork in SSX Tricky for better stats, this is about 100x worse.)


I want to keep giving them the benefit of the doubt; why won't they let me?


EDIT: Are there even going to be an equivalent of grindable rails in this game?

Maybe not, but it sounds like the paths you take down the mountain may be. Maybe they'll narrow it down. Either way, it's gonna be a major challenge to track 70 different mountains this time around for the scoreboard, if that's even possible.

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We don't even know it - but our scoreboards here may ultimately be useless if the game supports them. We've had SSX titles with no leaderbords so far, that's why the scoreboards have been so great. But now we're kind of playing the waiting game to see how that component turns out. Hopefully in the end we can come up with something cool, depending of course on what the game delivers in terms of competition.

I already have an idea though. As for racing, we can first divide the scoreboard in regions, and then the mountains within that region. Then, the scoreboard positions would be measured in who got to the end of the mountain quicker. With 360 degrees of mountain, it seems like a nice challenge to find the best (and, hum... safest) line to the bottom.

And that would most likely be the easiest way to setup a scoreboard. Why?

Well, because there's probably gonna be hundreds of courses in this game. They're not randomly generated as far as I understood. Neither are the mountains. Mountains were scanned with that software, and in the game they were pretty much the same as what you'd find if you would go there. "A perfect [Mount Everest] replication" was sitting in front of them, as the journalist described. That means win terms of topography we're getting the real deal. But - they tried doing the same for Mount Blanc, but it was "utterly overwhelming". So they had the software scan for mountains which had "SSX traits" to them. The gaps, jumps, turns, lenght we are all so familiar with, they filtered everything and left it overnight to scan the entire planet Earth. They got 4,3 million mountains from that it seems. They chose the ones they wanted to ride the most for the game. They could've asked us if they got 4,3 million mountains. We could've chosen a few imo.

Then, they had artists sculpt the mountains they had chosen. We're getting the real topography, but the slopes are made by the artists with gameplay and probably graphics in mind. They can crush, build, split on top of the mountain's natural slopes. Think of it this way - SSX3's backcountry's were similar to a natural formation, yet, they were sculpted to fit the game play, and boy did they fit. That's what they're doing here. Taking a natural untouched mountain, and building on it SSX style.

We're gonna get the tracks from this build up. They won't be randomly generated from what I could read. But with 70 mountains, 360 degrees, and as little as 4 tracks per mountain - we'll be getting 280 tracks.

It seems to me we won't be getting crows stands and amazing fireworks, or those painting on corners, but we'll be probably getting something along the lines of The Throne, Ruthless and Happiness, but a little more touched up. A mix between normal and backcountry tracks.


Edit: The article says Winter 2011 release.

2nd Edit: Thanks for checking that out vix. I also have an account (with a NeoGaf-certified email, my college's) but they activate each one individually, and some never get through. Gondee could post at least the recap, I had a small one in the sticky. You may not be able to post the scans, but you can't be deprived from saying what was in there Or throw a link or something to here. I'd like to post a link to this thread on Gamespot for example but... Isn't that a ToU violation too? I mean I'm not linking directly but...

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I've got my XBL friend's list nearly full so excuse me if I don't accept your FR. Currently I'm only playing on the Xbox 360.

Well, if there's some way to track something in this game like they do online, we'll do it on our scoreboards. Because EA will be running these online scoreboards for SSX DD, and if there's on EA loves to do, it's shut down their scoreboards after a year or two.


You may be right about the non-random mountains, baka. But I don't think there's 4.3 million mountains, I think their software found 4.3 million paths down the 20-70 mountains they were looking at. Which tells me their software is picking almost everything as an SSX-type experience which means it might be waaay too generic across every mountain. So let's hope they're doing some tweaking of the setup to customize the experience for each mountain.

And I think your general way of sorting the scoreboard by mountains might be right on, depending on how they set it up. Because if they've specified, in game, certain runs you have to follow (possibly by this helicopter dropping flares) and they name the courses, we'll include that in the scoreboard as long as it it somewhat consistent to allow for similar scores.


I don't know if they're taking it quite so hands-on. I think they are possibly running through each mountain and streamlining them somehow, but I doubt they are adding in tons of little spots for us to tackle. My guess is they're gonna let the software tackle that.


I think it's going to be almost all backcountry - but with probably none of the personality of the backcountry of the original game. It'll be interesting to see. It's definitely not going to be your standard SSX game.


Yeah, I think so. I've heard early 2012 too, but there's no way EA is going to miss the Holiday season with an SSX game.


If you want me to I will. I am not going to post the screencaps though. Too much hassle I think. EDIT: Okay, that's done, I posted your review from the sticky, with a few additional blurbs about the Mountain Man thingie.

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So I guess you couldn't post the link to the thread (we'd get a lot of hits from it) unfortunately. Thanks though. The new info isn't anywhere yet, not even on EA forums, and I'm dying for some discussion.

About the Winter 2011 release... That's now ._. January-March. That's why I'm confused.

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I've got my XBL friend's list nearly full so excuse me if I don't accept your FR. Currently I'm only playing on the Xbox 360.

I just posted to Neogaf, I'm not gonna post to the thread. If someone should do that, fine, but I'm not attracting undue attention.


OH YEAH. I guess it is! Wow, okay, color me surprised.

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Likely release date is Nov-Dec 2011.

Why can't you post a link to this thread on that NeoGaf site? Or on Gamefags/Gamespot?

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Are you a patriot? Then spend 1 hour reading this site.

It's just strikes me as odd that a professional gaming journalist would make such a mistake.

Maybe he doesn't want the scans taken down. What happens in NeoGaf spreads around even faster than sites like Gamespot and IGN. EGM would take notice of the scans rather quickly.

Edit: By the way, the colors and such, remember thie images could easily be taken from snowstorms and cloudy conditions. Doesn't mean there won't be sun around I think. But expect a color palette in line with SSX3. That one was already much more natural and less vibrant compared to Tricky.

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I've got my XBL friend's list nearly full so excuse me if I don't accept your FR. Currently I'm only playing on the Xbox 360.

Who gives a shit? Upload them to imageshack and 10 other image hosting sites until it spreads.

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Are you a patriot? Then spend 1 hour reading this site.

Okay Neogaf, lol. My post just got deleted and the thread is closed. Not sure if that's an over-reaction, but whatever Neogaf.

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You just got your own thread! How nice NeoGaf! Edit: I think they do this with major news pieces. Old thread which was about the VGAs gets shut down, new thread rises about the info. There's also a EGM #244 topic there.

So is anyone spreading this or what? Gosh what an off-topic...

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I've got my XBL friend's list nearly full so excuse me if I don't accept your FR. Currently I'm only playing on the Xbox 360.

Havent read all the article yet but Im lovin the Elise artwork, I think the character is faithful to the previous games (except OT). I also think this game could be less about the tracks and more to do with the characters against each other which will help give that feeling of personality to the player that seemed to get lost in the later games.

Looking forward to it more

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| Click to reveal hidden content

I don't see why they had to do that - it wasn't THAT important but whatever.

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Okay, here's what I can see playing around in Photoshop with the mountain listings:

1. ??? in Northeast Canada
2. Alaska
3. Cascades?
4. Rockies
5. Andes x 2
6. Antarctica
7. Africa (Kilimanjaro)
8. Alps x 2
9. Slovenia?
10. Caucusus
11. Scandinavia
12. Himalayas x 3
13. Siberia
14. Japan x 3 (North - ???, South, Fuji)
15. New Zealand

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I used a magnifying glass to mess with it, did the best i could, heh...gondee's list with my edit's:

1. Baffin (Canada)
Thor
2. Alaska
Denali
3. Coastal Mtns
?
4. Rockies
?
5. Andes x 2
Aconcagua? and Patagonia
6. Antarctica
Vinson
7. Africa
Kilimanjaro
8. Alps x 2
The ? and Mont Blanc
9. Slovenia
Triglav
10. Caucasus
Elbrus
11. Scandinavia
Galdhøpiggen ?
12. Himalayas x 3
Everest, Nanga Parbat, and ?
13. Siberia
?
14. Japan x 2
Rishiri and Fiji
15. New Zealand
Aoraki?

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- KotW -

ugh...well kiss the old style goodbye~

it may end up being a good game, but no points?..no ubers?...ehh....im soooooooo bummed~

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